Reeling Grasshopper WarblerWhen I looked out of the window this morning I could see it was going to be one of those very beautiful photogenic dawns. I rushed out of the house with the intention of taking some landcapes. With the right combi…
Category: Phil Barnett
Fómhar is here
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| Migrant Hawker |
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I’ve always thought the seasons were wrong. Mid-December feels a lot more like Winter than Autumn . Early March and even February, in some years, feels like spring.
So too with the beginning of Autumn. The 21st of September – the equinox – the Astronomical and Cultural start – seems much too late in the year. The meteorological Autumn starts at the beginning of September which is more like it.
I personally like the Gaelic calendar – Fómhar – Harvest is – August, September, October. Birders often see signs earlier – July or even June sees the start of the ‘Fall’ migration.
I’ve been away on holiday for the last 10 days and on returning to the patch it seems the year has turned. The Swifts have gone, flowers have been replaced by seed-heads.
A Willow warbler was singing – but around this time of year it becomes quieter and much less enthusiastic. This could be sub-song from a young bird – but it always seems to me to express a slight balefulness – a touch of sorrow that Spring has gone and summer is fading fast. A Grasshopper warbler on the other hand was still reeling away.
The most noticeable thing that had happened, however was – ‘thistleworld’. Several of the derelict fields had turned white and downy with the seeds of Spear, Marsh and Creeping Thistles. It was quite a sight and was obviously being appreciated by the Goldfinches. A very large charm of around 150 wind-chimed their way through what seemed like a thistle-down blizzard.
An Emperor Dragonfly patrolled its empire – the center of the lake – while Common Darters and a Southern hawker stuck to the margins. Fleabane had burst into flower and Birds-foot trefoil was now demonstrating how it got its name with chicken-claw clusters of black seed heads.
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| Britain’s three Commonest Thistles – Spear, Creeping, Marsh – (in July) |
The Hirsute Route
Caterpillar – day 22 – showing the five pairs of prolegs and three pairs of true legsCinnabar Moth LarvaeThe case of the Mystery Eggs on the Conservatory Door has had to be re-opened. This had been put in the ‘case closed’ file – the eg…
Meet our new alien overlords
This is Leiobunum rotundum – a harvestman – on a wall this morning.That’s all very well, but why don’t you furnish us with an all-time top 6 of Leiobunum rotundum facts – I here you say. Well here it is:they:can self-amputate their legs if in dangerpro…
bio Diversity Training
I watched a small section of the patch – a cranny if you will, and indeed a nook. A very ordinary bit of land only about one meter square. Of the kind, that there must be, going for, a quarter of a million on the patch, and billions in the whole …
Dropping by for a Swift drink
I sat by the “heron priested shore”, of the lake this morning, and watched the different drinking techniques used by the Swifts, House Martins and Swallows. It reminded me slightly of a childhood trip to Farnborough Airshow.The Swifts perfo…
Graminology
Over the past few weeks I’ve attempting to compile a plant list for the patch. The grasses, sedges and rushes have been challenging – there are a number of very similar species and some can look very different at different stages of their growth.
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| Meadow Foxtail |
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| Created Dogstail |
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| Cocksfoot |
There’s a whole grass glossary as well that you need to be familiar with. You have to know your awns from your auricles, yours glumes from your lemmas, ligules, panicles, racimes, and rachilas.
These and many other grass-based words just trip of the tongue and I have been weaving them into everyday conversation like some kind of Bob Flowerdew, Pippa Greenwood and Bunny Guinness rolled into one big botanising bundle of botany.
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| False Oat-Grass |
That list in full
Red Fescue
Tall Fescue
Perennial Rye-grass
Annual Meadow-grass
Floating Sweet-grass
Cocksfoot
Crested Dog’s-tail
Common Soft-brome
Common Couch
Common Bent
Bread Wheat
False Oat-grass
Wavy Hair-grass
Sweet Vernal-grass
Wood Millet
Timothy
Meadow Foxtail
Reed Canary-grass
Lesser Bulrush
Hard Rush
Soft-rush
Heath Rush
Compact Rush
Slender Rush
Pendulous Sedge
Common Sedge
Common Spike-rush
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| Reed Canary Grass |
*Other members of the Gardener’s Question Time team are available.
Woohoohoohoo Camouflage…
….things are never quite the way they seem.* I think the Buff Arches is my favourite moth – it’s a moth masterpiece. Even though you know you’re looking at a flat wing, the optical illusion is so convincing that you can’t help but see it as two surf…
Balls of confusion
These fruiting bodies – about 2mm in diameter – were growing on the trunk of a fallen Beech. I was quite puzzled as to what they were. There are some lichens that have fruiting bodies a bit like these. The fact that they were growing on dead wood p…
My Old Lady
Old LadyThe mothing has been good over the last few days. I’ve been getting around forty species a night in the trap. As I mentioned previously, this is fairly paltry compared to some, but not bad for my small Heath/Actinic trap stuck in a corner of th…