Orange ladybirds and other things

I counted a total of 613 orange ladybirds hibernating in fence posts in Colinton Dell today. Before this week I'd only ever seen them in the metal fence posts by the steps up to Colinton Village, but Edinburgh Natural History Society (members of which are also counting the ladybirds when they see them!) had let me know there were also some in the wooden fence posts near the old railway tunnel, which is where I took these photos. I love how some of the ladybirds have found small cracks and indentations to hide in.

 The really odd thing is that I never see these ladybirds other when they're all gathered together like this!

I'm delighted to recently have had three four line poems published on Quatrain Fish : here, here and here!

and to have one of my robin photos included in the British Birdlovers Seasonal robin gallery (my robin is number 137 out of 138). 

Following on from yesterday's blog post about the Paris Climate Talks, here's an excellent paper from Local Futures about how localisation and system change could combat climate change. (I've now added this link to yesterday's post too).