Kohl-Eyed Konik

I went for a walk at Amwell Nature Reserve this afternoon and was delighted to see the semi-feral Konik horses near the path. These beautiful animals come from Poland and are very hardy, they can survive on sedges and rushes when food is in short supply and are here for conservation reasons. The public is urged not to feed them and they are managed with little human intervention.

While I was taking pics a guy, who I have met lots of times at the local reserves, arrived with his newish, beautiful, curly blonde-haired girlfriend. He explained to her that the horses come from her homeland. We have lots of people from Poland living here in the Lea Valley. They have come to work in the glasshouses. I know from experience that one has to be strong and resilient and not afraid of grafting to work in horticulture. The Polish people have a lot in common with these gorgeous animals.

I asked the girl if she had cooked carp for her boyfriend on Christmas Eve. I tried it once and made a weird ginger sauce. She had and said that the trick is to cook it in milk which takes the muddiness away.

My horse has burrs in its mane. I don't suppose the horses are groomed so they'll probably stay there for a while. Fascinating that engineer Georges de Mestral,  after going out on a hunting trip with his dog in the Swiss Alps, found that his trouser legs and his dog’s hair were covered in burrs from the burdock plant and this inspired his invention of Velcro.