The Dark and the Light held them.

The torch is but a distraction from being in the moment. It allows us to move into our heads, unable to see beyond the light in our eyes, causing us to stay in the tunnel that is the beam, this place of false security, which prevents us from venturing outside of the artificial light and into another world long forgotten.

The Dark and the Light command us to pay attention to our sense of place through our awareness of all things, from the rustle of the spider moving through the undergrowth to the blinking of an owl’s eye hidden in the foliage of the tree nearby. We need these things in order to help us understand our sense of community with Mother Earth.

"Do we need torches"? She asked one night as we were about to take the children up into the woods to build a fire under the cover of darkness. I answered "no, if we give them torches they will be off into the woods and we will have trouble keeping them together, the best way is to allow nature do the work for us, with their help".

So, off we set into the darkness, they followed each other in single file, some holding onto the person in front because they did not want to be separated from each other in the dark and in the woods. Once we reached the place we were going too, they set about building a fire in the darkness from the wood that had been collected earlier that day, there was about eight of them and the fire was built in no time. They had practised many times before in day light.

Out came the fire steel, it was struck several times, the char cloth caught the ember and held it ready to be transferred to the tinder bundle, blowing it into a reassuring flame it was transferred to the pile of wood that looked like a tepee, this was to be their fire. Up she roared, giant flames leaping two to three times the height of their heads, embers looking like firefly’s drifting off into the night air of the surrounding wood. Then out they came, the marshmallows, and as we sat warming them over the embers, the story telling began.

The fire had done its job; holding the children together while it listened to their tales and their laughter, keeping them safe and warm. Just as the darkness had done its job in keeping them together until they reach the safety of the camp fire.

Who needs torches when you have the Dark and the Light?

Golden Eagle or Whimbrel

Some years ago now I spent a week with my friend Jeremy Hasting who runs Islay Birding/Bushcraft on Islay. We lived in a cave along the coast were we shared story’s and experiences as well as exchanging ideas like Nature Awareness.

On the day of our return it soon became clear how relaxed we had become as a result of living out in the wilderness of Islay. We were birding on our return when I said to Jeremy I feel a Golden Eagle coming on and we both agreed that would round the week off very nicely. We were not disappointed a short while later we spotted a Golden Eagle.

Adopting the prone position we both spent some considerable time watching this magnificent bird when I heard what I first thought was a Curlew but turned out to be a Whimbrel. I decided to call out to it and almost immediately I got a response so I whistled to it again, once again it returned the call as it was moving from our front along to the right of our location.

Once more I called out with another whistled and sure enough the Whimbrel responded again this time I was aware that it had changed its course and was heading back towards us. The calling continued between the Whimbrel and myself and we could hear the Whimbrel getting closer the whole time my eyes were firmly fixed to my binoculars so as not to miss out on the rare opportunity of seeing a Golden Eagle.

As the Whimbrel got even closer I decided to look up from my binoculars just in time to see the Whimbrel gliding in just 3-4” directly over Jeremy’s head and then landing just out of arms reach from me. In all my years of bird watching never have I been so close to a Whimbrel as this, it was interesting that not even the bright coloured plastic bags that contained our sleeping bags even bothered it, it was clear to me that we were so relaxed and in a different state of being that the Whimbrel did not recognise us as humans.

I motioned to Jeremy to get the camera out to which he rightly replied this is not a camera moment. We spent some twenty minutes or more with the Whimbrel walking in and around us with just two brief moments were it very briefly alarmed and at one point lifted of the ground only to land again immediately, this I believe was because we had moved energetically from a heart space to a head space. Eventually we had to move on and I found it difficult to end such a truly magical moment.

Some months later I was running a course with Hannah from Natural Pathways during the introductions one of our clients said she had a question for me and I invited her to ask it. Her question to me was “Golden Eagle or Whimbrel” I immediately smiled a big smile and replied in a soft voice “without doubt Whimbrel”.

Since then this moment has become something that Jeremy and I pass between each other when we know someone is going to visit either one of us. Jeremy many thanks for being a part of that never to be reported once in Life time special moment.

