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Spring Gentian

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 We were a bit further afield this week. We spent a day in Teesdale at the Cow Green reservoir. On the banks of the reservoir grow a number of unusual flowers. The rarest (not found in any other part of Britain) is the Spring Gentian. I have seen this plant before in Alpine pastures and in the wonderful limestone pavements of the Burren in the West of Ireland, but this is the first time I have seen them Britain. The plant is pollinated by bees but ants are responsible for spreading the seeds.There were only a few gentian but there were hundreds of the little mountain pansies which do well in the same dry and chalky soil.  Diary There has been a sudden spurt of growth by the wild flowers this week. Our meadow is full of the white flowers of pignut, and the pinks of ragged robin. In our bog meadow today I disturbed a hen pheasant who tried to chase me away from her tiny striped chicks that were running about in the tall grass. We have been hearing cuckoos this week. One day arou...
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A Badger and a Hedgehog

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 Out of laziness rather than anything else I set my trail cameras very near the house last night. I had seen some droppings that I thought might be from a fox and I was hopeful. It was a pleasant surprise to see the first hedgehog of the season and a badger. This was about 20m from our kitchen door and the nearest to the house I have seen them. Diary I visited Tarn Sike Reserve yesterday (Cumbria Wildlife Trust). Curlews, snipe, lapwing, meadow pipet and skylark. Reassured to see that there were still white clawed crayfish in the stream after the winter. Today I walked my butterfly transect t Waitby Greenriggs reserve - only 14 butterflies, some tatty peacock and small toroshell that had survived the winter and some freshly hatched orange tips. There were some nice spring flowers. I am showing the coltsfoot and dog violet which caught my attention here.
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Hawthorn vs Blackthorn

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 The hedges are full of life at the moment. This picture of our land shows both Hawthorn and blackthorn (both are popular in hedges being prickly and stock-proof).  It's easy to tell the two species apart at this time of the year as in the hawthorn the leaves come out first (and then the blossom) but with the blackthorn the bloom precedes the leaves. Both plants produce berries that are important to birds in the autumn and winter. In other signs of Spring there is a small patch of wood anemone in our bog meadow (these plants are usually associated with woodland). Diary Another swallow over the house this morning. A camera trap in the bog meadow showed a fox hunting. The weather is bright and sunny but too windy for me to do my butterfly survey.
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Roe Deer

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 I have been putting out trail cameras intermittently this month but got lucky this week with these shots of a doe roe deer. The video is interesting because it shows the "peep" contact calls of roe deer. I am used to the short dog like alarm barks and the longer barks of the territorial bucks but this is the first time that I have recorded these more subtle noises. It is difficult to research when these are used. If you google deer calls you find a lot of reviews by hunters showing mechanical whistles etc to lure deer to the gun which is not at all what I want! I'd love to hear from anybody who knows more about it. I expect that this doe doesn't yet have young as they are not usually born until May otherwise I would suspect she was keeping in touch with her young. Diary I saw the first swallows of the year on 20th April earlier than last year (3rd May). The bluebells are in bloom and the first of the cowslip. Last week I discovered the remnants of a mallard nest clos...
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Wych Elm Flowers

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 Some signs of spring are more subtle than others. I noticed that the wych elm trees had flowers on today. I posted about these trees  last year (21st Aug - see the archive) but of course the flowers had gone by then. Lots of people would walk past these and not notice but they are things of beauty and well worth a second look. Diary. There has been less wildlife about in the bog meadow since my neighbours cut down some trees. Any disturbance like that causes an upheaval. My overnight cameras have picked up one fox which I have had to keep quiet about as the local farmer has mysteriously lost a couple of new born lambs and I suspect my fox might well have been the culprit. A male sparrowhawk has been patrolling our bird feeders and we have had several sightings.  On a cold clear morning like today it was lovely to hear the great spotted woodpeckers drumming and the curlew with their lovely evocative burbling call. We have had another couple of stoat appearances in the las...
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Lesser Celandine

