Impetuous April

I’ve often heard people say they miss the seasons whilst living in the tropics. To be honest, the only season I ever liked is summer – so living in an eternal one suited me just fine. But, now I’m experiencing it for the first time in almost a decade, I have to admit spring too has its charm. 

Describing spring makes one resort to clichés that don’t suit the sense of naïve wonder I feel looking at the tiny flowers suddenly sprouting up everywhere, battling up in unexpected places, between tiles on roads and in the sand of the dunes. Spring beauty is so fragile. The weather is still cold, and too early an abundance can be punished by night frosts. Still, spring sunshine has unexpected powers. When you find a spot that is sheltered from wind and showered by sun, you (and hereby I mean me, an extremely cold-hating person) can sit fairly comfortably outdoors. Until the tiniest of clouds obscures the sun and I need to rush back inside, to my electric blanket. And yes, I still wear my thermal underwear most days, in case you were wondering.

For April weather is extremely treacherous. It fools you into believing spring is here, so you take off all your layers and run outside, and minutes later will whip a hailstorm around your ears, laughing. There is a saying in Dutch ‘April doet wat hij wil’ (April does what it wants) and I've never seen that as clearly as this impetuous last month. I realise now why Dutch people always talk about the weather. There is so much to talk about. Also, my mood seems to be directly linked to the amount of sunshine I get to see in a day. That jar of synthetic vitamin D tablets only goes that far. On the upside, most trees still don’t have any leaves, so at least those scarce rays of sunshine don’t get blocked.

What makes spring in cooler climes so special is that everything happens at the same time. In the tropics birds nest year round, here a massive muddle of building action explodes in April. Spellbound, I stare at Mr and Mrs Blackbird going back and forth into the tree in the back of our garden with little twigs, for an hour. Mind you, we are still in a lockdown. It does not take a lot to excite me these days. 

A few weeks back an exuberant frog orgy exploded in our pond. Now this was proper excitement, to see these frogs do what we humans have not been allowed in ages. Dozens of them attended the party of the year, right in our garden, and for some of them, the tight embraces got so intense that they lost their lives in the kerfuffle. This week the first tadpoles emerged from the huge patch of frog spawn that resulted, and I have no idea how the tiny pond will be able to sustain this sudden invasion of thousands. I’m sure the herons are sending out invitations for their big party, happening soon, snacks are being prepared.

Spring beauty is not only fragile but fleeting. Soon after opening the cherry blossoms twirl from the trees again, like snow. The daffodils I planted lightened up our front garden for a few weeks but slowly wilt away already. I keep forgetting things I was supposed to do in this season, time goes so fast. Before you know it, summer will be there, then autumn and god forbid, winter again.

Which means we have to enjoy it while it lasts. I need to get up from behind my laptop, drag my kids from their screens and take them into the dunes. The sun is out, the air is fresh. Slowly, I am warming to this concept of seasons. As long as the sun shines.

Prickly cuteness

When I walk down the stairs, I see my son on his knees in the hallway, talking into his phone – a friend in Hong Kong on the other side. ‘There’s a porcupine in our house,’ my son exclaims. I grin as I skip down the last step. ‘Not a porcupine, a hedgehog,’ I correct him, turning around to his sister in the kitchen. ‘Did you let Rob out?’

In Singapore we had squirrels, flying lemurs, pangolins and pythons in our garden, amongst many, many other representatives of jungle wildlife. When we moved to the Netherlands, I worried about getting my fix of crazy creatures. Thankfully there are plenty around, perhaps less exotic, but not less cute. Next to our house is the Westduinpark, a nature reserve that sports Den Haag’s hedgehog shelter. Somehow I ended up volunteering there, and that is how Rob the blind hedgehog made his - albeit brief – appearance in our house.

Rob the blind hedgehog aka Houdini

Hedgehogs are nocturnal and don’t need much in the way of sight, so Rob’s biggest problem is that he cannot distinguish day from night. Wandering around in broad daylight is unsafe - many hedgehogs end up as roadkill. The plan was for Rob to live in our small enclosed garden, so we could observe him to see if he was fit for release. However, Rob aka Houdini had other plans. He came to us because he was stressed in his cage in the shelter and kept escaping, but that wasn't the end of it.

We pick him up in a small cardboard box. In our garden he spends half an hour crisscrossing around at high speed, bumping into people’s legs, like Sonic the Hedgehog on speed. We retreat inside, hoping on his own he will calm down. When we can’t see him anymore, I hope he’s settled down into the big heap of leaves I raked together especially for him. As a good hedgehog should, in the middle of the day. 

