The last post was a long time ago, and with fair reason, although it was never my intention for them to drop off entirely. While I highly doubt there was anyone waiting with baited breath for the next update I apologise if there was.
SO... basically I got a job. Then another one, then rekindled a hobby, then ... you know ... stayed busy!
The job was in the Peak District National Park, building a footpath as part of a moorland restoration project. That went well, despite working through the tail end of winter and a very cold spring, regularly in snow or sleet and in one of the most exposed places possible in the UK south of the Lake District. Anyway, it was good, and the organisation over-seeing the project started hiring just as I was finishing up for the season, one thing led to another and for the last 2 1/2 months I've been working for the Moors for the Future Partnership as a Conservation Works Officer.
This is basically as good as it sounds and has involved learning a lot, being out doors a lot and even the odd ride in a helicopter to remote work sites... I know, I know its a tough job.
Around half way through the first of these jobs an idea I have been mulling over off and on since I was a teenager made a very obvious sub-conscious push for dominance and I decided to invest in a better (second hand still) camera and try to make something of my photography: for so long a hobby it seemed the time was right to make it something more.
As a result Wild Guy Photography was born and a lot of the efforts I had been putting into this blog have been redirected into that, including a new blog as part of the new web page. The subject matter is slightly different, but only in the sense that it includes more photo's. The theme if you will of my efforts and hopefully of my photographs is still how fascinating the natural world and its occupants are but with the new job my visits to the 'local patches have sadly been few and far between, I certainly don't have anything like the time I used to to visit them as I leave home for work before 7am and often get home after 6pm - busy days when you add coming home to a young family in the mix. Of course I have a new local patch now, my commute runs straight through the National Park and affords me beautiful views (when it's not foggy) not to mention the sites I get to visit 'in the line of duty'. Lets just say I'm not quite starved of natural nourishment despite the reduced time for local outings.
Anyway, as a result of this I'll be transferring my attention on a permanent basis to the Wild Guy bits and pieces but would welcome anyone who might be interested in continuing to follow me to do so either via the website and blog (www.wildguy.co.uk) or my Facebook page (here), Twitter feed (here), Instagram account (here) or anywhere else I may show up in the future.
I've found myself falling behind with updating this blog,
partly because of other commitments, and partly because
there is so much I could write about. So I'm going to try
and just do a few highlights instead.
Here's the highlights from the past week.
Last Friday Morning ~ We woke to snow! A rare occurrence this winter, only had one fall before now, right back at the end of November. Knowing that the forecast was for a warming day and not wanting to waste the clear skies and scenic views I allowed myself a few minutes after dropping my daughter off at school to visit one of my local patches: Park Hall Country Park.
The clear blue skies, low sun and crisp, fresh snow didn't disappoint and it was a beautiful morning. After taking a few pictures and walking ... not very far really, I heard a buzzard and turned to see it land in a tree overlooking a rising field of virgin snow. After a few minutes of repositioning to attempt to record this scene, inevitably perhaps the buzzard moved off. I managed to get a few images but none of them had quite the same impact as that first location. Regardless it was beautiful to see, made all the more special by the fleeting conditions that morning.
I love the hidden world you are able to glimpse more clearly after snow - rabbit footprints mooching down a path, fox tracks stalking around the edge of a field, a few hopped prints from a bird bracketed by wing marks in the snow indicating a rushed departure. Nice to be out on a day like that, even if only for a few minutes.
Tuesday Morning ~ I was out around the farm where I manage woodland again today. I had arrived early, just before sunrise so had an early start but even before I parked the car I had seen 3 or 4 Barn Owls. They really did look spectral in the half light against the heavy frost on the fields that morning. Just minutes later what has to be one of the most beautiful sunrises I can remember seeing was breaking over the horizon. I only had my phone camera with me but wasn't going to miss recording that view.
Within 5 minutes of leaving the car I had seen 5 deer of two different species, several species of duck including Teal, a Little Egret along with several other water birds (I was walking along a drainage dike bank). The frozen ground had a perfectly recorded history of what had passed that way (the last time it was soft at least) - deer slots were prolific but badger and fox tracks along with game birds were frequent.
I ended up walking 6 miles around the farm that morning, and what a morning, just a pleasure to be out of doors. The final bit of the walk included collecting the camera trap which I had placed out there last week. I managed to get another video of the stoat which was my initial target. I hope it won't be the last of my encounters with the little predator.
