The first week of my OpWal adventure - spent in the small, rural village of Meșendorf. A perfect introduction to wildflower meadows, chasing butterflies and the catching of birds and bats.
27th June - Day 0 The journey begins. Or not, in this case. The alarm went off at 4:30 am. As I picked up my phone to silence the alarm, I blearily saw through sleep-filled eyes that I had a text from WizzAir. Blinking the words into focus, I read the message - Flight Cancelled. This had the effect that I was now fully awake and, after a slight panic, I re-booked for tomorrow morning and went back to bed. The journey began 24 hours later.
28th June - Day 1 The alarm went off at 4:15 am, no flight cancellation this time. The trip to, and journey through the airport were fairly smooth and my flight departed Luton airport on time. After passing through security and bag collection at Cluj airport I met the first few people joining me on this Romanian adventure. We were greeted by a driver from Fundatia Adept, holding an OpWal sign. He took us on a three-hour mini-bus drive through Transylvania to the city of Sighișoara. Here, we briefly met Zuni for the first time as he welcomed us to Romania. He'll be our camp manager - in charge and responsible for just about everything. Rather him than me. At this point the research assistants (RAs) whom I'd been sharing the journey with departed to spend their first night in a hotel, while the rest of us (the staff) transferred our bags from the minibus to a pickup truck and were driven the last 40 minutes to our campsite in Meșendorf. I spent the rest of the day getting to know the site and the people I'd be spending the next four weeks with. One of them, Tom, happens to be very good friends with my friend and colleague Tom Johnson. Ecology is a small world. The RAs arrive tomorrow, that's when the work begins.
Our campsite is situated within an orchard belonging to a local family. You enter through a large wooden gate into a courtyard that leads to a rough-cut lawn. To the immediate left and right are stone buildings where our hosts live and cook our meals. Further along on the left-hand side is the food/lecture hall, a sturdy timber-framed building with perspex windows and a few tables and chairs placed outside. On the right-hand side of the courtyard is a similar, but more open structure that makes for a nice shady spot. Our hosts are in the process of finishing this building, the plan being that it will act as an outdoor dance floor for when they host weddings. Beyond the cut lawn is the toilet and shower block, with three of each for both males and females. The men have only one warm shower, whilst the women have two. Hot showers may not exist at our other camps, so we've been told to enjoy this luxury whilst we have it. Having said that, a cold shower after a hot survey is one of life's simple pleasures, so I won't complain too much. Past the shower block is the orchard - a long field that gently slopes downhill for about fifty meters. Staff tents are at the top of the hill and the RA tents are all lined up at the bottom.
29th June - Day 2
An easy start to the day, with breakfast at eight followed by some training lectures from Zuni. After a couple of hours, Zuni headed back to Sighișoara (Sigi as it's more commonly referred to) to pick up the RAs. Whilst he did this the remaining staff and I went for an explore around the local area. Meșendorf is a small village, dominated by a church at the top of the hill, with a few houses and a small shop at the bottom of the hill. Our camp lies halfway between the two. The biodiversity on display in our short walk included enough species to excite naturalists of all persuasions, and had we been in the UK the location would have been inundated with twitchers, snatching a glimpse of some of the rare birds on display. Fortunately, we are not in the UK, and the birds and butterflies here are considerably less rare than they are back home.
The afternoon contained health and safety training where we were informed that the three big risks are heatstroke, lightning strikes and sheepdogs. It turns out that all three of these are most likely to be a problem for the butterfly surveys, as we'll be running around in sheep fields, during the hottest part of the day, whilst waving metal nets in the air. Nothing to worry about. The good news is that we'll always be joined on survey by a Romanian field assistant who will have a big stick to fend off dogs and pepper spray to use as a last resort if they get too close. These dogs roam in small packs to protect the flocks from bears. Supposedly they bark a lot but don't bite. I'm not willing to test that theory. If a bear gets too close then we have to hope that the pepper spray is enough.
This evening I went up the hill above the village on a bat survey led by Tom, with a couple of the other staff. We set up three mist nets and a harp trap as the sun went down, and then we waited. Our base was about twenty or thirty meters away from the nearest traps and every few minutes we did a loop of the nets to see if we'd caught anything. In between trap checking, we began to get to know each other and watched the Milky Way emerge in the night sky. We stayed out until midnight catching two Whiskered Bats (Myotis myst) in that time.
30th June - Day 3
The butterfly surveys begin today.
