My Patch – October 2018

October 10th – this evening I rescued a lesser yellow underwing moth from a spiders web; it had lost a leg but flew off.  I know I should leave pray in webs but this web looked abandoned so thought it was only fair to rescue it. 

October 15th – 19:50 a tawny hooted. There is definitely a male and female about, there was definitely both parts of the call together later in the evening 🙂

October 16th – The tawny was calling again 😉

October 17th – The tawny was calling again 🙂

October 18th – Three fallow deer walked across the middle of the field this morning. One stag and two doe.  Now I haven’t knowingly seen fallow deer here before so it was a bit of a surprise.  I managed to take a rather bad photo through the window (which needs cleaning, the pesky birds have made it dirty!). 

This evening 93 gulls  were out in the field feeding.  A buzzard flew into a nearby tree and then flew off again, another buzzard was in the distance. I had mainly headed out into the field to look at the ditch now it has been finished.  I know all the ditches round here have been cleared, and all the vegetation which was in front of them has gone.  What I didn’t expect to find was the fence around the edge of the field has also been pulled down and just left where is lays!  I have no idea if anyone is going to put it back up but I’m guessing not! Any trees that were dug out have been burnt and now there are charred tree trunks just led on the margin of the field.  It looks a bit of a mess!  

Tonight I started my ‘heard an owl survey’ at 20:07 – I didn’t hear any in the 20 minutes slot but half an hour later they were calling 🙂

October 22nd – This afternoon there was a European hornet feeding on the bananas that had been left out for the butterflies. It’s the first one I’ve seen, I recorded it via the Asian hornet watch app.

October 23rd – There was a moth discovered in one of the bedrooms so I was called rescue it –  a green-brindled crescent. 

October 25th – It was a foggy start today with the temperature being 3.5C, winter is starting to be more noticeable. 

October 31st – this morning there was a light frost across the field…

My Patch – August 2018

August 1st – The buzzard was back on the bale of straw tonight, it looks like it could be a juvenile to me.  

August 2nd – This evening there were 3 mint moths on the mint, so I’m really glad that it has been left to go to seed.  They were also joined by a mother-of-pearl month.  

August 8th – the great spotted woodpecker is still feeding on the nuts! He’s the main bird I see at the moment as he seems to be slightly braver than the other birds and will still feed if I’m in the garden as long as I’m not moving about too much. 

August 9th – I haven’t seen the rabbits in the field since March when I saw them running about in the snow. This morning they were running about near their burrows.  This afternoon I also found a 22-spot ladybird, I’ve never found one before! 

August 13th – One of the hedges has been cut! There isn’t a lot I can do about it as a local farmer is contracted to trim them but really! don’t they know they shouldn’t be doing that until at least September 🙁 There were fledgling goldfinches in the garden tonight, they were making one hell of a racket. I think the parents were trying to get them to feed for themselves. I wonder if they had been displaced from the hedgerows? I also found a buff-tip moth caterpillar, it took me by surprise as it was on the edge of the arm of one of the chairs. 

August 15th – I thought I saw a frog in the garden the other day but wasn’t convinced as it was small and mud coloured, it hopped but I only saw it out of the corner of my eye and it could have been a cricket. Today I saw it again, it was about an inch long, it saw me and leapt under the fence and into the field. 

August 22nd – This afternoon I found a badger in the ditch, I seems it was hit over the weekend and someone had moved it.  We moved her round into the field so any other creature wanting to feed on her wouldn’t be hit too.  The entrance to the field is where there are regular animal crossings. It’s on a slight bend and people just don’t slow down at all, they also seem to drive in the middle of the road so if another car is coming they have to swerve!  You would think if you were a regular driver of the road you would have more sense, but I guess not! 

August 23rd – tonight I took a walk down to the river, there wasn’t much activity.  There was litter floating downstream, sadly this is a regular occurrence each time I visit but the water is too deep for me to do anything about it.  The rabbits are still digging their burrows in the walkways around the field so I walked back along the track as I knew I wouldn’t be able to see them walking back across the field.  I can generally only see them when I walk into the field, in the other direction they are more camouflaged!  I spotted some of the culprits on my way back!