Thursday Morning ~ Another cold and frosty morning dawned, albeit a dull cloudy one. A lot has been said about the mild winter we've had so far and even now we've had a bit of a cold snap there are still little relics of that mild weather, like this flowering Daisy, one of quite a few I found in this frosty field on route to a short walk through some local woods.
A little further on, in the woods, I was tracked along my route by birds, small flocks of Long-tailed Tits, Chaffinches, as well as a Tree Creeper and a Gold Crest. The Gold Crest is a particular favourite of mine. I love seeing them, and so often it starts as a game of hide and seek - the first glimpse is usually just that, a glimpse of something inconceivably small flitting in the vegetation, after a few more flits and glimpses you realise that it's one of two birds: a Wren or a Gold Crest, and then... finally a decent view and that flash of gold. I love those moments, they brighten my bird watching no end. I also love the old wives tale that they hitch a ride to the UK on the backs of Woodcock because there is no way a bird that small could fly across the sea itself! Photo's from oil rigs and boats in the North Sea covered in migrating birds, including a good share of Gold Crests indicates otherwise.
Along with the weeks nature highlights an update to the 1000x1000 challenge.
I'm up to 15.7 miles (way behind, some serious catching up to do!) and 74 species (doing OK, need to keep on it though).
Not that it has been much of a problem yet this year; our winter, until this weekend at least, really hasn't lived up to its title. For a few days this week I stayed in the woods and while the thermometer claimed it was down to just above freezing at night, and a frost outside the wood on at least one morning backed that up, it never really felt that cold. I wish it would get properly cold, cold enough to freeze the ground nice and hard so I can drive into the wood with a trailer to collect some of the seasoned wood from last year. At present, to avoid doing too much damage to the tracks the closest I can get is about 1/4 mile from camp - doesn't sound like much, but walking all that way, with all that equipment you might just change your mind.
Anyway, 'not feeling too cold' was not a sentiment shared by everyone in the woods this week. That's right - I had company for a change. My brother who works at an agricultural college had brought down a group of students to let them experience some woodland management work: protecting stools from browsing deer, building dead hedges with brash etc etc. By far their favourite task seemed to be burning the brash though, I can't think why?!
But this isn't about the students, it is about the wildlife and as always it didn't disappoint. For a start I had left out a borrowed camera trap when I left the week before; overlooking an obviously well used track with fresh deer slots I was confident it would not be collected empty, and to make double sure I had baited it with some squirrels culled as part of our ongoing control measures. Alongside the deer I was hoping for a scavenging Badger, but I suppose a fox would have been OK. Below is a video I put together from some of the footage - not all of it though...
I got a bit bored of squirrels and pheasants, so have only added limited footage of those but the deer particularly I was very happy with. It shows at least two Muntjac bucks, at least one doe (but likely a few) and a nice Roe buck in velvet too.
Towards the end of the video though you will have seen what I was particularly excited about this week - 'The Stoat'. Allow me to explain - those who have read this blog before will remember my find of what I thought to be a stoat 'nest' (den? - I'll have to check up on that). When I found it it contained half of a freshly dead Great-Spotted Woodpecker and a piece of Squirrel tail. Anyway, I was fairly confident that there was a stoat around and hopeful that one day I would catch a glimpse. Where the camera trap had been set up wasn't likely to catch it, at least no more likely than anywhere else in the wood, because it was some distance from where I had found the nest. Then...
We had been working on a coppice coupe across the wood from the camp, and some of the group, although not me (I either had my chainsaw ear defenders on or this is yet another indication that I need to expedite the hearing test my wife has told me I need to have) had heard a squealing, my brother had caught it and was confident that it had been a Rabbit squealing. Putting two and two together we reckoned it was quite likely to have been a sign of a successful stoat hunt and thought little more of it. Until a few minutes later when I headed back up to the main camp to collect some additional tools.
Lost in my own little world for a few minutes having walked that section of woodland track dozens if not hundreds of times by now, I didn't even notice until I was nearly on top of it a very dirty rabbit lying in the path. Awoken from my revere by this realisation, I immediately realized several things: 1) we had been right about the stoat hunting,
2) based on roughly where the squeals were heard it had already been dragged a fair way to get it this far (how dirty the rabbit was confirmed that)
3) the stoat was unlikely to abandon a meal of that quality so I must have disturbed it and
4) it would be back, but not until I wasn't on the scene.
