Second deer and rabbit proof cage

The experiment last year with a cage to keep out Deer and Rabbits and see what effect that had on Orchid flowering was a big success. I of course chose an Orchid hot spot in the East Field where I would have expected a lot of Orchids to appear. In the first exclusion zone (about 10m x 5m) I counted 73 rosettes and would have expected maybe 40 of thos to flower successfully - in fact there were 172 flowering spikes. This second exclusion zone is a similar size but in an area less dense with Orchids (although no rosettes have yet appeared). I also will maintain the first exclusion zone and see what the numbers are this year. The photo is the second cage under construction.

Larch felling

This is going on apace around The Narth (except of course those weedy Larches next to our land that they can't reach). The area going out of the village towards Penallt is just being cleared. A large part of the programme is a response to the disease which is spreading amongst Larch trees - I just hope it doesn't reach the two superb trees on the margin of the East Field. This must be partly the result of the monoculture that is practised by modern forestry.

Loadsa Tadpoles

There was a lot of spawn in the pond, so as I did last year I transferred some into the two sinks and the small plastic pond but unlike last year there seem to be some tadpoles hatched in all four locations. Most are in the main pond but there are predators there and it also is at risk of drying if we have the current rain fest turns into a hot spell. Here's a poor photo of some tadpoles in the main pond.

Pair of Mallards on the pond

Pretending it is more than a few inches deep! They were either eating duckweed or frogspawn. I hope it was the former.

New Species - Stereum rameale

I am slightly reluctant to spend a lot of time trying to identify woodland fungi species but occasionally I get sucked in and this resupinate fungus turned out to be Stereum rameale which is a new record for the site albeit a common enough fungus on dead twigs. Hairy Curtain Crust (STereum hirsutim) is definitely hairy whereas this is merely downy on the underside (when looked at some magnification).