The quadruplets at the sanctuary

You can imagine my surprise when I walk out my front door and see Rob racing across the road, full speed ahead. Thankfully I can grab him quickly, and put him in a box inside whilst I call the hedgehog shelter to confer: what to do with mr. Houdini? Before I hang up, Rob has escaped again, long story short: that sunny afternoon we decide to drop Rob off in the woods at Clingendael. He stomps off happily into the bushes, as far from roads and people as we can manage. Where he hope he still lives.

Release into the garden

After more, finer wire has been installed, we are ready for the next lot. Spriet, Meneertje, Meisje and Hyacint are quadruplets that lost their mother and were brought into the shelter as tiny infants. They are healthy and grow well, but as hedgehogs hibernate, young ones that don’t reach a proper weight in time have poor chances to make it through winter. The siblings will hibernate in our garden, where we can fatten them up on a diet of cat food and cuddles (well, just the food. They are prickly, after all). If they do wake up hungry too soon, we can supplement their food so they can go back to sleep.

These little guys behave as hedgehogs should: sleep all day. In the evening we can see them roam around the garden, digging up the lawn and wolfing down the food we put out for them gratefully. 

Weighing time

Every few days we weigh them, and clean out their little pen – hedgehogs are messy animals that love to relieve themselves where they sleep and eat. But when they look at us with their beady eyes and pointy snout, we will forgive them all their sins. The weather is mild and they are still underweight, it will likely be a while before they start their long sleep. So in the meanwhile we can enjoy their company.

De Egelopvang Den Haag runs on volunteers and donations, if you can, do consider giving them some extra cash to help more of these amazing little creatures. More information can be found on their website: https://www.egelopvangdenhaag.nl

And here, just because I know you love them as much as we do: some more photos:

Domestic drama

Dinner is never a quiet event at our place, although this is normally due to our children’s lack of table manners, or their refusal to sit still and well, eat. But today we have another form of entertainment: a family of wild jungle fowl. 

Mother hen struts around the grass niftily, a clutch of three babies in close pursuit. It’s close to bedtime, and mother look up at the trees, searching for a good spot to roost. She spots a fine branch, takes off and flutters steadily to a high-up branch. Her three babies look after her with trepidation. Mummy went very high! After a minute of staring, number one flies up. Its little wings can’t reach quite as high as mum, and it lands on a dead palm leaf halfway. After some quiet deliberation, number two follows suit. It ends about a meter higher that the sibling, and perches on its higher branch triumphantly. Number three now can’t stay behind, and flies up, managing to come highest of all. But none of them is as high as mummy, and slowly they flap their way further up.

Suddenly, there is a rustle in the bushes and a fierce rooster appears. He flies up determinedly to where his wife is sitting, and a ruckus erupts, with leaves shaking and chicken shrieking. The flustered hen soon jumps down from the tree again and lands in the grass with a thump. The babies look down from there spots at different height, confused how to proceed. 

Dad comes down too, in hot pursuit of mother. He runs after her with his tail up high, and his wings slightly spread. Mother is in no mood for this, and runs off, her wings open too, her legs bent and her neck low. For a minute they chase each other in and out the bushes whilst their offspring looks down, showing their dismay with louder and louder discerning cheeps.

The first one decides to take action, and dives down from the tree. At this point, cat Snowy, who like us has been observing the scene from a distance, decides to get in on the action. Slowly she prowls towards the baby, prompting Linde to panic and rush over to save the baby. The chick decides to scramble, quickly clambers up the bushes, until it is safely out of reach. Linde too decides to cut her losses; barefooted as she is, she doesn’t dare follow into the wet bushes, where Snowy stares up longingly to the little fluffy snack.

The other two babies, still sitting up high, still cheeping noisily, now decide to come down too. Soon all three of them run around the grass, looking for mummy, who is still being chased around the bushes by dad.

Mother finishes off the kerfuffle with a big peck into dad’s tail. He settles down, slowing to a strolling pace, as if he never did anything more exciting this evening than a turn around the garden.

Snowy sticks her nose out from under the bushes, spying the three chicks in the middle of the grass. She attempts to stalk, but has counted out dad, who swiftly runs past her, scaring the little cat back to our table for a tumble with sister Pepper.

The family, reunited, leisurely strolls off to the other side of the garden, the three babies running their little feet off to keep up with their parents.

