RXwildlife Sightings

We had two infrequent avian visitors to our Northiam garden this week.  The first was a reed bunting.  Feeding under the seed feeders, flicking its white edged tail, and hopping about nervously.  For some reason a female house sparrow took great offence to it and kept trying to drive it off.  Graphs on the BTO Garden Birdwatch website show that this time of year is the period when these birds are most likely to turn up in gardens, presumably as food is in short supply in the countryside. The second bird was an early morning arrival, a grey heron. These birds are particularly shy and tend to be seen first thing in the morning.

Perhaps, like me, it was Read the rest of this entry »

Sparrows in our garden have been nest building for the past couple of weeks now.  What did they do before Pampas Grass was introduced?

There can be little doubt that the introduction of the nyger seed feeder has had a dramatic impact on the numbers of goldfinch using gardens.  This is shown clearly by the graphs on the BTO Garden Birdwatch website which shows a clear trend in increased numbers of this bird over the past 15 years. At the start of 1996 they were recorded in just over 10% of the gardens participating in this monitoring scheme. Today the figure stands at over 60% of gardens

What a success story for Read the rest of this entry »

The warm weather this month is keeping reptiles active.  Our garden in Northiam was graced by an adult grass snake and a juvenile slow-worm, basking under pieces of warm roof felt.  Also under one of these was a tiny palmate newt eft, chancing its luck somewhat with the snake closeby!  This animal had a faint orange-brown stripe all the way down its back and tail, whereas in the smooth newt there is a short stripe starting on the top of the head and petering out above the fore-limbs.

The recent run of wet weather should help this animal to forage and put on weight before the winter draws on. In dry weather these animals tend to be confined to any refuge that retains some moisture. Under 25mm long it’s amazing to think that in 18 months time this could be an adult returning to our pond to breed, if it manages to avoid the grass snake!

Garden ponds can be great wildlife habitats, but with their butyl liners and plastic plant containers can look horribly artificial.  They don’t have to be that way though as this photo shows. This believe it or not is a pond with a butyl liner and under the mound of moss is a planting basket that was established in 1986. It became covered in a layer of moss that has been allowed to grow since then to form a natural looking hummock, through which lesser pond sedge and purple loosestrife grow.

I’m so taken with this mound that on the two occasions Read the rest of this entry »

Buddleia is well known as a pollen and nectear provider for butterflies and other insects, yesterday a good range of species were feeding on the buddleia in my garden. A Humming-bird Hawk-moth was a nice find, 4 Small Tortioseshell were also good to see as this species never seems to be abundant in recent years, other butterflies present Red Admiral, Large and Green-veined White, Comma and Holly Blue. Bumblebee species found feeding included Terrestris, Lapidarius, Pascuorum and Pratorum. Three of the above are pictured below.

Humming-bird Hawk-moth

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Both of the (introduced) East Sussex populations of the rare stinking hawk’s-beard Crepis foetida have increased in numbers this year.  At Rye a minimum of 1035 plants were present, a major increase from the previous highest total of 417 plants last year.  This significant increase was down to the creation of another fenced plot from which rabbits were excluded two years ago.  This now contains 79% of the plants, and most of the larger specimens.  The original plot may be getting a little overgrown, and may benefit from some deliberate scarification of the gravel to see if this produces better growing conditions.  As in previous years a few plants were found growing outside of these plots until they started to grow tall flowering stems and attracted lagomorph attention. Read the rest of this entry »

A meadow is a different place at night.  The hum of bees is replaced by the hum of midges, and a totally different suite of animals come out to forage.  Slugs and snails are abundant, one of the reasons why slow-worm do so well in this habitat.  At this time of the year newts are also common here, with three smooth newts observed clambering over the plant stems this evening in a surprisingly three dimensional way.

They do well in this habitat because it offers shelter from desiccation and predators.  The base of the lawn is surprisingly Read the rest of this entry »

Meadows vary down the years, dependent on conditions that influence survival of the plants in the sward over the preceeding year - variables influencing seed set, survival of seedlings and mature plants all introduce an element of unpredictability about these habitats.  Last year this grassland in Northiam was dominated by red clover Trifolium pratense.  This year it features abundant smooth hawk’s-beard Crepis capillaris which has produced an over-whelming dominance of yellow, rather than pink flowers. These are popular with a number of species of solitary bee and abundant small beetles at the moment.

This is a Read the rest of this entry »

We had another visit from a green woodpecker in our Northiam garden this week, this time a female, lacking the red centre in the black moustache. Rather than probe the lawn it systematically worked the edge of our patio in search of ants.

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