Tracking with Asperger’s

1. Can people with Asperger’s make good trackers?
2. Is there a line of work were they can utilise their skills, if so what is it?
3. How do they see tracks on the ground?

These are all questions I feel that need to be explored and no doubt as the answers appear more and more questions will arise, great can’t wait.

I would like to share with you some tracking experiences I had while working with young men who presented with ADHD and Asperger’s.

It has been hope for some time now to be able to use tracking as a therapeutic intervention.

My first experience with Asperger’s was when I went tracking one day up to some sand dunes near to where I live with some young men and several adults, the idea for the day was to see how these young men would get on with tracking.

I asked one of my colleagues to go and hide anywhere in the dunes without us knowing where he went. After taking the boys through some basics off tracking, we set off to have some fun in locating my colleague who was hiding among the grass in the sand dunes. Being as we were tracking in sand it would prove not too difficult a medium to work with for the boys.

I asked my colleague to set up some critical points along the way, these where places where he would stop for a while to make a decision as to which direction to go in, he was instructed to move around a bit looking for the best way to go and I would use these points to ask the boys questions, for example "what happened here"?

As we followed the staff members trail, we came across an area of fouled tracks, and I could see his boot tracks in and out; however one of the boys could actually see the tracks in amongst all the other tracks. I could not see a thing a short while after leaving the foul tracks behind the same boy then said that we were no longer following the same boot print.

So we took a closer look at it, we measured it as we had already taken measurements from the first track with our tracking stick and sure enough and to my surprise, we were following a different person with the same tread on their boot as my colleagues and there was only a small difference in size.

How random is that.

We back tracked and the young man pointed to where he could see the real trail leading off to the right, we duly followed this and within moments we located the member of staff’s hiding place.

So how was he able to see tracks on the ground, where I could not?

Sometime after that day I came across a video on YouTube were a lady was explaining about autism in particular Asperger’s. She was saying that people with Asperger’s see in the same way horses do, in pictures and she gave an example of a cross.

If you will, picture a red cross that is made up of hundreds of tiny red crosses, where I would see just on big Red Cross someone with Asperger’s would see the hundreds of little red crosses. When I heard this suddenly it became clear to me how that young man was able to the tracks in the muddy foul tracked area. This got me thinking about other possibilities. Such as how can I expand my understanding and bring it to my work and encourage these young people to work with the skills they have rather than assume that they need our help all the time. In other words what can I learn from them?

Another time I was with a group of boys who were following a trail laid for them until they lost it. I encouraged them to spend time trying to work out what had happened and to see if they could pick up the trail again. What happened next for me was wonderful. These boys find it hard to stay still let alone focus on one thing and here they were, all three of them sat by a footprint for twenty minutes discussing what might have happened, working together by asking each other questions and getting each other to go off and check the mole hills and other soft soil areas for tracks that look the same as the track they were following.

They were in fact on the wrong track, but the value of letting them problem solve and work together far outweighed the task of tracking, which we were able to pick up latter anyway. That, for me was one of those magic moments in life.

Can people with Asperger’s make good trackers?

This I am not sure about yet as I would need to take them out more and set up exercises where I can measure the outcomes. However, I feel there is some potential here, and it may be that like us not everyone is suited to tracking.

Is there a line of work were they can utilise their skills, if so what is it?

I do not know the answer to this question but it is worth exploring, I do know however, in the case of these young men with more practise and encouragement from me, and for them to realised the potential in themselves and the value of what they are doing for one or two of them in their mature years the possibility may have been there. But they would have required more hands on from staff to encourage them in this field, is that realistic. Well if you want it bad enough then why not.

The Coopers Hawk says goodbye

At the end of our bird language course we were gathered around giving our feedback on the course and as often would happen on this course people would burst into song and dance… so today was no exception there was drumming and in between people shared their experiences of being on the course.

Then, we all became aware of a bird that had been elusive to most of us all week long, suddenly it was up and circling above our heads on a wonderful sunny day.

It was as if he had come to say goodbye to us all and to join in the musical celebrations as well. The bird was of course the Coopers Hawk.