Fleeing a storm? The clouds will point you in the right direction

Imagine you are looking out of the window and see three seagulls on a roof ridge. One side of the roof looks green, the other bright orange, and the birds are all looking out over the orange side. Which way is the wind blowing?

Tristan Gooley, a brilliant guide to the signs and wonders of the natural world, explains the solution. The birds are facing south, because the side of the roof that looks orange is covered in a common lichen called xanthoria, which loves sunshine. The northerly side is mossy. And birds will always face the wind so as not to ruffle their feathers.

Guidance: Clouds with an anvil-like top are storm clouds, ‘thunderheads’, and if a ‘finger’ of cloud is emerging from the anvil, they will point in the direction the storm is heading

If this sort of detailed reading of nature appeals, you’ll love this book. Gooley is excellent on the ‘language of plants’, and what they can tell us at a glance. Why are springtime catkins not nearly so beautiful as flowers? Because they’re generally wind-pollinated, and the wind doesn’t care about appearances. But pollinating insects such as bees like their flowers colourful and scented.

We all love birdsong, but it can be a vital aid to navigation too. If you’re in a dense, dark woodland, but suddenly hear a whitethroat, you must be approaching a clearing, probably full of brambles, the habitat of the whitethroat.

You may already know that a huge, towering cloud with an anvil-like top is a storm cloud, a ‘thunderhead’, but I never knew that if a ‘finger’ of cloud is emerging from the anvil, it will point in the direction the storm is heading – so you can avoid it. Useful if you’re traversing Dartmoor!

He also explains how you might navigate off the moor in thick, impenetrable fog. 

Any long grass you see will tend to flatten and bend according to the most recent wind, but shorter grass bends more with the prevailing wind. 

So the grass can be your compass. Yes, of course you could just use an actual compass, but there’s no question that this kind of close study and reading of signs embeds you in nature more than any man-made instrument ever could.

The author’s alertness and expertise are impressive, and he makes a beguiling and inspiring guide. 

When so many human hours of the day are spent in the virtual reality of one screen or another, he’s passionate about reconnecting with the world around us, the world of sun and birds and wind, of ‘rocks and stones and trees’, in Wordsworth’s phrase.

Wonderful.