The Weekly Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 3478 by Angharad Copyright© 2024/2025 Angharad

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This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
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Cate and I managed to identify most of the invertebrates we'd collected from the stream before she decided to do a swallow dive, at dinner, the rest thought it was hilarious and she eventually laughed too. Fortunately, she'd not got a mouthful of the water so it wasn't a swallow dive, as she didn't swallow, and only her dignity was offended. Danni and Sarah got together with me after dinner and the few remaining species I hadn't identified, foxed them as well. We set to going through the ID tables, which were in the books I'd accumulated over the years, some rather specialised texts published by the Freshwater Biological Association were now long out of print and if available, were almost collector's items. The one we were using was out of print when I got it, but the FBA did me a photo copy of it for a tenner, that was a few years ago. I happened to look at a copy of the original on a second hand books website and the price being advertised was £177. I suppose the market works on the basis that, the value of something is in reality determined by what someone else will pay for it, taking into account its rarity.

The book I'd looked at and we were using, was Dr Alan Savage's, Adults of the British Aquatic Hemiptera heteroptera. A key with ecological notes. Essentially it's a book about freshwater bugs, which is a term abused by many from the medical profession down. To an entomologist (those who study insects), bugs are insects which belong to the Order Hemiptera, placed into a couple of sub-orders, the Heteroptera and the Homoptera. These are based on their anatomy and usually the way they hold their wings, it becomes a little more complicated with wingless species, but I won't go there. Bugs are insects which have a rostrum or beak instead of mandibles, as in the chewing insects, and the rostrum is used to pierce the food item be that plant or another insect or sometimes larger animal like tadpoles or even small fish.

Some species can even pierce human skin and some of those are quite painful if they happen to you, I speak from experience, which as a twelve year old girl, was a particularly painful one which nearly put me off pond dipping altogether. My mother was sympathetic but tried to include some reality in her comforting me by saying that the bug, if it can see all of you, sees something a hundred times bigger than them, as far as they know catching them is a prelude to their being killed and possibly eaten, they can't escape if you're holding them unless they can distract you and cause you to release them. If they give you a nasty painful jab, you tend to let them go in case they do it again. It was a saucer bug Illyocoris cimicoides which I have treated with caution ever since. They aren't very big (12-15mm), but boy can they make your eyes water as you shake your hand about, well you can't suck it, if you've been handling things in pond water.

Notonecta the greater waterboatman/ backswimmer has an even nastier 'bite' but it is a bigger insect. Anyway, all the freshwater bugs are Heteroptera and that includes the surface dwelling ones as well as the submerged ones and the list of them is quite long, although some live in different geographical areas or prefer ponds or running water, lentic or lotic ,respectively.

During my researches for a series of lectures I'll be doing to first years on freshwater ecology, I came across the suggestion that backswimmers, swim upside down, showing their ventral or underside, is that they have a series of hairs and use them to store air, which they breathe, so that side of them is more buoyant. Several water species use the same system for carrying oxygen, which is called a plastron, but I don't think any swim on their back. Some of the beetles have one, but they swim right-side up. I also discovered that Notonecta emits kairomones, these are substances which warn potential prey, that they are about without any advantage to the predator. It has quite an effect on some small crustaceans commonly known as water fleas, who grow certain appendages to try and protect themselves. These are Daphnia which form part of the zooplankton in ponds and lakes or sheltered parts of rivers. A lot of dried aquarium fish food is made of Daphnia species which are cultured commercially. If there is such a thing as reincarnation, don't come back as a female water flea, when giving birth the babies erupt out of their mother's belly which dies in the act if not eaten by a fish or other predator. It really is a matter of life or death and survival of the better adapted.

The lesser waterboatmen Corixidae mainly, swim the right way up, and are largely vegetarian, but there are quite a few of them (40 species in the UK) and they can be a little difficult to identify, which was what we were all doing with my catch from the stream. It's all microscopic and fortunately I have a couple of microscopes at home, so we at least had a chance of identifying them correctly, but sadly. they were deceased by the time we'd finished, but we stored their bodies in some alcohol as specimens for future reference, so I like to think they didn't die in vain but taught us something.

Microscopic, just means you need a microscope to see the identifying features whether that be small micro-organisms, like Protozoans (Amoeba and friends) or things like reproductive organs in the bugs, some of which have to be dissected out to see clearly. This happens with quite a few insects, especially small flies. I'm no expert on Diptera although some of them have interesting larvae, especially some of the aquatic variety, things like mosquitoes and biting flies which are everybody's favourites (joke).

