Tristan Gooley

So we can think of there being fast reproducers, and these tend to be very, very small insects who have short lifespans, high numbers of offspring, or the slow reproducers.

So slow reproducers, a killer whale, a horse, a human being.

If you can count the number of offspring, it's a slow reproducer.

If you can't, it's a fast one.

Now, what's that got to do with the seasons?

Well, what we find is...

that the slow reproducers are tied to the length of day.

So whatever the temperature is doing, it will only change things a very small amount.

Whereas the fast reproducers are much, much more tuned into temperature.

So if we have a little heat wave in spring or maybe a cold snap a little earlier than we're expecting it towards the end of the year, that will have a massive impact on those fast reproducers.

then all we have to do is notice that whenever we're in a landscape, there's going to be places where the fast reproducers are concentrated and a place where the slow ones are.

So let me give you an example.

If you're in a small woodland and you're in the heart of that woodland, you will be surrounded by slow reproducers, tall, mature trees, maybe some larger mammals like a deer or something like that.

Whatever the temperature does, whatever the weather does, those numbers are not going to change.

If you walk to the edge of the woods, you're going from a slow reproducing to a fast reproducing area.

You're suddenly seeing lots and lots of little wildflowers and a massive cloud of midges or other flying insects.

because the fast reproducers have picked up on the temperature change, responded to it.

So every landscape is a mixture of that slow and fast.

And once you kind of tune in and know to look for those, you can see why, you know, you might walk for 10 minutes and not notice a strange seasonal event, but then you move into a different area, a fast reproducing area, and you go, oh, wow, this feels like a different season.

So the smaller an organism is, plant or animal, generally speaking, the more of an opportunist it is.