Crickets score 9 August, 2010

Returning to the UK after such a long time in Africa, Jane’s brother Dean thought we might need some tropical ambience when we came round to visit them. He bought two dozen African black crickets from a pet supply shop (I think they sell them as food for reptiles, rather than as pets) and had them chirruping away upstairs when we arrived. They were quite loud, but we didn’t notice them, a great illustration of how you can become so used to something that you fail to notice it any more.

We took the crickets home. As the children were fascinated by them, we created a little environment in a small aquarium, with egg boxes, a small cactus in an empty plastic pot and a few other things to amuse them. We searched websites to find out what harms them (dampness), what to feed them (orange slices, carrots and potatoes, as they dry out rather than going soggy) and what their life cycle is (short).

The ovipositor tracks are visible in the glass of sand

Within two days we noticed the females were burrowing into the soil around the cactus, poking their long ovipositors in as deeply as they could. These egg-laying tubes stick out behind the females, and help to distinguish them from the males, who are the only ones to rub their wing edges together to ‘sing’. Interesting, we thought, as we read that females could produce thousands of eggs which would hatch within days. We put in a glass of sand, the better to observe the laying process (see picture).

After several days of no baby crickets, we reasoned that the females were probably irradiated by the pet supply shop, to reduce competition. Good idea, we agreed, with some relief. Until, that is, either one of the females threw off the damage caused by irradiation, or our assumption was proven incorrect.

“Babies!” squealed Kira. “The crickets have had babies . . . and they are everywhere!”

And so they were. Unlike their heavier parents, baby crickets – about 2mm long – can climb the glass. They can get out the air vents. They can crawl and hop at speed and blend into the carpet. While their parents sit, docile and easily pleased under their egg boxes, their progeny set about exploring the wider environment with all the zeal of the younger generation.

Our experiment with crickets is now over, sad to say.

Air traffic control centre destroyed 9 August, 2010

The NATC centre is pulled down before our eyes

My rented apartment in West Drayton is in a complex of nicely-designed and laid out apartments in a thriving part of Uxbridge minutes from Heathrow Airport and a short cycle ride from Stockley Park, where I work. The Parkwest development is on part of the site of the former National Air Traffic Control Centre.

The view from my window sets pulses racing, at least among the builders and construction project managers who have come to visit (so far, one of each). I overlook the destruction of the rest of the NATC. It’s an unfortunate view in some ways, as the Parkwest site is otherwise very attractive.

A relative who once visited the NATC in its heyday assures me that it goes down as far as it reached up, at least three floors, and doubts that all the rubble being created here would fill up the holes below. Have they filled them with cement?  You can’t tell by looking, and it’s probably an arrestable offence to ask, as activities on the site were apparently covered by the Official Secrets Act.

My current plan is to try to take two or three photos a week, then build them up into a montage. Who knows, maybe the site developers would one day like to buy it as a record of their good work?

Exploding cucumbers 8 August, 2010

Here’s one of the things we’ll miss from Cyprus, and we only encountered it during its fruiting season just before we left the island.

Unexploded cucumber

Exploding cucumbers do what it says on the packet – as they ripen they build up a high pressure inside and, when lightly touched, the small, hairy cucumber-fruit bit pops violently.

Clearly a great strategy for distributing seeds, it also creates marvelous fun as adults and kids take turns to touch them, and hope not to get a faceful of sticky seeds.

Thanks, Maia, for introducing us to them in a monastery car park high over Oroklini!

For more on the exploding cucumber, here’s Wikimedia Commons’s entry on Ecballium elaterium.