August 24th – One of the cats left a dead rat in the front garden of the house today!  At least we know the rats are still about… there is a barn a little further down the road and we think they catch them there, or next door have chickens so its a possibility they are in their garden too.  I do however think if they catch them they should eat them, not just leave them on the floor!

August 31st – tonight I found lots of caterpillars on the rose bush, after a little investigation I have discovered they are large rose sawfly.  All the gardening websites tell you how to get rid of them but these are happily munching away in the garden!  

My Patch – July 2018

I have been trying to catch up on writing some of my blog posts, which is why I am posting July in January!! After summer I have been rather rubbish at posting anything; partly because I have lots of images where I need to identify the insects or flowers and its taken longer than anticipated.  I end up with a list of ‘blogs to write’ and then feel like events occurred too long ago to write about them. I do however feel that they are all part of a story I’ve been telling on here so have been doing my best to start catching up….

My first trip out into the patch in July was the 9th – I wasn’t out there very long; I got bitten by a horsefly on the inside of my wrist.  I saw it and tried to flick it off but it didn’t move, I had to try and brush it off again, finally it went.  Now I had a few bites the other week that turned into great big red patches so I thought it best to go and put some bite lotion on it.  I have to say it didn’t help, this bite came up in blisters and half my forearm swelled up!  I was wearing Boots sun cream that has insect repellent in it, either I hadn’t covered that spot or it doesn’t work too well with horseflies!  I asked on Twitter for some suggestions to keep them away and two options that came back were, Avon Skin so soft and Jungle formula.  I’ll have to give each a try to see which one works the best for me.

While I was out in the field I heard roe deer in the copse; well that was until a walker spooked them with their yappy dog that didn’t seem to follow commands!  All I could hear after that was a high pitched dog whistle that wasn’t going to help me see anything!  Why do people have to be so noisy?!  There were numerous butterflies on the what I believe to be bristly oxtongue and also ox-eye daisies.  I am rubbish at identifying the ‘white’ butterflies, once I have seen them all in the flesh and I ‘know’ which is which I will be more confident but at the moment I’m still not sure.  They were quite difficult to photograph as they were continually flitting around not sitting still for a second.  There was a very small dark butterfly that I couldn’t identify, its what I was trying to follow when I got bitten!  I still have no idea what it was, I hope I can get back out there one evening to have another look for it. 

I was tending the 12 tomato plants and noticed a leaf cutter bee buzzing around my head, I moved away and watched from the other side of the garden as I was unsure of where it was going.  It carried a piece of leaf into a tray of soil and went into a burrow.  I managed to get a very bad picture of it.   The tray now has a label on it saying it shouldn’t be disturbed as there is a potential nest in there 🙂 

July 16th – tonight there were 6 swallows feeding over the field. 

July 18th – I was surprised by all the corvids that flew over the field tonight to roost – there must have been about 70 of them.  I couldn’t clearly identify them as I was looking into the setting sun but I would make a guess at mainly rooks and carrion crows.

July 19th – I was pottering in the garden tonight when I spotted the starlings were collecting on the telephone line. I like to think it’s a family photo of all the starlings that have fledged in the garden this year! 

July 20th – The farmer has made the first test cut of the oil-seed rape in the field.  Its great because there is now a clear path to walk around the field, not so great at the loss of all the field chamomile and bristly oxtongue that were in flower 🙁

July  23rd – the crop was cut today. 

July 24th – I didn’t know there was a wren nest in the Jasmine but today a fledgling wren was perched on the archway while I was watering. I took a quick photo and moved to the other side of the garden to stay out of its way. There was a parent nearby shouting at me!

