I started my blog just after new year. I'd made a resolution to get out and enjoy nature more and decided that a photo blog would help motivate me. There's a new picture posted every day so that really makes me get away from the desk and take more photos. But most importantly it makes me get outside and enjoy the sights, sounds, smells and tastes of nature.
I'm lucky - I really enjoy my job, working in nature conservation. But I'm stuck behind a desk most days and with two small boys at home there's no time to go on big trips up north to see 'big' nature. So I enjoy the nature I find around me, in our garden, on the way to work, in the parks and cyclepaths around the office. There's a lot of beauty in small things.
I've picked out two of my favourite photos - the first one (above) is a really common spider that I watched building a web in our back garden in Portobello. I was fascinated by the precision, millions of years of instinct and evolution, expressed in a web that this spider built and re-built every couple of days. In the photo you can see the spider grab its silk with its rear leg to hook onto the rest of the web.
My second favourite is a very common moss that grows on walls everywhere - but its still beautiful and fascinating - the drooping capsules are full of spores that will grow to new mosses.
I also enjoy foraging, so many of the posts with wildflowers and trees will say if they're edible and how you can eat them. I've recently been making food with the invasive species Japanese knotweed! Foraging is another way of looking at nature - edible wild plants are everywhere once you start looking!
That's the key for me - just to get outside and look around. Nature is all around us, even in the heart of the city.
Check out the rest of Malcolm's work on Wild Edinburgh. Do you have a blog you would like us to feature? Please comment below or get in touch.
