Green Style

I have various styles of dress, depending on the occasion, but I always try to source my clothes in an environmentally responsible manner. I buy most of my clothes from second hand shops - Edinburgh has a great selection of stores selling used clothes to raise money for charity. This is a great way to recycle! Also charity shops in the UK are seeing an increase in custom during the current financial downturn as more people see second hand as a way of saving money (though admittedly some charity shops in Edinburgh are quite expensive when compared to discount retailers!). I always give my clothes back to second hand shops as well, unless they actually fall apart in which case I reuse the fabric to make a purse or something. I buy underwear from the Natural Catalogue, which sells nice organic cotton items. I buy shoes from the high street, good shoes that will last a while (though sometimes fashions mean that good shoes are hard to find!). My favourite pair of boots has lasted so far over five years (probably longer) and has been repaired three times. So whatever I'm wearing, whatever colour it is, it's sure to be green...

My Style for Sunday Scribblings
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Turnstones

dusk

turnstones scurry
grey white movement
against grey white pebbles

the shush of the sea

the skirr of stones
turned by probing beaks


Inspired largely by the lovely bird, the turnstone, which we saw on the coast at Oban, and partly by this post on obscure words on Write Anything

Poverty and the Environment

The theme of this year's Blog Action Day is Poverty. It used to be said that environmentalists didn't care about people. However, all the time it is becoming clearer that environmental issues are closely bound with poverty. In many countries poorer people are driven to destroy their environment, eg a need for farmland and firewood driving people to cut down forests, at the same time many environmental injustices are disproportionately borne by poorer people - eg in many richer countries including Scotland, toxic waste dumps are more likely to be located near poorer communities. Many issues connect the environment and poverty - eg biofuels made from maize and other food crops are accelerating rainforest destruction at the same time as causing food crises in several countries.

It is becoming clearer too that to ensure a future for the human race, we need to take better care of the natural environment. More and more charities and governmental agencies are now realising this. There are a lot of resources out there, but to start to find out more, why not browse some of these links (please note I've not read everything in the links and don't necessarily agree with everything said there, but they are good resources to start reading about the issues):

Oxfam Climate Change Resources
World Wildlife Fund pages on rural poverty and environmental degradation
UK Department for International Development Document on Poverty and Environment
United Nations Poverty and Environment Initiative
Poverty Environment Partnership

and if you only read two other Blog Action Day posts, make sure it's Melissa's over at Poet with a Day Job and Beth's at Fake Plastic Fish.

Seil Island

Seil Island is a small island off the west coast of Scotland, near Oban. it is reached from the mainland by the Atlantic Bridge, a terrifying single track hump backed bridge. It's a lovely place, we went for a long walk along the coast and there was a new wonderful view round every corner. The weather was perfect too, sunny and still. We saw some interesting lichens and fungi in the woods and plenty of birds too.

Kerrera

Kerrera is a small island just off the coast from Oban, on the west coast of Scotland. It's a very short ferry trip from the 'ferry port' on the mainland (see the first photo). The day we were there it was raining steadily but not too heavily and there was no wind and it was quite warm so it was okay! The scenery is stunning and we saw loads of birds, including herons, cormorants, black guillemots (in their winter plumage, not looking as spectacular as they do in summer as seen in the photos in the link), loads of blue tits and great tits, and a large number of goldfinches. When we were waiting for the boat back to Oban, we saw an otter, just poking its head out from the water then diving down and showing its tail then back again. Lovely sight. I've never seen an otter before, despite all our trips around the Highlands, Islands and West Coast of Scotland, so this was a very exciting moment, especially as it stayed round for a while. No photos, sorry, I was more interested in watching than snapping, though my partner is pretty sure that the otter can be seen somewhere in the second photo.

Loch Feochan, near Oban

Oban

We had a lovely time in Oban, a small town on the west coast of Scotland, in the middle of glorious countryside, a confusion of lochs, mountains and islands, all in muted autumnal shades at this time of year. We stayed at the lovely Thornloe Guest house, complete with sea views, good veggie breakfasts and two delightful rabbits, Bernard (the grey one at the front) and Hoppy.

The weather was very mixed, but we got out to explore the area whatever the weather. We saw a lot of wildlife, including red deer, red squirrels and an otter (which was very exciting as we've had so many holidays in the Highlands, islands and West Coast of Scotland and this was my first otter!) I'll post more in the next few days.