July 25th – approx 30 swallows flew over and I discovered 104 large white caterpillars on one of the plants in the garden – I think it’s a false London rocket but I’m not 100% sure. I left them all where they were, happy that they had come to feast in the garden. The garden is after all being created for the wildlife 🙂 

July 26th – today I managed to go for a walk in the field.  It is really dry, there are cracks in the ground.  All of the bristly oxtongue where the butterflies were has all been cut down.  It feels a very different place with all the vegetation/crop removed.  The copse is starting to look brown underneath the trees.  The next field over hasn’t been harvested yet and still has some greenery around the margins.  All that is really left in the field now is mainly stinging nettles and a few patches of grass on top edge.  I know these are important but its sad that the chamomile etc has all been cut down when it would still have been useful to the insects buzzing around the field.  When the farmers all cut at the same time this sudden vanishing food source must have a real impact on our wildlife.   

July 27th – this morning there was a buzzard sat on one of the straw bales. 

Over the month I have also been looking at who else has started to visit the garden area next to the field, some I can identify easily but there are so many new creatures I have never seen before! which I have been trying my best to identify (if I have any wrong, please let me know):

My Patch – January 2018

January at the field has not been overly successful.  I have only spent one day in the field and not had many encounters in the evenings and mornings because of the lack of light at the moment – though it is improving 🙂

January 10th – the mute swans are still in the field this morning there were 16 🙂

January 26th – I took the day off of work to spend some time at the field. I was lucky it was a sunny as the days either side were wet and gloomy.  I don’t ever see a lot walking along the top edge of the field, I think part of that fact is I have to look down a lot!   There are lots of holes/burrows in the ground, though the ones I have mentioned before seem to have collapsed as the ground has sunk though new holes have appeared! I’m sure they belong to rabbits, but I am yet to see a rabbit in the field!  I did have a quick glimpse of a robin and a blue tit that were in the hedgerow.  There are a lot of paw prints along the track I was walking, though I am 100% sure they belong to the cat!

Walking down the side of the copse was again the most productive part of my walk. The squirrel drey is still securely in the tree and as I was looking up a heard a nose and looking at the base of the tree a saw the whites of two large back paws bounding away, I had disturbed a hare that I think was sunbathing in the cover of the part of the hedgerow.  I hadn’t seen it, if I had it would have made a lovely photograph.  I was looking out across the field and saw a couple of lumps, I had a look through the binoculars thinking they would be clumps of mud, nope TWO HARES!!!! They were a fair way off in the field and didn’t seem at all bothered by me watching, they were grazing, cleaning etc  I was having problems photographing them, I was looking into the sun and there was a heat haze across the field – typical! I have never seen two hares together before and I was so surprised to see them. My attention was drawn away to the birds in the hedgerow, two robins that were hoping about having a slight territorial dispute and then to long-tailed tits in the top of the trees.  Walking down the lower part of the copse towards the river I again spooked the roe deer.  I hear them moving then normally see white bottoms bouncing off through the trees.  I need to locate myself in the copse at some point to photograph them.  My guess is there is normally two or three that run off. 

The river was full.  It had obviously burst its banks recently as a patch of the field was a large puddle.  I have never seen it that full before.  It did look pretty with the sun shining and the neutral tones of the fields behind. Two swans flew over and later a cormorant.  I heard a wren and a moorhen but didn’t see them.  The holes that I have seen in the bank previously were fully submerged so if they were homes to any creature they were 100% flooded out.  I was stood watching three goldfinch flitting between the trees, I turned round to find a hare metres from me.  I slowly lifted the camera to take a photo but it was gone as soon as I moved a muscle, I hadn’t expected to see one right behind me!  I estimate there were 3 to 4 hares in the field! As the river receded from its original flooded level it has dropped lots of plastic bottles along the rivers edge, I did think about trying to get them out, however, I was on my own and didn’t know how sturdy the bank was! I will take backup and fish them out next time I go.  If the water level doesn’t rise again they look like they will remain wedged in the tree line.

Rather than walking round the field I walked back up the copse. Two wren were in the hedgerow and a blackbird was keeping a few meters ahead of me all the way along, I’d get close it would fly a little further along and the continued.  I heard a bee, a queen buff-tailed bumble bee, it was buzzing along the side of the hedgerow.

As I reached the top of the field I heard a buzzard calling, when I turned I realised there were three circling over the copse riding the thermals.  Looking over the slight ridge to the left I could see the mute swans, 24 of them 🙂

As I wouldn’t be able to visit the patch over the Big Garden Birdwatch weekend I decided to do a count in the garden for my own records.

