Apparently half-term holidays are time for relaxation. Ha ha. I’ve been planning environmental enrichment activities for KS3 and have waded through one of the many bags of books that needed marking. Then there are all the jobs that we need to do on the smallholding such as planting winter greens and garlic. But being busy keeps my mind occupied and stops me focussing on the doom coming out of the UN Biodiversity Conference COP16.
Apparently “We have just five years to halt and reverse biodiversity loss and protect ecosystems essential to life.” I hate to be the bearer of bad news but that means it’s adults that need to act. We don’t have time to wait for teachers to empower kids to become changemakers. Let’s think of education as a rudimentary yet vital backup plan in case of utter failure by the people currently in power & politics.
Ash to ashes
We have our own biodiversity challenges on the smallholding. A large ash tree on the roadside was sadly infected with ash dieback. In winter storms weakened branches could have come down causing an accident, so a tree surgeon felled it safely. The Woodland Trust estimates the ash dieback fungus, which arrived in the UK around 30 years ago, will kill up to 80% of ash trees and will cost our economy around £15 billion. With 150 million mature trees likely to be lost the effects will be staggering, changing landscapes forever and threatening many species which rely on ash.
The sick tree has been chopped into large blocks, moved once and stacked, split into smaller logs, stacked again and is now stored for seasoning. We estimate we have around 4 years-worth of fuel for the wood burner. Even preparing the logs has made me warm at least 3 times already. The tree’s journey doesn’t end there, as wood ash can be added to the compost pile to enrich it in potassium, nitrogen, and phosphorus.
Both ash dieback and Dutch elm disease probably originated from the importation of infected saplings. A little like human-borne pandemics, international movement of biological organisms always comes with the risk of wider infection and death. Humans started learning about this around 1520 when smallpox is believed to have arrived in the Americas on a Spanish ship. The disease spread rapidly, killing an estimated 90% of Native Americans. We seem to really struggle learning lessons from history, and carbon-emitting frequent fliers are dispersing new viruses all the time. Anyone for Mpox?
Family tree
Taking down trees is something we try not to do more than necessary. We’re keener on creating habitats. A decade ago, members of the family planted a native species tree each on the smallholding. Mine was a maple, Hubster chose an oak, our son a Scot’s pine and our daughter a holly. Then our wider family planted hazels, rowans, aspens and spindle. Our family trees now form a small wood. Autumn is here and we have ombré shades of red, orange and yellow leaves crunching underfoot as we walk around.
Death and our ancestors
I might not have much free time, but this is the season to reflect back on our ancestors. We lit candles on the eve of the ancient Celtic festival of Samhain, which fell on the 1st of November, to welcome the spirits of our forebears into our home. In the past Celtic gods were given offerings of food and drink to ensure people and livestock survived the winter. The souls of dead kin were thought to revisit their homes, and a place was set at the table for the meal. Our ancestral family trees have deep roots reaching down underground and binding us to Earth.
Concerningly, Hubster nearly joined the recently departed when he moved a pile of wood chippings. The coughing fit that followed a couple of hours later was incredibly severe. We checked online (the joy of Web MD), and he’d given himself a case of ‘farmer’s lung’, induced by the inhalation of mould spores. Fortunately, I don’t have to put a candle out for him just yet as he’s recovering slowly. Smallholdings should come with a serious health warning as ours is likely to be the death of us.
Now our own kids have moved out, we don’t bother with the plastic-wrapped sugary ket (‘ket’ is a colloquial term for sweets) associated with modern Halloween activities and fortunately we are well away from any neighbours with children so are unlikely to get any trick or treaters. Goodness, I sound like a green grinch, but I am on holiday from school after all.
Eco Committee Assemble
In order to share the grim reality of the commercial nightmare that Halloween has become, the Eco Committee gave a whole school assembly. They presented some incredibly scary facts about Halloween in the UK last year: 7 million costumes were thrown out, 83% of outfits are made from non-recyclable, oil-based plastics that will be incinerated causing air pollution and more global warming, 22.2 million pumpkins were chucked away, and we spent over £1 billion worth of chocolate and sweets (that’s over £10 for every person aged 0-100).
The Eco Committee reassured the rest of the school that being green doesn’t mean they can’t have fun. They suggested swapping or creating costumes, making soup, cake or pie with the pumpkin flesh, handing out homemade treats or Fair-Trade chocolate and reusing materials for decorations. I didn’t tell the young change makers that their efforts are probably going to have little effect. The amount of plastic churned out to continue to support the oil industry is unfathomably going to increase from 500 million tonnes in 2023 to a projected 1 billion tons per year in 2050.
Individual action and collective action don’t seem to have any impact on slowing industrial-scale ecocide down in the horror show that is capitalism, let alone the fright of any mentions of ‘climate’ missing entirely in the budget.
School drama
Just before half term started, I walked past the hall and Mrs J the drama teacher was instructing a class of Year 7s to imagine they were trees; she’s hoping to find suitable support actors for the end of year performance of Macbeth.
The pupils formed a coppice with some very enthusiastic saplings swaying their arms in the air like branches and waving their fingers for the leaves, other shrubs, specifically Pupil L and his mates, were giggling and pretending to chop down their tree peers. Maybe he was making links to the lesson on deforestation he had last week.
Drama in the school lab
There was a bit of drama in the school lab too. I was demonstrating a dissection of a sheep’s lung as part of our topic on respiration systems with Year 9s. I showed them the trachea with its cartilage rings, and how the breathing tubes branch out to form the bronchus, bronchi, bronchioles and down to the tiny air sacs called alveoli.
We made links to gas exchange, respiratory infections, damage from smoking and my newfound knowledge on farmer’s lung. I was just showing how to inflate part of the lung when Pupil R, turned peculiarly green and fainted. He was fine but I ended the dissection there and then to get him back to a healthy shade of pink before calling his parents to collect him.
Knocking on wood
The thing about teachers who support sustainability initiatives in schools is that there is often only one teacher who leads almost all green initiatives. As there is so little about climate or sustainability in the curriculum it means much of what we do to enrich learning is added on to an already heavy work commitment. Recently a couple of organisations have been asking me to collaborate with them and there is some temptation to step away from teaching to branch out into consultancy. I’m having regular ‘should I stay or should I go now’ conflicting feelings.
I’m not sure when I became superstitious, but I often knock on wood. This may also date back to pagan times, when people still believed spirits lived in trees, and touching a tree would protect them from bad luck.
Floods a reminder of the death march humanity seems to be committed to
None of us can be sure of what our own future holds but the fatal flash floods in Valencia are a reminder of the death march humanity seems to be committed to. At least on the smallholding I have around 15 different types of trees I can repeatedly knock on and, just maybe, the tree spirits will give me luck with whatever lies ahead.
Note to self: Have a word with the HT about conkers. In my youth they were tied to a string and used to smash into your opponent’s conker. I’m not sure what the Year 8s were doing under the horse chestnut but I’m certain a few of them went home with conker-shaped bruises. We should really be planting the nuts to bring new life.
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