March 2009 Archives

Saturday.
Across the fields to Acaster Malbis , and back along the river.
Brilliant sunshine , though the warm spring weather is unlikely to last.

A sad walk in some ways :
We hear talk of Urban deserts : those fields are as fine an example of a Rural desert as you could find.
Ploughed , harrowed and manicured to a lawn of winter barley and sown grass , they are virually sterile.
The ditch and hedges are the only relief , but the ditch dies about halfway along into a redbrown guttter.
I don't blame the farmer : he's being efficient.
But as a result of our agricultural policies , much of what urbanites think of as Countryside
is effectively dead  .And setaside has now been abandoned.

Two skylarks.  Modern planting regimes give them less a chance to rear a brood .
A few Dunnocks in the hedge.

Once onto the riverbank by the Ship , the early boatowners are out for the weekend.
Has some edict gone out to Tidy all the moorings ?
Several sallows have been cut down ; I counted about eight..... several bonfires.
Seems rather pointless to me : Sallows are a useful species to wildlife , attractive , and help bind the bank.
The tendency to reduce the mooring areas to neat little urban gardens is to be deplored.
It's a riverbank , not a bungalow.
The ironmongery , fencing and favela architecture are bad enough : they don't have to kill all the native plants as well.

End of Rant.

A Sallow just starting to bloom :


WAXWINGS :
Pen Dragon sent a message that there were Waxwings in Keble Park North.....
Rushed round , no luck. I shall keep my eyes open.
These wonderfully attractive birds periodically erupt into Britain in winter from their
home in the northern Pine forests, seeking berries to eat.
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They are very tame , and apparently easy to watch. Which is presumably why I have yet to see one ! Despite several trips round the ara on the bike , I missed them.

Thursday :
More small plants are starting to bloom:~
Wood Anemones in Field 84:




And I couldn't resist the Flowering Cherry : no wonder the Japanese hold a special Festival to
celebrate them :

First Flowers , Mammals, and more Amphibians :~

Thursday.

The very first flowers are starting to appear now , apart from the rather
obvious cultivated Daffodils. These smaller plants of the verge and hedgerow
are so common they are ignored by most : but some of them are rather nice   :

Red Deadnettle :~





The White Deadnettle :~





And along the riverbank the Weeping Willows are producing a fine display,
and the Sallows are erupting into catkins:



Mammals :
There are a surprising number of species that could be said
to live in this area ,if not always strictly within the Parish boundaries.
Apart from the obvious Rabbits in the fields, Hedgehogs and grey Squirrels in gardens,
( and Mice in my house ! ) we have a few more that people may be unaware of.

I have been watching the Roe Deer across the river from
the boatyard , amongst the fallen trees and straw coloured scub.
Best time dawn or dusk.They are also common enough in the woods
around Acaster Malbis.

My friend Harblow tells me he saw a Water Vole in the Ings drain
recently,and it seems highly likely given the number of holes in the banks.
 I have report of Mink being seen on the river: which is bad news for the
Water Voles , since Mink seem to be the chief cause of their catastrophic
decline in recent years , to the extent that they are near to being an endangered species.

Foxes are about : their scent marks are very distinctive once you learn to recognise them .
" The Fox , he stinketh evermore " : somewhere between fresh sweat and burning rubber.
You just catch a brief whiff as you walk along .

There are several other Mammals I shall touch on later.

Amphibians :

 More Frogspawn has appeared in several spots :presumably the laying of the spawn
is entirely dependent on temperature . The sun this week has certainly set them off .

Toads we have also , though I haven't seen any spawn yet.

Newts seem absent : you have to take a trip down the cycle track to see them,
 which I did yesterday , and am happy to report they were flourishing.
This appalling picture does them no justice , and is another reason why i shall buy a new camera !


 Expecting not much, I was actually treated to a clear view of courtship behaviour,
which I have never seen before except on TV. A treat to round off a superb day.


