Photoperiod, honeymoon and summer solstice, by Tomás Cortés
PHOTOPERIOD
Circadian rhythms in animals are important in determining both sleep patterns and eating patterns, as well as for the activity of hormonal axes, which time is essential to guess or intuit their behavior.
Now at the time of the summer solstice is when the days are longest, with more hours of sun, it starts to get hotter for longer, the ponds have not yet dried up but the streams no longer run and the banks of water the stagnant waters have, waiting for the sun to dry them slowly but gradually.
Can we really think that animals have the same behavior as during the rest of the year? Do we have it?
It is, for example, in the central hours when the land bears more temperature due to the little shadow cast by the sun, when the countryside becomes silent, dozes, rests, looking for breath, then some animals seek the coolness of the valleys of the shady areas protected by the shadows of the treetops, which, being dense in the form of a leaf cap, do offer a little shade in the rest of the field spaces.
In the same way that on the cold days of the winter solstice, when frosts are common, and the mountains are frozen, the animals look for the sunny days, it is at this time when the animals look for water and the coolness of the little green grass there is, of course it is found in springs, valleys, ponds and rivers.
The influence of the photoperiod
In the case of roe deer (1), it has been shown that a winter with few hours of sun affects the development of the antlers, making them poorer, because in the same way The hours of sun are necessary for the development of the antlers of our deer, having a great complicity and compatibility with the contribution of food from the field, I mean by this that both are two fundamental variables when it comes to the development of the animals.
According to a study by a doctorate from the University of Córdoba (which I have browsed above) focused on the influence of photoperiod in sheep, it tells us that the circadian rhythm of melatonin secretion translates the effects of photoperiod on the function of reproduction (2), but the regulation of the reproductive cycle throughout the year by the photoperiod is more complex than the stimulatory result of short days and the inhibitory effects of long days, the beginning of the sexual season occurs in the middle of of August.
In order not to dwell too much on this point, I will say that the sun causes the secretion of melatonin, but also when there is more solar incidence there are more points of melatonin production.
Well, it turns out that when the production of both melatonin and receptors begins to decrease, in the case of sheep, that is when the animals begin to become sexually active.
Everything works so that the calving season coincides with the maximum food production in the field
Curiously, the same thing happens to deer, fallow deer and mouflon with photoperiod, since they have their own time of maximum sexual peak in the months of September, October, November, yes, this period can be extended or reduced depending on multiple variables. All this so that the farrowing season coincides with the maximum feed production in the field, with the aim of raising the next generation.
How do the maximum hours of sunshine influence animal behaviour?
It is therefore this variable that most influences animal behavior, but then, in June, how do the maximum hours of sun influence in animal behavior?
Even at the risk of getting into a pool without water, I dare say that although it is true that big game species usually synchronize their births for the time of greatest abundance of food (this is spring), it is when summer is approaching when weaning marks the animals as there begins to be a greater food shortage, perhaps not all species, but of course a change in the diet is reduced because the lack of grass and an abundance of dry grass the mother does not it can produce neither the quantity nor the quality of milk necessary for the calf, which it will gradually withdraw from lactation.
In this way, the young will expand with grass, herbs and everything that produces the necessary energy for its development.
Deer finish forming their antlers
In the case of deer, it is at this time that their antlers finish forming, even with lint, due to the gradual appearance of testosterone, that shapes its horns, as well as the removal of green vegetable grass, turning to dry grass.
The green grass is still there, the tips are still rounded, the oil lamp can be seen in its incipient form, the litter is full with all its thickness, it can be said that it is in the process of growing.
There is only fifteen days difference between one photo and another, although without a doubt a significant development can be seen in those fifteen days.
The lamp has come out and the rods continue their rise in length, the luchaderas and contras become more astifinas.
Certainly in my modest knowledge it is the abundance of food that favors a greater development of the horns, although it is also true that the incidence of the photoperiod begins to mark the TEMPUS FUGIT of the growth of the rods.
The ideal time to establish the health of the population
As for pigs, it can be said that it is the ideal time to see them and where we can establish the health of the population, since we can judge how have the farrowing pens been for the pigs, now is the time when the herds come out of the bush with their playful young, flooding the mountains with noise and fights, it is true that many casualties are caused by foxes and birds of prey, but the farrowing has been good and shows us that the population will go 'in crescendo'.