Getting back to the family, Cate had a biology test the next day, and she said she was going to tell the teacher her mum was a biology lecturer. I cautioned her against it, because if she did, she may be expected to do very well in her test. If she didn't, they may wonder why. She was old enough to see some consequences, to which boys are mostly blind, especially when their hormones are driving their actions. We sat for an hour after going through her coursework, with me trying to find likely subjects for a test and her looking bored at me. It seems the more you try to do for your kids, the less they think of you, in terms of gratitude or appreciation.

The level she is studying for GCSE, and the level at which I normally teach is quite a gap which I have to remember when talking to anyone but Tom, Danni and Sarah, it's so easy to talk over their heads and they look either spaced out or nod pretending to understand because you're their mum. I wonder if Brian Cox has this problem when explaining the ins and outs of particle physics, or are all his students like Trish and super-bright. It may sound disloyal, but I don't know any of our students in the first year could be described as bright, let alone, super-bright.

Tom had been whingeing about balancing budgets. I know it's bad enough at my level, so what his level is like, I hate to think. When he goes, I think I shall certainly do the same. I may be a super-professor, but it would be a scarier world out there without Tom backing me. That doesn't mean he does it all the time, or if he does I'm unaware of it, rather I like to think he's there if I need him and leave it at that, but his wise counsel has saved me several times, sometimes from myself or my relatively emotional volatility.

This time of year is a very busy time at university as they are dealing with clearing, with new students who achieved their required grades and previous years' students who might be with us for three or four more years, even longer if they go on to do post grad degrees.I and I know Daddy too, is always worried about them running up debt and having nothing to show for it, so we keep harping on about that they are here to work not just play and while some have never lived away from home before, we try to make sure they toe the line. We allow them up to half term or even the end of the semester to settle down and adjust themselves; university is harder work than school, you're expected to discipline yourself as no one will do it for you. I try to warn them if they survive three years but fail to get their degree, they'll have spent a lot of money, accumulated a big debt they still have to pay off and that's all they'll have plus they'll have wasted several years during which they may have qualified as a plumber or electrician and be earning a decent wage. Instead they'll have a very expensive experience and nothing else to show for it except the odd STD or pregnancy. I know some girls leave because they have become pregnant in each intake. Sometimes we can negotiate for them coming back after the baby is born but mostly they don't bother.

All courses have students who drop out, perhaps because it wasn't what they thought they wanted, or it was too difficult or they just wanted to fool about. They are supposed to be adult, but that is sometimes questionable for a sizeable tranche of students. I know it happens elsewhere as well so it isn't just us and a small failure rate shows we have things about right. Too may fail and the bar is set too high, too many pass and it could be too low. It gets easier with experience like most questions of judgment but it is a constant nagging at the back of your mind.

The trouble is, I want the kids to have a good time, enjoy themselves and get a reasonable degree, it is possible but most adolescents seem unable to understand the methodology of work hard, play hard, enjoy yourself without pickling your liver, picking up some horrible disease or becoming bankrupt. Be aware that in a city the size of Portsmouth there are plenty of predators who want your body or you money. It's a naval port with plenty of matelots ready to shag you, beat you up, or take all your money - then disappear. It has its share of hazards and risks, but then so do all places and in the general scheme of things, it's probably no worse than anywhere else. Oxbridge may allege it has better degrees, they are also more expensive and because there are so many students, there are loads of exploiters, nowhere is perfect, so look out for yourself and if things sound too good to be true, they probably are.

Diane was in her element bustling around doing half a dozen things at once, while struggled to plan my first-year freshwater ecology course. She brought me loads of tea, but kept interrupting me, just as my concentration had centred down on what I was trying to do. I locked the door of my office and took the phone of the hook but she rang my mobile number, which I didn't switch off because I wanted to be available to Danni or Sarah, Daddy, or those back at home or at the convent. They have been ill in the past and had the odd accident and I need to be able to look after them, they are legally my children, even if we have offered them on e-bay. So, as much as I'd like to be unobtainable, the reality of being so is more frightening than the dream.

Eventually, I managed a rough outline for my course, I'd take counsel from Danni, Sarah and Daddy after dinner and try to flesh it out a little. I also had to rewrite the speech I made to all our new students. I know I could use the same one again, and I do largely, but I also try to find some new jokes, which aren't too difficult for my staff to understand let alone new students, who are probably pure and simple, well, simple anyway.

David was collecting the school girls and I had given the two undergraduate offspring a lift in that morning, so once they appeared at my office I knew it was time to go home and start work again after dinner. I used to laugh at Daddy, who was always working, but I see things differently now - is that age, wisdom or just experience - one day I might be able to answer it.