Great spotted woodpecker 1
Blue tit 7
Great tit 3
Goldfinch 10
Robin 2
Collard dove 3
Starling 14
House sparrow 6
Dunnock 1
Carrion crow 1
Chaffinch 2
Total no. of species 11
Total no. of birds 50
Weather Light cloud

January 29th – It is now noticeable that the evening are very slowly getting lighter.  I am looking forward to February as I’ve scanned the sunset calendar and by the time February 20th rolls round the sun will be setting at 5:31pm which means I will be able to get about half an hour of light to have a quick look around or start work on the garden at my patch – the land owner hasn’t done anything with the garden for a while due to personal reasons and I have been granted permission to ‘improve its wildlife friendliness! 🙂

January 30th – 31 mute swans were just on the other side of the fence, I didn’t have my camera so I took a quick photograph on my phone.  I haven’t seen them that far up the field before.  Hopefully they will be staying around for a little longer, I think they will still be there for as long as the crop is still sprouting.  

My new patch

One of the problems I had found of late is that before the clocks changed to BST it was still dark when I got home from work! so I’ve been finding it difficult to get out and about as much as I would like.  I have however found a solution; a friend lives in the countryside near where I work, and the land owner has given me permission to wildlife watch in one of the fields 🙂 They often see Roe Deer, hear Tawny Owls and occasionally see Barn Owls; so I am going to start visiting regularly – it will still be light when I get there!

My first visit was last week.  I got there half an hour after I finished work which gave me about an hour to wander.  I could see there were 25 Mute Swans on the other side of the field so headed their way.  They weren’t in the slightest bit concerned about my presence; they just kept on eating the crop – shoots of wheat. 

As I was stood watching them I noticed a Buzzard flying around behind me. I followed it in my binoculars, landing in a tree, I then noticed to the right of it was a nest! Now I don’t yet know if it is the Buzzards nest or it was coincidence but I will most definitely be keeping a close eye to see. 

Although I didn’t really walk much of the field I could see the track that the Roe Deer have left through the crop and could hear plenty of other birds (my bird song skills are not good enough yet to be able to clearly identify species). I’ll be heading back there this week to have another look around.

RSPB Ham Wall – June 2016

RSPB Ham Wall - Glastonbury TorAs part of ’30 Days Wild’ I set out for the day to visit RSPB Ham Wall. I had heard of Ham Wall because of the Starlings they get in winter but I knew little about the site.

I had read the RSPB’s recent sightings blog posts before heading out so had an idea of what it was possible to see and where they might be. Obviously Bittern was at the top of the list!

It took me longer to get there than anticipated, I’m sure the satnav took me the scenic route! The car park is beautiful with wildflowers between the parking bays. I’d just stepped out of the car and heard a chap say ‘there’s a bittern flying overhead’ I caught a quick glimps – a shape moving in the distance.

Access via the main path wasn’t available due to work on the bridge so I followed the diversion signs and headed towards Tor view hide. On route I stopped at some of the screens to see what was about. A gentleman pointed me in the direction of a screen where a heron was nicely posing.

RSPB Ham Wall - BitternThe hide was quite busy when I got there with only a couple of seats spare. As people left I moved to a seat with a better view. The girl sat next to me was a regular to the site and amazing at spotting bitterns flying over the reeds, my first proper bittern sighting was thanks to her 🙂 There were plenty of other birds to watch including the incredibly cute Coot chicks.

After a couple of hours I moved onto Alavon hide for a quick look. There were a pair of Marsh Harriers constantly in the sky along with a Great White Egret on what looked like its nest.

I thoroughly enjoyed my time there and look forward to heading back there in the Autumn to see the Starlings 🙂

My full list of sightings for the day:
Birds: Bittern, Mute Swan, Mallard, Cormorant, Grey Heron, Great Crested Grebe, Tufted Duck, Coot, Great White Egret, Little Grebe, Hobby, Buzzard, Swift, Marsh Harrier, Pied Wagtail
Insects: Stag beetle