In the photograph above it can be seen how, despite giving birth and lactation, the females have not undergone breeding as in other times, being fat and strong, ready to suffer the rigors of summer. With what is to be assumed, that thanks to a greater diet, the females will get more offspring, apart from being able to cover themselves again soon, thus increasing their progeny and leaving their genes in the following generations.
Definitely, it is in this month of longer days when we can extract more information from the forest for the future season, to balance populations and establish some sanitary measures for the sake of population well-being.
HONEYMOON photoperiod
Although I didn't want to talk about the moon because in the trilogy I already left characteristics, names, colors, its situation, I found it curious that the full moon in June is called the honeymoon.
Está demostrada la influencia de la luz sobre las gallinas ponedoras. So that in greater light, greater number of positions, and vice versa, this is an issue that industrialists know and stimulate or slow down the production of eggs based on market needs basically with the parameters of food and artificial light.
Well, this links to the moon at the point that, as there are more hours of light, the bees are more active in their flights collecting pollen to make their honey, thus being the time when they produce more honey, which which causes the full moon in June to be known as the honeymoon.
It seems that, since ancient times, this fact was associated with fertility. In Roman times, a vessel with mead was kept in the rooms of the newlyweds to increase fertility.
Certainly after the marriage rite we say that the honeymoon takes place, although at least I did not know the reason for that name.
Subsequently, the name of honeymoon was viral to call the holidays of the bride and groom that follow the marriage rite held.
For many couples they delayed their weddings to June to have fertility because with the hydromiel and conjuring the gods they would have (or so they thought) a major marriage and better offspring.
SUMMER SOLSTICE photoperiod
Summer solstice marks the longest day of the year, when day beats night by a landslide.
When the sun stays longer lighting the area of the Earth where we are (northern hemisphere).
Although the solstice is really on June 21, it is the 24th when the festivities of San Juan are celebrated with their well-known bonfires, whose pagan function is to give more strength to the sun so that it competes with the night, since from From that day on, the sun gradually loses its strength until it reaches its minimum point at the winter solstice.
Long, gradual, constant, hot days, in need of water, but still without a shortage of it, with food in abundance, but each time it feeds less, the ponds with the songs of frogs in abundance reveal their season, the young Some of the foxes commit the imprudence of the cubs, the birds of prey have hatched their eggs and the chicks are already making their first flights.
The birds that breed early are capable of taking out a second flock, many of the flying birds stay in the stomachs of genets, foxes, martens, minks, mongooses, wild boars, there are many hungry animals, the pigs search in the ponds any chicken, such as ducks, or coots, which are mercilessly shot, on land it is the young rabbits that form part of their protein diet.
How to Ride a motorcycle | Beginners Guide glamor bike all driving 2018: https://t.co/BUeH8RjL0M via @YouTube
— shimul bose Sun Apr 01 09:41:53 +0000 2018
The opportunistic wild boar takes advantage of the situation
In a study carried out in the Ebro delta, it was discovered that there were many remains of adult ducks in the stomach of wild boars, this is logical because that is when they change the feathers and then the duck cannot fly, with which they were able to maintain a larger litter due to their diet, endangering the ecosystem.
It is our opportunistic friend THE WILD BOAR who always takes advantage of this situation, when the season of famine begins and his behavior marks us a march from the depths of the mountain, to the banks and irrigated fields or orchards, since it is there where you can take advantage of food, but this begins from the solstice, with the heat of that time.
MY VACUUM DURING THE SOLSTICE photoperiod
Now as far as hunting is concerned, I confess that at this time of the year vacuoing drives me crazy, you know, hunting when the cattle and pigs come out of the Mount at night or, on the contrary, at dawn when the latter go to bed, after their campesadas in the pastures.
Vacueo is one of the practices that I like the most because it is natural and because you play from power to power with the pieces.
You have to guess their queresnces, their paths, the behavior they will have, the time they will come, camouflage yourself with the holm oaks, take off your air, not make noise, definitely for me this is to hunt in a cleaner way.
Vaqueo versus waiting photoperiod
a year ago talking to a friend (‘j’) veterinarian and very hunter emerged the following conversation:
–I have put four feeders that I attend and that I continue regularly and I usually have quite successful because they enter and some mato every year, - ‘J’ told me.