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 The first of our meadow flowers made an appearance this week. In a few weeks the field will be full of them but there are just a handful at the moment. I took this with the handy little macro lens that clips onto my phone. A great bit of kit if you remember to carry it with you. Apparently 21st Feb is known as "Celandine day" as the famous naturalist Gilbert White reckoned that it flowered on this day. Gilbert White lived a few hundred miles South of here and at a lower altitude and we are a month later here - despite global warming. The flower is regarded as a harbinger of spring - which fits for this locality too. The plant used to be called "pilewort" because it used to be used to treat haemorrhoids. This was because of the "doctrine of signatures" and antiquated piece of nonsense that I have discussed on previous blogs. Diary Lovely sunny weather. There are lambs out in the fields and there is a real feeling of Spring. I am still upset by the tree fel...
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Frogspawn

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 My first sighting of frogspawn was on 24th March last year. I saw my first frogspawn today this year - 3 days earlier. As I approached the pond I could hear the frogs croaking and see mating couples "clamped" together. The noise always stops and the movement ceases if you don't approach the pond stealthily - they always seem to sense my approach. Diary There was a frost last night but the weather has been warm and sunny during the day. I saw a couple of small tortoiseshell butterflies on the wing. (Earlier in the week I saw a brimstone butterfly and a peacock butterfly in Skipton about an hour South of here. Several buzzards in flight above the house and a female sparrowhawk patrolling the bird feeder. The redpoll I saw (last thing I posted) was confirmed by the on line birding community as a "common or meally redpoll" which is sufficiently unusual for them to want me to report it as a "record" to the Cumbrian Bird Club. Local birders are reporting ch...
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Redpoll

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 We had an unusual visitor to our bird feeders this week. A redpoll. The bird books don't all agree on the categorisation of Redpolls! It seems that there are two types of redpoll that I am likely to see in the UK. The lesser redpoll (which is more common and breeds in the UK) and the common redpoll (which is less common and is usually a winter visitor seen only to the East of the country).  These birds both have alternative names but I won't confuse the issue further!  There appear to be only minor differences between the two types of bird with the common redpoll being more grey than brown. Even though we are not to the East of the country I reckon that I have a common redpoll but I am not at all sure and am happy to be corrected! Redpolls are a type of finch and eat small seeds and insects. Diary I am hearing curlew most mornings together with drumming of the great spotted woodpeckers. The stoat continues to visit. .... and I took this photo of our snowdrops which are n...
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A High Speed Stoat Chase

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 It was great to see our stoat again this morning. What was different today is that we saw the stoat in a face off and then a high speed chase of a squirrel. I have seen this before. They are a close match for speed on the ground but the squirrel is much faster if it can take to the trees. The animals move too quickly for me to video the chase but the following clip shows that the stoats can climb quite well. Diary Milkder today. I could hear curlew and great spotted woodpeckers this morning. Sparrowhawk and buzzard seen on this morning's dog walk.
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A polecat a badger a fox and a stoat!

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 It has been frosty overnight but sunny during the daytime. I left out my trail cameras for a couple of nights and captured images of a polecat , a badger, and a fox. We have had several stoat visits to the garden during daytime. In previous years this has been a female looking for somewhere to give birth. Here's hoping this happens this year too. I was away yesterday but this footage was captured by my glamorous assistant in my absence. It is much brighter in the mornings these days but the biggest change is that the birds are so much more vocal in the mornings - marking out their territories in advance of the mating season. We drove home over the moors from Middleton in Teesdale today and there were scores of curlew, lapwing, and oystercatcher in the fields by the side of the road. All of these waders nest on the ground on moorland.
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Red Kite Special

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 We took a trip up to Scotland this week to look for red kites. We went to Argaty farm which is near Stirling. Unfortunately we chose a bad day for photography. Light was very poor and it was difficult to take photographs. The birds move very quickly and rarely settle on the ground swooping down to collect their food. The site is the only one in Central Scotland where the kites are fed regularly so you are pretty well guaranteed a sighting. We saw in the region of 30 birds. I was not delighted with the results and will go back and do it again sometime when the weather is better. The video gives a better idea of the situation. The birds are fed small amounts at the same time each day. Diary. The evening before  we left home for Scotland  I saw the first bat of the year in the lane. (possibly a noctule but Im not sure). We extended our trip to Scotland and visited the pine forest at Tentsmuir on the Tay estuary. Skylarks singing in the sunshine and although there had been a...
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Crossbank Nature Reserve