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Since it's reasonably dry , I've been into the centre of the Ings looking
for interesting plants, and also to see if any of the ponds have any more spawn .
Nothing to see yet, though there are mats of small leaves everywhere emerging, mostly docks and Great Burnet.

However , three times this week I have flushed Snipe from the tall grasses, one day as many as five.
Seeing these birds on the ground is almost impossible : they are in visually impenetrable vegetation , and very well camouflaged.
But they are nervous , and instead of scuttling off somewhere , they always explode into flight.

PIC RSPB

If they do this , you can't really mistake them for anything else.
Very rapid wingbeats of the narrow pointed wings ,and the zigzag flight , always with a harsh little squeak of indignation.

Two other winter visitors are still with us :

 The Goosander are still on the river : I saw a fine pair yesterday , looking very smart in their breeding plumage.

And there is still a small flock of Redwing in the horse paddock area, hopping gently along in the short
grass looking for food... I imagine they will be leaving for the north quite soon.

PIC RSPB

Insects are emerging when the sun comes out : I have Solitary Bees , which are like smaller honeybees, hatching from out of my lawn where they overwinter as pupae. They potter gently about amongst the crocuses, with the occasional Bumblebee for company. The first Bluebottle is also out.

I think this solitary might be Andrena fulva, the Tawny Mining Bee. It lives in holes in the lawn.  If you look around carefully you can find the holes with their little excavated spoil heaps around them.

7/3/09

Computer problems have delayed one or two entries : I'll try to catch up in the next few days .
Spring ( though it doesn't feel like it in the cold wind ) is rushing ahead .

Several friends have remarked on hearing the woodpeckers : the rapid drumming signal , which always reminds me of the school trick of rattling a wooden ruler against the side of a desk .
These of course are the Greater Spotted Woodpeckers , which seem to be resident.

A few days ago I had a nice view of a pair chasing around in a cheerful frenzy in one of the old trees near the boatyard....
With any luck they will be nesting soon in one of the partially rotten trees.

Thought : the tendency to want to chop down dying or rotten trees is a very bad move for wildlife : if the trees are not actually dangerous, much better to leave them. They are home for a vast array of Fungi and insects , as well as more obvious things like Woodpeckers and Owls.
The excessive human desire for " Tidiness " is one of the reasons so many species are declining. The same applies to those piles of old compost and branches in the corner of the garden. Leave them alone , or even add to them with a rotting log.
Anyone who saw last night's programme about the wildlife flourishing along the line of the former Iron Curtain could learn a lesson : wildlife gets on fine if you leave space for it , then leave it alone.
 



The bigger Green Woodpecker is a rarity here : sometimes seen in the fields down towards Acaster Malbis.
The very small Lesser Spotted version sometimes visits bird-tables around here , but I haven't seen one for ages.

This weekend the first green leaves are already showing : some of the Hawthorns are showing a distinct greenish bumfluff , and have you noticed how the grass is changing colour to a fresh green , and starting to grow a little ?
The weeping willows along the far riverbank have changed colour ; the catkins are already well out , and pussy willow buds have appeared.

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Sunday 8/3/09

Spawn ! A friend told me two weeks ago that the frogs were spawning behind his house in Stamford Bridge , so I've been checking most days along the ditches for the first signs :
 Today , I've found it.
Last year was a bit of an amphibian disaster : the spawn was laid in March , then washed onto the fields by flooding , followed by some wintery weather which destroyed it.
Result : very few amphibians around all year.
Let's hope this year is more successful for them.A good frog population is almost a benchmark of Nature's health.
We have some good ditches for them along the Ings , but we have very few ponds: a few more wouldn't hurt.



Today , amongst the brown grasses on the Ings , the Lesser Celandine.A very unassuming flower , but welcome.




Throughout this blog , I shall try and use my own pics. I'm not an experienced wildlife photographer, but I rather relish the challenge of recording our local species as they appear. At present I'm only equipped to take static subjects, but I hope that will change soon. The bird pics all come from open sources on the web, since getting bird pics is a specialised business.
If anyone has good pics of anything of interest taken locally , please write .

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