At this point the rabbit, having spotted me and not quite given up the fight gave a few feeble kicks until it came to rest against a pile of firewood, meanwhile I backtracked to a large tree 10 metres or so back to watch. After just a minute or two there I decided a much better idea was to get the camera trap which I had at camp waiting to reset, and set it up watching the Rabbit - so I did just that.
The story at this point becomes a bit drawn out so I'll try to summarise. Having left the trap in said position I went back to check it and found the rabbit gone and three new triggers (but no way of viewing them - no screen on this model! Grrr!). I located the rabbit which had been dragged under a pallet of firewood several metres from where I had last seen it and lying in such a way it was pretty clear it hadn't got there by itself. I reset the camera again, this time overlooking the access point to the pallet and again left it be. That night I checked the trap again - no rabbit under the pallet, 60 triggers on the camera. The main path was probably in sensor range so I was expecting most of those to be distant views of me or the students going back and forth but hoped that at least one was my elusive little predator. Again I managed to locate the rabbit carcase, this time dragged another few metres and pushed (or pulled) under some old corrugated tin panels, with a clear path of disturbed leaves in its wake.
As I write this the camera trap is still watching that gap under the tin, but with a fresh memory card. I brought the original one home and got what you see at the end of the video. The three triggers in the original location turned out to be me setting it up, me collecting it and... a student, typical. I guess it was just a little to far away for the sensor to pick up but I was treading a delicate line between not disturbing the scene and catching the footage, this time I erred a little too much on the side of no disturbance, but it is what it is. The footage in the video is from the second location and were two of the first shots captured, perhaps just minutes after I placed the camera but I can't be sure because I forgot to note the time I relocated the camera! It certainly wasn't more than an hour. I can't wait to pick up the camera from its current location and see what I've got on there. Fingers crossed!
Anyway - while I think it is pretty clear what the highlight of my trip was it wasn't the only thing I did or saw. I also saw all three species of deer we get in the woods, loads of bird life, including, one morning without even leaving my bed: Great Tit, Blue Tit, Marsh Tit, Long-tailed Tit, Blackbird, Fieldfare and Robin and heard a Green Woodpecker; along with Tawny Owls and deer during the night - not a bad place for a bed. The bulbs are still determined to come through although with the weather taking the turn it has since I left on Thursday evening they may have at least started to weaken their resolve! I'll hopefully be back for a flying visit on Tuesday so I can check the camera trap then - updates will follow: excited hardly covers it!
1000x1000 species update:
Miles Walked: 7.74 m
Species Recorded: 57
I am a fair way behind on the walking side as you can probably tell!
Species recording I am doing OK but will need to do a few days of proper recording effort rather than just jotting down what I remember while I am out and about at this stage.
I mentioned previously I'd do a few holiday posts - my 'local' patch when I'm away from home. This is Part 1 - my parents local patch;
Part 2 will be my parents-in-laws local area.
I've mentioned a few times about nature close to homes other than my own. While growing up I've moved around a fair bit, as a result the concept of a 'home' in the sense of a house or even a region which I consider to be 'where I belong' doesn't really work. I've been pretty lucky that many of the different areas I have at some point called home have been beautiful, and provided me with easy access to stunning areas to explore and get to know.
My parents have now, for the time being at least, settled in Cambridgeshire - the Fens to be precise - and when we visit them there is no shortage of natural distractions to keep me occupied, despite being flat as far as the eye can see from my parents house, the only real elevation change visible from their house is the bank of the Ouse Washes where they rise up to keep the water in during the winter. Its pretty different from where I currently call home in Stoke-on-Trent. They live 1/2 mile outside of a small rural village in an old farm house, surrounded by large, intensively farmed arable fields. This may not sound at first like the ideal area for wildlife but you may be surprised.
Being so close to the washes they are regularly over-flown by vast clouds of birds - swans, geese, various ducks, Lapwings, occasionally Golden Plovers and so on. They have even had Cranes fly over in the last few years as they have started spreading through East Anglia with the Ouse Washes a regular haunt. The honking and trumpeting around dawn and dusk in the winter as flocks of hundreds commute to and from roosting grounds is a consistent reminder that the vast open fields do provide a resource for something other than British Sugar (sugar beet is a common crop). In the summer the intermittently wet ditches bordering the fields supply hordes of Dragonflies to feast on the hordes of other invertebrates breeding in the ditches.
A Ruddy Darter photographed at WWT Welney, just a few miles away, a few years ago.
