This weeks blog features a new line in environmentally friendly underwear for Ladies, Men and Children and introduces Rent-a-Duck an effective biological approach to snail warfare in the garden.

While you read the following article why not listen to my e-baroque compositions – just click on the box below:

or if techno music is more your cup of tea here are my techno/ambient compositions:

I hope you find the article below interesting…please visit chrisduggleby.com again.

Germany likes to lead the way when it comes to promoting innovations with a strong ‘green‘ flavour. With this in mind I was particularly impressed this weekend to read in the Alpine Press about a couple of developments which I am certain will be of interest to the rest of the non-German speaking international community.

Rent-a-Duck

The first subject concerns an approach to dealing with garden snails which does not require the use of unpleasant and unnatural chemicals. Andrea Halbwirth from the Bavarian village of Untereichhofen has for many years been breeding a collection of Indian Runner Ducks like the ones below:

I do not need to tell any hobby gardener about the frustrations caused to their precious plants by snails. This year seems to be particularly bad here in the Alps where we have been blessed with an unusually high amount of early summer rainfall (including this weekend which is a total write-off for those wanting to work in the garden).

For anyone who is unfamiliar with the collateral damage caused by ‘slime warfare’ it is hard to imagine how much destruction a snail can cause to an unsuspecting lettuce patch or an innocent collection of seedlings carefully cultivated to hopefully fill the summer garden with a patchwork of beautiful colours. Sadly no amount of good words can dissuade a determined snail from pursuing his slimy life of vegetative carnage.

Over 30 years ago Frau Halbwirth simply didn’t know where to turn – the local snail population was making her life on the farm an absolute nightmare. Everywhere she looked there was vegetative devastation surrounded by little trails of slime. That’s when she decided to invest in the Indian Runner Ducks. Since then she has not had to worry about snails. Every morning the ducks are turned out of their barracks and march through the farmyard searching out unwanted intruders. When they find them they gobble them into their beaks and throat and when they have collected enough specimens they head for water to wash their tasty escargot breakfast down. This continues throughout the day as long as they can find free roaming snails.

The Halbwirths’ ducks are so hard working that they keep the whole village free of snails. They are also quite industrious when it comes to breeding and now the farm has started to rent them out to others faced with snail warfare. Currently they require a €15 deposit for each duck and charge €10 per week rent (€30 per month). The business has proved to be very successful and some renters become so attached to their ducks that they adopt them permanently (following a suitable financial arrangement with the owners). For German readers the link to the original article is here.

Such industrious duck heroes deserve to have a piece of music dedicated to them. With this in mind you might like to hear my rendition of the TRANSFORMATES 變Anthem featuring Doris the Digital Duck on Vocals:

Bavarian Bio-Undies

Another interesting Bavarian business venture was mentioned in the Alpine Press this weekend. It featured a start-up venture created by Thomas Vatter und Marcus Faulwasser. These gentlemen prefer to wear bio-textiles but found it quite a challenge to find bio-undies which were not passion killers. Therefore they decided to design and market their own range of Passion promoting Bio-underwear for ladies, men and children.

I was particularly taken by the names they have given to their products. What lady could not resist putting on a pair of ‘Easy Emma‘ boy shorts or a ‘Steady Suzie‘ bikini slip. Likewise what fashion conscious bloke could say no to a pair of ‘Tight Tim‘ trunk shorts or in the boxer range he would have a choice between the free fitting ‘Loose Larry‘ shorts or the ‘Classy Claus‘ boxer briefs. The range is completed with the children’s ‘Naughty Nic‘ baby body. For environmentally conscious fashionable families the Naughty Nic range also coordinates with the parents undies.

Rather than steal their eco-undie pics you can take a look yourself at their website. The link is here and there is an English language option (no I am not on commission!). Interestingly they have named the company after one of the founders “Vatter” which when pronounced in English comes out as “Fatter” – no doubt they intend to be fully inclusive when it comes to larger eco-customers. Actually if they had named the company after the other founder (Marcus Faulwasser) I suspect this could have proved challenging in the German market. ‘Faulwasser‘ translates roughly as ‘Putrid Water‘ and somehow I couldn’t imagine the discerning German customer wanting to buy their eco panties with the words ‘Putrid Water’ on the waste band! The link to the original German article is here.

As pictured above I certainly know of one one sports celebrity who will be keen to pose in a pair of ‘Tight Tim’ trunk shorts. If you have missed his musical debut here is the song dedicated to Lycra Larry‘s unfortunate ‘exposure‘ incident:

Well I think that is enough environmentally friendly news for this week. As it’s still raining I think I had better get back to composing some more hits for the TRANSFORMATES 變 Music Project. I just need to finish one more Baroque Interpretation to complete the next album. Hopefully I will be able to share this track with you in the next blog.

Remember now – Bio does not need to be at the expense of passion!

Chris Duggleby

Time for the ducks to take a bow……

If you would like to get a sneak preview of the other tracks on my forthcoming ‘Baroque Interpretations’ album why not take a look at the play list below….