My Olivedale Garden
Saturday 1.01.2022
Well 2021 is over. I'd like to wish everyone, iNaturalist and nature in general a wonderful 2022. We can always hope it will be better than 2021.
My retirement coincided with the first hard lockdown in South Africa at the end of March 2020. I have survived four waves of covid. I've stayed very close to home and so my garden and iNaturalist has been a godsend. In 2021 I only had one trip to the Walter Sisulu Botanic Garden and one to Norscot Koppies, a small local reserve.
My year on iNat: https://www.inaturalist.org/stats/2021/doug263
Of my 792 observations, 705 have been in my garden; 282 species. And I am still finding new things to see and learn about.
That's probably miniscule compared with 20 or 30 years ago but one has to work with what one has. I have learnt a huge amount in the past 18 months and wish to thank everybody who contributed to identifications of my observations.
I thought about highlights for 2021 but very new thing I see and every new thing I learn is a highlight so I'll just leave it at that.
I was sad to hear of the death of EO Wilson. I read his book Half Earth and was very interested in his work in Gorongosa National Park in Mozambique.
Weatherwise I recorded 952.4 mm of rain for the calendar year 2021 versus 981.6 mm for 2020. That's not bad for the highveld but some areas of the country still battle with drought.
So forward into 2022 and the challenges it will present.
