Do you carry a nature calendar around in your head? A checklist of reassuring events in the almanac of spring? The first sighting of a primrose, the soporific drone of an early queen bumblebee, a sudden burst of song from a hedge sparrow, maybe? I added another bookmark to mine in mid-March, when I glanced through the open bathroom window while cleaning my teeth and noticed snail toothmarks on the windowsill.
A garden snail, hungry after spending winter sealed in its shell under the eaves, had been reawakened by the arrival of mild, wet weather. On its way down, it had paused to rasp algae from the sill surface before slithering over the edge. A snail’s mouth is on the sole of its foot, convenient for snacking on the move. Its radula – a tongue coated in chitinous teeth – had left a telltale sawtooth pattern of pristine white arcs on grimy UPVC.