–Well, I don't put feeders, nor do I go to the baths, I like to hunt them at dawn in the steps they take to get into the mountains, I don't kill much, but I have a lot of fun.
All his reaction to my argument was to say that I was very old and that's why I killed little, now, fortunately, he wanted my friend to do this thing without realizing it, and since then his thoughts have been this respect changed.
He told me with a bright face, a smile on his face, he had managed to find out the path that led a good pig to his bed, the feeders were taken by the females with the kids while the male did not appear in the feeder, tired of not seeing him one of those times when he was in the field, he went to put himself like whoever doesn't want the thing in a bush tail a little rougher, more wrapped and more covered, thinking that "if I were a male I would go to bed." there".
He finished the cast with a navajero on the ground, but the rush that gave him the power cast and proving to outsmart the pig was incomparable. Since then he has simultaneous emptying with waiting.
Behavior of pigs on long days
Although the practice of herding deserves further development in a larger and more extensive text, in this part that I will touch on in passing, I am going to focus on the influence in the behavior of pigs on the longest days.
The nocturnal habits of wild boars are well known, which is why we look for them in the nocturnal world, but this is not an AXIOM, nor can we consider it as a maxim, it is during this time with more hours of sun when the wild boar has to start making longer paths from the bed to food or water, because in the mountains food becomes more difficult, drier, less nutritious, lacking in protein, unlike in the plains where the crops are still in the field, there is green in the unharvested cereal leaves, there is still clover and broadleaf grass, the banks have tadpoles, frogs, crabs, in the pasture they eat rabbits, chicks, in short, our omnivorous friends spend more time outdoors in the pasture than in the mountains.
Here I put a first deduction, since it has more distance to the food and drink points and since it lasts less night, the boar spends more time in the open. Therefore, our pigs do more daytime life than normal.
Pigs lying in the middle of the pasture photoperiod
It is at this time after I got up and when I think the dawn has passed, when many times I have found them retiring to the woods for hours he didn't even think they would be in open ground.
But what's more, something has happened to me more than a couple of times that I've found them lying down sleeping in the middle of the pasture with no other cover than the yellow and dry grass, which makes a tremendous contrast with the black of their fur .
It happened to me once, after finishing a morning vacuum due to the lateness of the hour, that when I was walking home lost in my thoughts, I suddenly saw a lump near an oak tree that from afar seemed like the club or vine of an old holm oak cut due to disease of 'the dry', as I got closer I saw something strange in the lump due to the concave shape, I hesitated so much because I thought it was a stone, a pity I did not have the camera Well, the print was worthy of a portrait, in the end, after coming out of my astonishment, I realized that it was a pig.
The 'chavalería', pigs and photoperiod scratches
Another case that happened to me was when I spent a week behind a big pig going to the cat flap in the mesh in the morning and at night, getting up early and staying up late, one of those times a wonderful event happened to me.
It turns out that, first, three or four females with their piglets passed through the cat flap, I was positioned maybe forty or fifty meters, just from the cat flap.
First, a female passed by as if making sure of the absence of danger on the other side, I remained motionless and with the right air, the darkness of the night grew bigger, minutes later the 'chavalería' came out, the pigs and scratches, playing With their squeals and fights, they broke the silence, from time to time the grunt of one of the sluts imposed silence while more scratches continued to come out of the cat flap, I didn't get to count them but I think there would be fifteen to twenty between scratches and red, sluts there would be about four.
Something magical and strange photoperiod
The sluts continued their way towards the mountain crossing the small col where the cat flap was located, the trail clear of traces marked the path to go to the ground, they continued straight and perpendicular to my position.
The fact is that the scratches were playing dispersing, to the point that one of them came to my feet, I suppose he would be surprised to know that it was that figure in the night.
Something as magical and strange as having a scratch within reach of my hand, the moment did not last long, thanks to a cluck of a slut sounding at that moment, calling her offspring to order.
I thought that if they snorted at me they would have screwed up my position, although also if they felt there was danger to their scratches they would have come after me (I have no doubt about that, they've already kicked me once).
Slowly the scratches, they went along the path that the mother had taken in the direction of the open pasture, which I did later in the direction of the farmhouse, since I could no longer see anything, in the absence of the moon.