We have two routes to survey over the next week. The first transect (on the church side) is made up of high-quality meadows, whilst the second (the shop side) contains lower-quality meadows that are in the process of being cut for hay. Irrespective of quality, the meadows on both sides are a rich array of colours. As you walk through them the ground moves beneath each step, as if the earth itself is alive. Crickets and grasshoppers the size of frogs jump out of your way every time place your foot down. Whilst the lower level is filled with these Orthoptera, the air is filled with butterflies of a hundred species. The meadows spread out over undulating hills that are bounded by forests. The trees are managed for timber, so are smaller than I was expecting, but this is where the bears are to be found, and, if you know what you're looking for (which I don't) there's evidence of them everywhere. Footprints, scat and broken logs torn apart in search of insects are all signs of their presence. In the far distance, beyond the meadows and valley that Meșendorf is nestled within, are the hulking silhouettes of the Carpathian mountains. They looked formidable and frustratingly out of reach.
I took a group of six out into the meadows near camp, which involved a short walk through the village up a slightly inclining road. Now, usually, a short walk up a slight slope would pose no problem, however, a Europe-wide heatwave with temperatures in the mid-thirties tends to make even the simplest of walks more challenging. Despite the heat, we completed five transects along our route, which took us through beautiful meadows and woodland edges. The transects themselves only take five minutes and involve everyone standing in a line and walking 50 meters in one direction, recording all the butterfly species they see. I won't go into the methods here, but needless to say, they're fairly simple (apart from some of the species ID, which seems impossibly hard at this early stage of the trip). So in total, we were surveying for less than half an hour, but we were out for several hours. During the surveys, the RAs are encouraged to catch any butterflies they are unsure of the ID and then pop them in pots (urine sample pots - cost-effective and perfect for the job). These samples are then ID'd in the shade after the transect has been completed, which can take a long time. Walking between transects also takes time due to the heat. Historically, the heat has not been my friend, so I was taking no chances this time around. I was carrying enough water to float a small dingy in and ensured that we stopped in the shade regularly between transects.
Once we returned to camp I did very little for the rest of the afternoon, other than take a shower and sit in the shade. I did have to take a Skype meeting for a project I'm working on because even when you're in the middle of rural Transylvania deadlines are deadlines and academia is relentless. Just before the evening meal a group of us were taken out in the 4x4 to go and see the second transect route on the other side of the village. As we entered a street near the start of the route a group of dogs that had been lying in the road became fully alert and started barking at us and ran towards the car. These were not shepherds' dogs and very much did bite. Fortunately for us, we were in a car, but unfortunately for the car, the tires were fair game and a couple of the dogs started nipping at the wheels, whilst another tried jumping up at the window. The window was swiftly closed and we drove on, the dogs barking and biting all the way through their territory. I'll admit I was extremely concerned at the thought of walking down this road on survey tomorrow, however, it turned out that the reason for the drive wasn't to show us the route but to show us a suitable diversion that avoided the dogs. I was very relieved.
We were back to camp in time for dinner, after which it was data entry time, followed by bed. I've accidentally set my tent up on a slight slope, but there's not really anywhere else for it to go now so I'm stuck. I sleep with my head up the hill and wake up a few times in the night to find I've slid down to the bottom of my tent and have to shuffle my way back to the top without leaving my sleeping bag. There is a constant loud drone of the crickets, which isn't so bad as it's regular, so I can zone that out. The real issue that keeps everyone awake is the village dogs. One barks, which sets off another, which sets off another, and so on and on in a doggie domino effect. Most houses in the village have dogs and ours was no exception, with a huge but harmless former sheepdog called Max keeping watch over us. Sleep isn't great, but I'm usually so tired from being out all day in the heat that I drop off fairly quickly.
1st July - Day 4 Our hosts put on a fine spread for breakfast every morning, with a selection of meats, cheeses and bread that goes down very well with everyone. My digestive system, being the absolute bastard that it is, means that I start my days in a much plainer way, Romanian cornflakes, which taste like cardboard. The only upside to eating my bland bowl of cereal, whilst enviously looking on at everyone else's breakfast, is that the milk comes from the village and is delivered the night before and pasteurised overnight. It's deliciously rich and creamy and almost makes the cardboard ok.
I set out with a group of RAs at 9 am. This time we started at the other end of the transect that I'd done yesterday and walked it backwards. It turned out to be a great day of butterflying, with beautiful views of both a Green Hairstreak (Callophrys rubi) and a Purple Emperor (Apatura iris). At one stage a few rumbles of thunder were cause for concern, but we weren't far off camp by that point, so even if a storm did roll through the valley we wouldn't get caught out for too long. Back at camp we sat and waited for a storm that never broke. Although it didn't rain, the weather change did result in the air temperature dropping from too hot, to just quite hot. I expect that this will only be a temporary reprieve from the heat.
I went on another bat survey again after dinner, this time to the old church. The church itself is about 700 years old and was built to keep out the Mongols on their campaign into Europe. We set up three mist nets and the harp trap at strategic points on the ground, whilst Tom headed up the bell tower to place another mist net.