We sit and watch and enjoy. Who needs a television when you have a garden?

We're off to see the dragons: Komodo National Park

The evening before, I struggled to go to sleep for rain and wind battering the windows of our hotel room, and the first thing I did when I woke up was look out the window to the sea. There were layers of cotton wool clouds, some worrisome darkening in the corners by the mountains, but it was dry!

With our fingers firmly crossed, we took off to the harbour, and after only a little bit of waiting we set sail. The sea was slightly choppy, and the sky a tad overcast, not ideal for a day of snorkelling. But moping is not allowed on holidays, and we were excited to finally go and see the Komodo National Park. Much of the Park is sea, and our first day was dedicated to the wonderful world under the surface. First stop, Kanawa Island, where we snorkelled off the jetty, and just when we were putting on our fins, we saw the first wonder of the day floating just beneath us: two spiky lion fish. I literary dunked the camera under and snapped away. 

Lion fish at Kanawa Island

We did not see too much more, as the water was still choppy, and after lunch on the boat we proceeded for more snorkelling at Sebayur Kecil island. We saw many amazing fish, including the kid's favourite, the tomato fish, and many sea creatures. Roel and Jasmijn spotted one very rare being in the shape of a huge dark lump, somewhat like a finless dolphin. Guide Paul recons it can only have been a dugong, or sea cow, a very rare sighting indeed! It was gone too soon to snap a photo. 

Starfish

Tomato clownfish

The sea was very choppy, and landing on our Pirate Beach Camp for the night was adventurous, but we were elated to arrive in our slice of heaven for the night. The promised camping was more like glamping, with running water and electricity (which they managed to get going just after we showered the kids in the dark). The rough beach was perfect for play, collecting huge shells, or just relaxing.

Our trusty yacht

The next morning gleamed bright and blue, perfect for seeing more under the sea, first stop Batu Bolong. If you’d jump in an aquarium, you would not see this many fish, in all colours of the rainbow. We spotted a huge barracuda, as well as countless others, small and big, bright and dark. The coral was unspoilt and radiant. 

Next stop was Manta Point, and just when we were face to face with one of these gentle giants: the camera battery was flat! Nevertheless, the creatures were awe inspiring, and even though Jasmijn had been claiming she’d never swim with huge (they can reach up to 4 meters wide), scary creatures like this, she jumped in and did it. 

Lunch was at Mawan Island, where we climbed the hill for the most amazing view of the surrounding islands, in the now perfect sunny weather. We saw a very pretty blue spotted stingray here, as well as many little blue fish. 


Afterwards, we set sail to see the dragons!

Sisters

Boat bums

We had only been on the island a few minutes when the fist one, a smallish juvenile, casually strutted past. We saw many of the prehistoric looking giants around the ranger station, where they liked to lounge. 

Juvenile Komodo dragon at the ranger station

Our guides kept stressing that they don't feed the lizards, that they merely come for the great smells wafting from the ranger kitchen, but they seemed a bit too well-fed for us to believe that. Then again, with three small children in tow, I rather like my dragons with a full tummy. The guides were armed with sticks, to ward off wayward dragons, and the ones that we saw move, did so at a les than alarming pace, but still. Knowing a bite of these guys is lethal, unless you want to spend a month in hospital on IV antibiotics, is enough for that tinge of terror residing in a mothers stomach make you hold your breath, apart from using it occasionally to hiss 'stay behind the ranger' to your excitedly bouncing offspring. The bite of a Komodo dragon is not poisonous, but contains a nasty cocktail of bacteria that will slowly kill even a karbau, the large local buffalo. The patient dragon will follow a bitten buffalo around for days until eventually drops dead, and can be guzzled down. 

After admiring the lazy lizards at the ranger station we went for a walk around the island, which had amazing views, but not a dragon in sight. 

We're going on a lizard hunt 

Rinca Island views

When we were back on the boat it was time for the last stop of the day, sunset at Kalong Island, where (they say) a million flying foxes live. At sunset they wake up collectively, and start their nightly trek to Flores mainland to hunt their dinner. An amazing sight to behold!

Flying foxes at Kalong Island

Flying Foxes on their way to Flores

Then it was time for us too to head back to Flores, in the dark that quickly descended. Our adventure was almost over, and it was one we wil never forget!

The blobs

Linde was the first to point it out to me, ‘Mama, what is that?’