Comforting Extremaduran photoperiod breakfast
When you go to bed at one at night and get up at half past five or six in the morning, without the possibility of recovering hours of siesta because you have other obligations to attend to , then, you have a lack of sleep, which makes you more irascible, genius, makes you make mistakes, changeable, furious, sad, but if on top of that effort you realize that it is useless, then that is when you get pissed off, thinking what you're doing wrong.
I was just saying if there was a bit of moonlight it would hold out a bit longer.
The rest of the days passed in this way until Sunday, when I had to leave to go back to work the next day. After another unsuccessful morning, I returned to the farmhouse to gather strength with an Extremaduran breakfast, baked bread made from oak wood from Alburquerque, acorn-fed Iberian ham from dehesa, which I own, and the famous tomato from Miajadas (European tomato capital). Let's go if that comforts!
With the demeanor of the photoperiod northern white-haired sluts
After making some arrangements, I decide to go around the cameras to check the cards, and that way I go up to the mountains with the car along the road perimeter.
I'm going around the area, the clock shows eleven forty-five minutes, I pass this week's cat flap where I get off and I don't see the footsteps of the big male, only those of the troop, I go back to get in the car, I pull the car a few meters ahead, perhaps ten, I attest that it was not more than ten meters, then I SEE HIM!
Big as a tame slut, round as a patent leather, with the bearing of northern white sluts, with water and mud slipping down its side from having gotten into a nearby pond, from having taken a mud bath five minutes before, being Aware of his strength, he walked away from the car at a dirty trot, without fear, luckily I had the rifle in the car, I had time to stop, apply the handbrake, take the rifle, raise a bullet, aim and fire a shot I finished him without suffering in any way.
The fact disconcerted me enormously, at twelve in the morning he bathed and instead of running away he walked around like the owner of that girl.
I identified (or at least I think so) the pig as the one who had injured two of the dogs I have in the farmhouse, but in addition to cutting both of them well. A border collie, and a boxer dog, who had me covered with knives, and that both dogs know what they are doing.
Another similar photoperiod encounter
Now at this time the walks at dawn last longer, last week on Saturday something similar happened to me, I left at dawn, after a couple of hours I am walking along another pasture fence, accompanied by a mix of boxer and presa canaria dog that has the body of an athlete, the strength in the oars of a blacksmith and the bite of a lion. Although I have not taught it to hunt, only cattle.
Gabriel y Galán already said it in his poem ‘El ganadero’.
"He has two bloodhounds
Wide-mouthed, well-toothed,
In case an empicada beef
It is unlawful in the meadow» photoperiod
As I was saying, we were returning home, the dog that throws its nose into the wind, but doesn't detect anything, walks a hundred meters ahead of me, I'm sure I won't see anything because of the time it is, I continue with the walking, the crisscrossed grass causes me a few stumbles so I look for the sidewalks through the grass.
'School fight' between the pig and the boxer
To my right a cattle fence marks the separation of a fence for cattle, then I SEE a pig looking for a pass, black as a brand of medium size, I hold the rifle to my face and put it in the scope, I observe it carefully, it is not big I estimate about two years, but I am so surprised to see it in broad daylight so exposed...
…When I stopped, the bitch looks for me and then she sees him, she goes after him, attacks him and the pig steps back, but only a few meters and he doesn't turn his back on the bitch, he ruffles his mane to appear bigger, then it is the pig, the one who attacks the bitch, she makes the same play, backs off without losing face, and attacks again barking at him, all this happens with the cattle mesh in between without touching it either of them, come on, what This is the case of school fights of "hold me down and I'll kill him" and the other one who fights does the same, they definitely measure their forces but nothing more.
Hunting the same pig three times
For my part, I point it a couple more times recreating myself in the viewfinder, it is undoubtedly a couple of years old, this should not be killed, you have to let them grow, it happens a couple of minutes and the pig goes somewhere else, I call the bitch to prevent her from following him.
When I get to the farm they ask me.
–Have you done anything? photoperiod
–Well, yes, I've killed a pig at least three times.
–How come you kill him three times?
–Yes, I'll explain, I had the rifle pointed at him but I shot him mentally, he was a brave and brave slut, and God willing we'll see each other another time.