Shortly after dusk, we had our first bat. Or rather, bats. Five Brown Long Eared Bats (Plecotus auritus) all flew into the nets at around the same time. This suggests that there is a roost in the church somewhere and that these bats were all emerging to forage when they were caught. After this initial bat bonanza things calmed down, and the likelihood of catching more bats reduced. There would probably be more caught as they returned from foraging just before dawn, but for those of us staff who had come along to the survey for fun, the initial emergence was enough. We headed back to camp at around 11 p.m., leaving Tom with his group of RAs to tend the traps. I've no idea what time they'll get back tonight, but I doubt they'll get much sleep.
2nd July - Day 5
A very long, hot day up in the fields on the other side of the village today. It started off fairly cloudy as we left camp, but by the time we started the butterfly surveys the cloud had burned off and we were out in the blazing sun again. Dehydration is a constant worry, and as a result, I seem to be repeating the same few phrases over and over to the RAs, the most common by far being "drink something". For context, we were out for seven hours today and in that time I drank four litres of water and still felt dehydrated when we got back to camp. It really is very hot, did I mention that? There were fewer blue (Lycaenid) butterflies today, but Woodland Brown (Lopinga achine) and Large Copper (Lycaena dispar) were added to the ever-increasing species list.
We went via the small village shop on our return walk to camp. This was necessary to pick up vital supplies of ice-creams, none of which made it the 200m back to camp. In camp itself, I followed my usual routine of having a shower and finding a shady spot to relax. There's a radio that plays 24/7 in the shower block which varies from Romanian folk music in the mornings (which is pretty good) to generic pop in the afternoon, but only from around 2000-2010. Think Black Eyed Peas, Cheryl Cole etc. It's quite terrible.
After dinner, we set up a bright light in front of the lecture projector screen and waited for moths to arrive. This took some time, it being high summer and dusk not arriving until late. To pass the time we kicked a football around a small circle and we tried to explain the rules of cricket to an American RA. I don't think we made much progress on that front, but by the time we were done the moths started to arrive. From about 10 pm until we shut the bulb down at midnight, we had a steady stream of species landing on the screen. Some ID was done by the RAs, but it was all complicated by the fact that the guide to UK moths that we were using had only a fraction of the species we were finding. I cheated and used the ObsID app whilst pretending to be really good at moth ID. Everyone was very impressed until I was rumbled. We put the more spectacular moths in pots which are now in the fridge chilling overnight. I'll ID them before breakfast for people to take a look at and then release them. Two very cool, non-moth invertebrates also turned up during the night. The first of which was a mole-cricket (Gryllotalpa gryllotalpa), another one of those species that are super rare back home, but are all over the place here apparently. The second one caused a great deal of confusion as none of us knew what it was. It looked like a weird damselfly, and after some frantic googling, we determined it was an adult Ant Lion (Euroleon nostras). I've seen the larvae of these before, but never an adult, and never in Europe.
3rd July - Day 6 There is sickness in camp. Truth be told, there has been sickness in camp since we arrived, I've just not wanted to write about it. The first morning, prior to the RAs' arrival, one of the staff members tested positive for Covid. The person she shared a tent with the night before has now also tested positive and a few other people are showing flu-like symptoms. We'll see how things progress over the next few days.
On to more pleasant things. We were a little late starting our survey today as our field assistant had been on the botany survey yesterday and was feeling a little the worse for wear. A last-minute swap meant we went out with Christian instead and had a great day. All of the field assistants are studying or have studied conservation or environmental science at university and are keen to see as much as possible. Christian is possibly the keenest of the lot, so it was a lot of fun to head out with him. The actual surveys were quieter than I was expecting today, although we did still see two or three new species. Paul, an experienced bird ringer and long-term returning OpWal staff member, reckons we'll see something new every day of the trip. I think he's right. I'll be joining Paul in the morning for my first bird-ringing session. I see relatively few birds during my butterfly surveys, as most birds are sensible and sheltering from the heat. This is why I'm excited to go to the ringing session, even if it means no bats or moths tonight and a 5:30 am start. It should be worth it though.
4th July - Day 7 I have improved the cardboard cornflakes! We have local honey now and a generous spoonful of that makes them vastly more palatable. I've got ahead of myself though, I was out long before breakfast this morning.
The alarm went off at 5:30 am. Which was awful. Paul set the mist nets up at 5:45 am and by 6:15 am we had a few birds ready to be ringed. As we got to the net on the first check a Green Woodpecker (Picus viridis) and a Hawfinch (Coccothraustes coccothraustes) managed to untangle themselves and escape, but a good number of other birds remained. Throughout the session there were enough birds for everyone to hold and release one, mine was a red-backed shrike, an excellent bird.
