Took the camera down to get some river shots to add to the doc which was rather refreshing. On my way down the road I also thought I could include the bones that the eagles incessantly drop and eat the marrow from the scattered remnants of old and sick goats that died on their last “paseo” across the vast Mijas mountain ranges.
I have never found out which are the ones that do such a thing, what a shot that would make! Many raptors do this: gaining access to the nutritious marrow which is often the only scraps left from an otherwise arid landscape. Also some scenes of a rather impressive algarroba tree.
By the time I got the river, it was still rather stifling hot at 6pm, so I rapped up with a couple of river scenes and did a piece to camera on solitary bees. Originally I was going to one on ants, but seeing that they moved around at an impossible speed, I decided an over-worked bee would be slightly easier but no less interesting. The poor insect clearly had seen better days, it had literally worked itself into this state, as a solitary worker bee.
Most people have the perception that these ancient insects are primarily social, however, over 90% are solitary bees! The females will find crevices and cracks to construct underground nests, where they will lay their eggs. The food provided to the offspring in the form of pollen and nectar (the only diet of the bee’s having evolved down a different dietary route from their carnivorous ancestors, wasps). This food is gathered, but after no care is given after laying the eggs- unlike in the social colonies. The three social groups include bumble bees, honey bees and the stingless bees. They all exhibit eusocial behaviour, that is, they show the highest level of organization of animal sociality, defined by cooperative brood care (including brood care of offspring from other individuals), overlapping generations within a colony of adults, and a division of labour into reproductive and non-reproductive groups. The division of labour creates specialized behavioural groups within an animal society which are sometimes called castes . Eusociality is distinguished from all other social systems because individuals of at least one caste usually lose the ability to perform at least one behaviour characteristic of individuals in another caste.
I noticed that the goat farmer had marked out all of his land with a pathetic little fence, and in doing so, taking a bit of our own land in the process. He was growing some rather withered looking melons and other unidentifiable crops. What a waste of land!
He had entirely destroyed the back of the river, along with it all the vital berry bushes and habitat for nesting birds such as the stunning Nightingale and ground nesting birds such as they grey partridge. I actually heard a partridge on my way back up, no luck in seeing it though. All in all, quite a fun experience and got some good footage to edit, it’s a wrap!