Apart from the wetland birds Badgers, Foxes, three species of deer, Hares, Barn and Little Owls, Partridges, Herons, Egrets, all the 'garden birds' you'd expect, along with some you wouldn't, plus their predators - Sparrowhawks, Kestrels, the odd Hobby and Peregrine even; all have graced their 'garden' with a presence, some more regular than others. One particular highlight are the Marsh Harriers which have nested the last few seasons a half mile or so behind the house with both parents and several chicks being a regular sight towards the end of the breeding season. You certainly don't get that from your bedroom window just anywhere! Bats roost in the attic; a Barn Owl regularly roosted in one of the outbuildings last year and this summer Kestrels nested in one of the mature sycamore trees which stand out front.
The inverted commas around 'garden' above are because it's rather atypical - more accurately it is a yard between the house and the outbuildings and then a portion of the field the house backs onto left to grass by the landlord for the use of the tenants. It is, depending on the season, a camp site, overflow car park, vegetable garden, rugby pitch, archery range and on and on. Carpeted with flowers in the summer its a hotbed for butterflies, bees and hover flies.
A Common Blue butterfly photographed at the Ouse Wash reserve, a few miles the other direction.
Being that close to the Washes, if the wildlife in the garden isn't satisfying enough, a short jaunt gets you to some of the best wetland bird watching opportunities in the UK during the winter months. Both the RSPB's Ouse Washes reserve and WWT's Welney reserve (if you don't mind paying the entry fee) are minutes away by car, and probably less as the swan flies. My last post listed a brief visit to the Ouse Washes in a stolen few minutes before a meeting. While they are renowned for their winter birds, and the vast flocks are undeniably an inspiring if noisy spectacle, I actually prefer them in the summer. Maybe its my recent fascination with Dragonflies because they are plentiful along the water courses, or maybe its just that with the lower water levels you can actually see the land that makes up the staggering engineering feat which the washes are. If no other landscape demonstrates it then the Washes show that mans influence can be beneficial to wildlife, even if it isn't by design. They are a fascinating landscape feature, perhaps not unique but certainly unusual, rare and ecologically diverse.
My parents have only lived there a few years to date but this has already produced a few moments that stand out. One was this summer - I was visiting with my daughter and was excitedly told that my little brother had seen a badger behind the house. I'd seen latrines around the field boundaries and a badger had been hit on the road out front the year before, so that there were badgers around was never in doubt. They'd even been spotted on camera trap footage from the 'garden' but never seen in the flesh. When the following evening a cry of "Badger!" went up the stampede to get upstairs to the window overlooking the garden threatened to bring down the ceiling. Sure enough, there was a badger, a smallish one by the look of it, working its way systematically along the un-mown border between the field proper and the 'garden'. Having watched it for a few minutes and noticing its consistent progress along the border I grabbed the camera and dashed downstairs to try and get in front of it so I could snap a picture or two if the light would play ball. My initial plan worked: I belly crawled out across the field and laid up against the un-mown border to keep my outline disguised by the long grass and shadows, what little wind was blowing in my favour and I could just make out the visitor steadily working its way towards me in the almost gone dusk light - I was counting on its poor eyesight and the favourable wind to allow it to get nice and close.
What followed was without doubt my most exciting Badger watching episode to date. It just kept on coming closer and close until it was about 10 yards short of me, at which point it decided that the centre of the field held richer prospects and headed away from shelter into more open areas and walked right past me, just yards away. Turning to follow it I realised that two of my brothers had followed me out and had laid on the other side of the field to join in the close encounter experience. This route also put the badger in a far better place for taking a picture. Although the quality is shocking due to the by this point also non-existent light, it catches the essence of the moment - so close we could hear it chewing. We laid still and let it on its way, once it was a little way past us it caught our scent, the wind which had hidden us now betraying our presence. It looked around, only a little concerned, then ambled back through the border, into the crop and disappeared. Judging by its behaviour and the time of year I suspect it was a young badger from the year before turfed out to find its own way, but its impossible to say for sure. Regardless it was brilliant to watch, a memory which will stick with me and a massive point of jealously for my wife who joined us down there the next day.
There are probably other instances I could recount but this wasn't intended as exhaustive, simply a snap shot, a reminder that nature is never far away, and a brief reminder to myself of how fortunate I am to have nature so close, so often, regardless of where I am. Another account - Local Patch Abroad (Pt 2) - will follow in the near future describing the areas near my in-laws, which if anything, is even more diverse and interesting ecologically speaking!