Back to butterflies. It was a short day in the field and we were back by 1:00 pm. This gave me the whole afternoon to do absolutely nothing except enjoy my surroundings. It's a great place to do this, the views down and across the valley are beautiful and the wildlife that turns up in camp is pretty special.
After dinner, I was invited to go on "Adventure Time". This involves getting in a car and driving to a spot where large mammals have recently been spotted. It was a slightly surreal experience as we parked up and stood at the edge of a busy road and scanned the adjacent fields for large mammals whilst huge HGVs hurtled past. In the first hour, we only saw Roe Deer (Capreolus capreolus), but eventually, we spotted a Red Deer (Cervus elaphus), a species that generates more excitement among Romanians than any other apparently. Just before we left we were lucky enough to see the family of Wild Boar (Sus scrofa) that we had specifically driven to the location for. There were about eleven of them in total made up of females and piglets. The light was failing as we saw them, so it wasn't the greatest of views, but having never seen them before it was still an amazing experience. Cars rumbling by and all.
Zuni had set the moth trap up whilst I'd been out and we had another great night seeing what turned up. It's a great way to do the moth trapping. We could set up a standard trap, leave it overnight and do all the ID in the morning, but it's far more enjoyable for everyone to see the moths arrive and try to ID them in situ. Also, I think I'd probably have a mental breakdown if we set up a standard trap, because if the moth abundance is anything like the butterfly abundance I'd have about a thousand moths to ID before breakfast.
5th July - Day 8 Word on the grapevine is that honey milk is a thing. I will investigate tomorrow. Anyway, I was up at 5:30 am again, but no early morning has ever been more worth it than today. Paul and Madalina had already caught a Green Woodpecker (which looked huge in the hand) before we arrived. We then watched as they extracted 27 Tree Sparrows (Passer montanus) from the mist net. They had caught and ringed a flock of tree sparrows here yesterday as well, and only one of this morning's wore a ring, meaning the other 26 hadn't been caught before. Now, if GCSE biology mark-release-recapture is anything to go by that means that there are 900 sparrows in the bush by the mist net (total marked birds in second sample/total in second sample = total in first sample/total population). This is, of course, a very bad estimate. Catching two ringed birds halves our sparrow population to 450, three drops it to 300 etc. It only works with large numbers really. I've got distracted. Back to the birds.
In the second net check, we had a Hawfinch. We also saw a Hoopoe (Upupa epops) and a Golden Oriel (Oriolus oriolus). This means that I just have to see a Bee Eater (Merops apiaster) to complete my list of birds that I was desperate to see in Romania (although I expect that list will grow rather than shrink). We also caught a Marsh Tit (Poecile palustris), a Yellowhammer (Emberiza citrinella) and a Red-backed Shrike (Lanius collurio), along with a flyby from a Lesser Spotted Woodpecker (Dryobates minor).
After breakfast I set out butterflying with just a field assistant, Laura, and no RAs as they were on other surveys. I was over-ambitious and hoped to complete nine surveys today, meaning that we would have done all of the transects twice, but after six surveys I started to feel rubbish so we came back to camp, where Zuni said he wasn't surprised we didn't make all nine. I'm writing this entry from the cool room, inside one of the stone buildings we're not normally allowed in, eating crisps and sweets, and drinking a lot. The temperature has been low to mid-thirties all week whilst I've been out surveying and I've been pleasantly surprised that I've made it this far without crashing. The four litres of water, long sleeve shirt, wide-brim hat and sunglasses I constantly wear probably have something to do with it. I won't have a tan when I get back, but if I can avoid heatstroke I'm happy to make that trade. I've coped better than some of the RAs, but in their defence, I get more sleep than they do with their schedules.
Our last night in Meșendorf turned out to be an interesting one. Our hosts organised a BBQ for us, with an ample supply of beers and their homemade wine, which it turns out, is lethal. Their two sons gave us a demonstration of traditional Romanian folk dancing, after which a party broke out where the drink flowed and the music played. As things were kicking off I received a text from Paul saying they had just caught a Wryneck (Jynx torquilla) in a mist net. I snuck away from the party and had a really enjoyable time helping to process another flock of tree sparrows. This involved identifying, sexing, ageing and weighing the birds, popping a ring on their leg and then releasing them. Paul supervised me in ringing one. I've held birds in the hand before, but I'd never ringed one. This was a great moment for me. I rejoined the party a little later which had migrated to the campfire at the top of the orchard. The wine had only resulted in one casualty so far - an American RA who was legally old enough to drink in Romania but not at home. I expect there would be more than one sore head in the morning though. An ample supply of carbs had turned up though, as our hosts, perhaps knowing people would need something to soak up the alcohol, had provided a whole trough of homemade doughnuts. These, like everything else provided by our hosts, were fantastic. This was a great end to an amazing first week. Tomorrow we move villages, but Meșendorf will take some beating.