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 We have lived here for the best part of 14 years and have never visited a nature reserve a mere half dozen miles from the house ! When we arrived here somebody told me that it was not worth visiting and I have just ignored it! I finally put things right this week and visited  Crossbank Nature Reserve .  This is a private reserve attached to a pub. The whole place is a bit neglected but there were nice views of the countryside and the Howgill Fells from a bird hide. In the hollow at the bottom of the hill are a series of ponds fed by a stream. There are some  pathways crossing some perilous rotten wooden bridges with half of the slats missing! When I was there there were a lot of Canada geese, some moorhen, a heron, and a few teal. Diary A sunny and chilly morning today. Overnight cameras revealed a fox and several carrion crows making free with the dog biscuits that I had baited the area with.  The red squirrels are quite active at the moment. A nice kestrel pe...
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A Stormy Week

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 I have been doing this blog for over a year now and am starting to find it difficult not to repeat myself as the seasons repeat. I will probably post a bit less frequently in future and give a round up rather than a daily report. Its been very rainy and we have had a succession of winter storms - something to do with the direction of the jet stream apparently. Its been good time for photographs of rainbows and waterfalls though! I paid a visit to Tarn Sike Nature Reserve (CWT) after storm Franklyn at the end of last week. The stream is usually invisible from this vantage point but this video shows what it was like two days after the storm. Diary Fox in the camera trap. Lots of common gulls one the wet fields and a large flock of rooks using the field to gather on rather than a tree at the height of the winds. A big gang of long tailed tits on the bird feeders.
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Visit to Caerlaverock

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 I took a trip to Southern Scotland today to the North side of the Solway Firth. The WWT have a bird reserve at Caerlaverock that is one of my favourite reserves.  Caerlaverock Reserve The reserve is famous for its winter populations of Whooper swans and of Barnacle geese. These Whooper swans spend their summers in Iceland and undertake the long migration to Caerlaverock. The record time for this commute is 12 hrs at around 70 mph with a favourable jet stream!  The swans can lose 20% of their weight in migration. The image is taken on a pond at Caerlaverock showing the yellow breaker whooper swans together with a couple of the indigenous (orange beaked) mute swans. The other bird that makes this reserve so special is the barnacle goose that overwinters here in very large numbers. Barnacle geese breed in the Svalbard Archipelago off  Northern Norway. Up to 12,000 Barnacle geese overwinter here a significant percentage of the World population. It used to be thought tha...
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Red Kites Again

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 Great excitement yesterday when through the sleet we could see 5 birds of prey having an aerial combat. Three were buzzards but two were red kites. Just a fleeting glimpse and by the time I had fitted the right lens to my camera they had gone. This is the first time we have ever seen more than one red kite at the same time. We have had some miserable weather with sleet and wet snow - but were treated to a spectacular sunrise this morning. And when I arrived back home in the dark earlier in the week I got this shot of the Orion constellation  on my phone camera. Diary We have seen a lot of a male kestrel which has adopted a tree perch outside our window as a hunting perch in the last few days. I was pleased to capture this shot of a badger on the trail cams.
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Mild Winter With Flowers Arrving Early

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 People roundabout have been commenting on how mild a winter it has been (so far). This coincided with an article in this morning's  newspaper about how much earlier flowers are blooming and the potentially catastrophic effects this might have.  Guardian Newspaper I guess this underlines the importance of record keeping.                                                                                          Diary Mild again for the time of year 7C or thereabouts today with little wind. I have been seeing the usual foxes and rabbits on overnight cameras. I saw a badger two nights ago for the first time. in a while. A local farmer has given me a tip as to where their sett is so I will have to go and exp...
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