Lone Wolf by Adam Weymouth

Subtitled Walking the Faultlines of Europe (in the UK edition, which is the one I read, though not the one illustrated here), this book follows the author's journey across Europe in the footsteps of a male wolf. In 2011, a young wolf named Slavc set out from Slovenia, travelled for four months through the Alps, eventually arriving in Italy, near Verona, where he met a female wolf, named, perhaps predictably for Shakespeare fans, Juliet. Now there are over a hundred wolves in the area. 

Weymouth writes about the historical human persecution of wolves and the current resurgence of the population (the wolf population has increased by 1,000 percent since 1965) bringing the animal back into landscapes where it has been absent for decades (though its range is barely more than half what it was in 1800). He talks to farmers and hunters, and visits the Wolf Science Centre in Vienna, listening to people's mixed feelings about wolves and looking at other environmental issues including climate change and forest fires. 

Having not lived around wolves for so long, people are understandably nervous about the reappearance of predators that can eat their livestock, and without government support, it can be expensive to protect flocks against predation. People are reluctant to let nature take over: 

"...this is what we speak of when we speak of rewilding. Certainly we should manage the risks as best we can, but rewilding means that the wild gets a hand back in the game, with an agency all of its own"

As one of the farmers interviewed in the book says: "If you make the choice to work in nature, you can't complain about nature. Nature gives us all this and we must give something in return". 

This is a very readable, thought provoking book about our relationship with nature and 'the wilderness' centred on one species and the journey of one individual across a changing continent.  

Lone Wolf by Adam Weymouth, published (2025) by Penguin.  

 **

You may also be interested in my review of The Last Wolf by Jim Crumley.  

Red Raspberry Slime Mould

It really does pay to look closely at things! I noticed these little blobs of a pretty orange colour today on some dead wood. I thought it was probably a slime mould and took a photo and it is indeed a slime mould. I think it's Red Raspberry Slime, but I'm willing to be corrected if there are any slime mould experts reading this. 

 Shared with Nature Notes. 

A Small Copper Butterfly on Corstorphine Hill

 Yesterday we had a lovely walk around Corstorphine Hill. One of the highlights was seeing this beautiful Small Copper butterfly, one of my favourites. These are really tiny butterflies with gorgeous colours and markings. They're not uncommon but they can be very elusive, partly because they're so small. This individual was very happy to be photographed, first posing on Ragwort, which is an important plant for many insects

then the butterfly moved to the thistles

We also saw a Speckled Wood 

Buzzards nest in this area, and two were flying above us (not that you can tell they're Buzzards in the photo below!) 

A Raven also flew over, but too quickly to be captured on camera! 

Shared with Nature Notes.  

A Walk at Cramond

 Earlier today we had a lovely walk along the Firth of Forth from Silverknowes to Cramond, passing Cramond island

 The walkway was very busy with lots of people walking, a few people cycling and a lot of dogs. The walk is quite quiet at this time of year in terms of birds, there are lots of gulls and crows but few waders, as they tend to gather here in autumn and winter. We were, however, very happy to see a large family group of Goldfinches, you can see them in the photo below, feeding on the thistle seeds, the adults have red faces, the youngsters lack red faces, and if you enlarge the photo and look very carefully you may be able to recognise the Goldfinch with a partially red face, that is almost (but not quite) an adult). 

For Nature Notes. 
 

Not all bees are social!

 When you think of bees, you probably think of honey bees and bumblebees, which are all social insects. However, not all bees are social, most bees in the UK in fact are solitary bees. Yesterday Crafty Green Boyfriend and I attended an excellent Introduction to Solitary Bees event, organised by TWIC (The Wildlife Information Centre). You can read more about it in this week's Substack post.

The photo below shows a female Hairy Footed Flower Bee, my favourite solitary bee! These bees can be seen in Edinburgh's Botanic Gardens in the Spring. 

 

Easter Craiglockart Hill and Craiglockart Pond

 Yesterday we had a lovely walk around Easter Craiglockart Hill and Craiglockart Pond. It's quite a steep hill so it's nice that there are a few benches at the top where you can sit and enjoy the views. 

It was lovely to see several patches of Harebells, such lovely, delicate flowers 

We then walked through the pleasant meadow / orchard area 
 

which is in the grounds of Craighouse, which has a long and interesting history, starting from Old Craig House which was built in the 16th Century, through the development of a clinic which later became part of Napier University and is now a housing development, though with plentiful green-space surrounding it. You can see most of the buildings in the photo below 

From there we walked to Craiglockart Pond  

which is next to a lovely wetland area, full of bulrushes and other plants

There are three superficially similar but different flowers growing here, Rosebay Willowherb

the closely related Hairy Willowherb (also known as Great Willowherb) 

and Purple Loosestrife 

Always a lovely area to walk round! 

 

 

Closing my Etsy shop

 It's many years now since I set up shop on Etsy. My first shop was called Crafty Green Poet and sold an eclectic mix of handmade items (mostly jewellery), vintage items and craft supplies. After a few years I decided to split the shop into two and about ten years ago set up Crafty Green Magpie as the shop for the vintage and supplies, Crafty Green Poet then solely selling handmade items. A few years after that, people stopped buying my handmade items - one of my biggest sellers had always been my handmade lanyards, which people totally stopped buying during the COVID lockdown when people stopped going into the office.... So I recombined the shops back into one and Crafty Green Magpie has since then been selling mostly vintage and supplies with the occasional handmade item. 

Anyway, I've decided it's now time to stop selling. My Crafty Green Magpie Etsy shop will close soon after Christmas. You can browse all the items here.