Common Spotted Orchids 2021

There is definitely an increase in Common Spotted Orchid rosettes at this point - a huge increase in the South Field and increases in the other fields too. Last year we had 146 rosettes showing by 26 April - this year it is 256. However I am not expecting a 75% increase in Orchids overall or anything close to that. First of all 75 of the 109 increase is in the South Field where the number at this stage has gone from 19 rosettes to 94 rosettes this year. Increases in the other fields are much more modest. Secondly the extended dry spell may be preventing further plants from coming up this year. Thirdly there is no reason to expect a similar increase in Broad Leaved Helleborines. Why the South Field has more than four times as many rosettes showing as last year I have absolutely no idea!

Bad week for the birds

The untimely death of one of our Crows has been followed by a blackbird deserting a nest with two eggs in it. It was my inadvertent fault as I went into a barn to retrieve some metal cages used to protect the orchids from predation by rabbits and deer. The blackbird had foolishly built a nest at the back of the barn supported by a stack of cages. Although I didn't remove any cages close to the nest she was disturbed by my prescence and abandoned it. Hopefully she will be able to start again. Update 23 April - the female blackbird is back on the nest - has she laid fresh eggs?

New Species - Dog's Mercury

Although it is pretty common in the woodland around here, I have not seen any Dog's Mercury (mercurialis perennis) in our small wooded areas. There is a patch however which has appeared on the footpath above our South Field so that is now another new species for the site.

Crow RIP

Sadly there was a dead crow under one of our Oak trees. Only the day before I was admiring the way one of our Crows was seeing off a Raven and maybe such a mismatch in fighting weight led to the death. All I could find was a cut at the base of the belly less than half an inch across as a possible cause. Later I saw a single Crow feeding in the West Field whereas normally there are two. My favourite birds.

Trees at The Beeches

The trees here are mostly Beech, Oak, Ash, European Larch, Holly, Hazel. Hawthorn and Blackthorn. In addition there are two Wild Cherry trees on the boundary with the woodland and also a Sycamore. However behind the garage there are also four Willow trees and I have been trying to tie down the species of Willow which is not as easy as it looks. On the face of it they are all female Goat Willow trees based on the length of the catkins but it seems that there are hybrids which are difficult to identify. I will wait for the leaves to develop and see if that sorts the matter out. Meanwhile the catkins are attracting lots of bees and hoverflies (also difficult to identify).

The Owners

As humble tenants of this wildlife site it is always a pleasure to welcome the owners close up to the house. This visit was to mop up some seeds I had tipped from the bird feeders, whilst cleaning them, onto our millstone. Good to see they got there before any of the rodents.

White Rabbits again

In 2018 we had a couple of white rabbits on site - there is a story that some white rabbits escaped decades ago and white is now in the gene pool locally. Well they are back - we have two more now advertising their prescence to Buzzards, Foxes etc. I hope these two don't go the way of the last two who got Mixy.

New Species - False Puffball (Reticularia lycoperdon )

Not just a new species but a new Kingdom as this is a Slime Mould and is in the Kingdom 'Protista' and I haven't recorded and Protists here before. This is on a conifer stump about 2 metres above ground height. In identifying it I came across this blog entry from 2014 on a Carmarthenshire Fungi blog that extended my knowledge of Slime Moulds and this species so I have quoted it below. "Slime Moulds are a strange class of amoeboid protozoa, previously thought to be fungi but now known to be Myxomycota, which are organisms which prey on microbial food webs. This particular species is a bacterial predator and usually very tiny and unlikely to be seen, but this particular stage of it’s life cycle is a fruiting body known as a sporangium. This is a globular formation which swells up to around 50-80mm"