First up I've made a minor adjustment to my challenge plans:
I originally said that I would only count species I saw while I was walking my 1000 miles - I have since realised that this is a bit arbitrary. For the first few months it probably won't make any difference apart from being annoying when I see something from the car or while working. And for the last few months, when I realise just how big a number 1000 is when it comes to species, it will be an unnecessary limitation. With that in mind I've got some catching up to do on noting down the species seen over the last few days while I've been working in the woods. I've strated a new page at the top which I will try to update
Despite this change I still won't count miles walked unless I've set out to 'walk'. In case you wonder why the distinction - yesterday (according to a app my phone came with and I can't figure how to turn off) I walked over 8 miles while working in the woods yesterday just going back and forth without actually 'walking' anywhere. While this is good for me because it means without even trying I'll blast past 1000 miles half way through the year, I don't think it's quite what the challenge issuers had in mind.
And so on to my work trip: I love my job!
At the minute (in the middle of 'winter' which isn't really a winter... yet) the temperatures are more like spring as I'm sure you've noticed. The wildlife certainly had. Without really looking I found Blackthorn, Primrose and Dogs Mercury in flower, Hazel catkins out and various other trees in bud, while the bulbs are coming up in quantities I wouldn't expect until early March. Animals too - I saw Fieldfares in much larger groups than ever before at the wood and it was suggested to me that perhaps, due to the unseasonal weather, they are gathering to return to breeding grounds. If this is the case I'm not sure what they have to look forward to! I saw Squirrels (Grey's of course) shall we say 'in the throes of spring', and while not at the woods, I've also seen Coots mating. While not as unusual perhaps there is also a plethora of fungi out and about at present.
Primrose in flower crazy
(Apologies for poor quality of all photo's in this post, taken with my phone)
However - the high rainfall (191% of average December rainfall according to preliminary Met Office reports!) has also been felt: the track going into the woods has been getting gradually wetter and wetter over the last 2 months or so and we are now at the point where we'll have to stop outside and carry all our gear in until we get drier weather and the track dries out. Not ideal as we have a fair bit of kit and it weighs, well not literally a tonne, but you get the idea.
Blackthorn blossom
The woods really are alive. I love the soundscape as well as the landscape. I'm the worlds worst 'bird song recogniser' (if that is even a phrase) - I can recognise a few but others, despite efforts of varying commitment at various times, sound so similar I just can't do it, or at least can't put the right name to the song or call. I know that a lot of this is probably just consistent and determined practise, but that is where I am at present regardless.
But laying in bed (i.e in a sleeping bag, on the floor, in an open sided tarp shelter) waking up in the morning listening to the world waking up around me is wonderful. Yesterday morning without even getting out of my sleeping bag I had a Robin sat just yards away and a small mammal of some sort, either a wood mouse of field vole I think, but it really was the briefest of glimpses, peering round a corner of the tarp. As the day progresses other sounds take over - drumming woodpeckers was a particularly common noise over the last few days.
Hazel Catkins
Noises are an inseparable part of sleeping in the woods, whether they unsettle or excite you is a personal thing - I love it. Owls calling, deer barking, rustles and snuffles, including some just inches from my ear on Tuesday night, I'm guessing a mouse in the dead leaves against the tarp. It reminds you that while the human world has effectively shut down, the natural world is as busy as ever. I've left a camera trap out at present and hopefully next week will have something to show for it.
A first thing walk-round revealed woodcock exploding out of nettle beds, Chinese Water Deer nosily exiting stage right from deep within a bramble thicket, a hare sneaking away far more discreetly than either managed, large, noisy flocks of fieldfare playing musical tree and many other little birds flitting to and fro. I foolishly didn't take my binoculars; sometimes it's nice to just see rather than look (does that make sense) but I wish I had them that morning as there was so much to see. It also doesn't help me with my species lists.
As of yet, while I am still seeing something new most days I haven't started to be really intensive about species recording, doubtless that will start in the next month or so when daily 'new' species start being a bit fewer and further between. This inevitable means there are some species I will have 'seen' but not recorded yet. There are also some which I have photographed but not got around to identifying yet, I will endeavour to do these quickly as time allows.
As my posts become more regular to keep up with my progressing challange, they will also become shorter, forgive me then for leaving this one here. This afternoon I am getting out for a short walk closer to home so may have more updates to add before the day is out anyway!
See My '1000x1000 challenge' page to see where I am up to so far.
Thanks for reading!