The yellowish blob was hanging on the edge of the pool, just above the surface, resembling a ball of construction foam – you know, the stuff you squirt from a can. I figured the builders left it there. When I pulled it off, and threw it in the garden, its soft squishiness surprised me. Maybe the chlorine water had rendered it so soft?

When we saw another one the next day, I pinched myself. Surely that had not been there before? I scraped it off carefully, and examined it more closely. On the inside of the spongy grey-yellow foam, there were little white balls. Some kind of eggs? It took a bit of effort on Google to figure out his was the egg mass of the four lined tree frog. 

In the evenings, when we were sipping our drinks by the poolside, we’d see the tree frogs come down from the surrounding trees, and host lustful pool parties. They hovered around the edges, croaking out to prospective mates loudly. Occasionally, we caught them in the act, ‘get a room, you two!’ 

The kids got used to our daily blobs, and we had to set rules, no throwing, and no putting them down your sister’s swimsuits. Once, we must have missed a blob, and the pool was full of tiny tadpoles. The children spend a morning painstakingly catching every single one with their hands, and collecting them in the pail where we were hatching some blobs already. We had tadpoles aplenty; we were now running a frog farm.  

 The tadpoles thrive on chye sim and spinach, and it did not take long before the first legs appeared. As soon as they could crawl, they would jump out of the pail, and join their friends in the trees. Worried about being inundated by tree frogs, we had to find a solution for our little swimmers. 

Since I found out that our hens loved snapping up these swimming wormlike creatures, I skim the pail regularly to avoid tadpole excesses. Extra protein is always good for our egg layers. 

We love our frogs, a friendly, albeit nocturnally noisy addition to our Adam Park Farm.

Mama’s got a gun

I am sitting behind my computer, typing away quietly, and he sneaks up on me. Sensing a dark shadow behind me, I turn around and gasp. He looks at me, his eyes piecing, a slight grin playing around his fierce pointy canines. I scream. I wave my arms. He shrugs, and retreats, casually. 

A few days later I walk into the living room from the bedroom hallway. He is sauntering halfway the living room, same spot, and looks annoyed that I interrupted his stroll to the kitchen. Caught in the act, he feels cornered, and looks around him. Which way to go, into the kitchen? Back the way he came, the patio doors? I’m blocking the back window as well as the hall to the bedrooms. He starts towards the kitchen, his favourite destination, where he knows we keep the food.

I shout, wave my hands, try to block him without aggravating. He would have no way out, all doors and windows in the kitchen are closed, because of him. All food is locked away. But worse, Indah might be in the kitchen, and when he feels the back-exit is blocked by me, he might get aggressive. I flap and sway my arms, shout, still trying to avoid looking into his eyes. Don’t go there! He gets the message and picks a quick exit via the patio instead. I breathe out again.

We have lived with macaques peacefully for years. We have enjoyed sitting on the patio, sipping or tea and Ribena, watching them weaving through the trees, some with babies clutching to their bellies. We watched them file by in a row, jumping a large palm leaf one at the time, waiting for it to slowly sway over, jumping off to the next tree, and the leaf swaying back to it’s original position, ready to pick up the next one in the monkey family train. 

We have learned to hide all food, even the toothpaste, and to lock the medicine cabinet securely. We chose to live in the jungle and we knew they lived there too. 

But this guy is different. I don’t trust him. And he, obviously, does not trust me. 

He is starting to treat not only the garden, but also the house as his home. And that is where I draw my line. 

Possibly this male, a large Alfa, I competing with us for space. Our house is comfortable and safe, and, as he knows well, full of nice food to steal and toothpaste to suck. We need to teach him who’s the boss. Another possible scenario is that, since this group contains two large males, our guy is in fact not Alfa, but Beta male, and he is being pushed out of the group. The recent monkey wars, where they fight high up in the trees, loud screeches resonating through the street, support this theory. Beta male will be aggressive, frustrated by being pushed out of his family group, and insecure as he will need to go out to start his own, in a world where territory is scarce. 

All perfectly natural behaviour for a monkey, but not a war I want battled out in my living room. 

Advice from a macaque specialist at Acres advices: macaque activated sprinklers (which I am sure the kids will love, just a bit too much), spraying chili or other foul substances on window sills (which, since they quite happily rip chili’s of our plants, I doubt the effectiveness of) or spraying/ splashing them with water. Show him who’s boss.

So. I went out and bought me the biggest super soaker I could find. And a small handgun for by my desk. Beware, you motherfucking monkeys. Mama’s got a gun. The battle is on!