As daughter Laura returned from holiday on the 1st
July, we were preparing for our own holiday in Yorkshire, so we had a drive
over to see her and Douglas and to return the cat from its own ‘summer
holiday’. It was nice to record a
10-spot ladybird in their garden and to catch up with good numbers
of tree
sparrows that breed and feed around their garden. I had been having problems with my wee Lumix
TZ60 camera, a faithful companion over many years, but, with various electrical
faults developing it was time for a new one.
The first replacement came via Amazon (John Lewis ordering procedure too
confusing) and, after a few days of use I realised that the function that
allowed the camera to switch from image on screen to built-in viewfinder was
causing the camera to not provide an image on either, so it was returned. The arrival packaging also left something to
be desired with the camera, in its box, sliding around inside. However, arriving just 3 days before the
holiday there wasn’t time to send back so I just had to put up with the
fault. When working the camera was just
as good as the earlier model though one of the iA options had changed to
something much poorer when adjusting to allow for colour enhancement. The camera went straight into use and on the
evening
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| Lesser butterfly orchid and large emerald moth |
when it arrived accompanied me to an orchid count on the local golf
course with half a dozen BSBI members.
Lesser butterfly orchids appear in small numbers each year in the areas
of un-cut rough between some of the holes, and places where the course was
extended many years ago into an area where the orchid was known to be
present. The green-keepers are aware of
the orchids presence and manage the sites sensitively. In this dry summer a couple of dozen flowering
spikes were found along with a few greater butterfly and fragrant orchids. Bonuses were a new location for the six-spot
burnet moth and a nicely resting large emerald moth (Geometra papilionaria).
The following evening saw me carrying out my last count of
one of our local lochs, a great evening just sitting, watching and
recording. Nothing too unusual but
another useful bit of information to add to the BTO database from a slightly
remote loch. On the way quite a few
heather beetles were seen (Lochmaea suturalis) along with a wee moth I hadn’t
seen for a number of years: the Rannoch looper (Macaria brunneata). A white ‘spot’ on the side of a plant when
checked turned out to be a crab
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| Rannoch looper moth |
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| Crab spider with chimney sweeper moth evening meal |
spider (possibly Xysticus cristatus) holding
its evening meal, a chimney sweeper moth (Odezia atrata). These spiders are often seen on the tops of
flower-heads with legs outstretched, waiting for unsuspecting prey items to
land. This spider was to make another
catch in August which turned out to be very special! At the loch mallard and teal were feeding and
agitated calling close by suggested there was a water rail with young. A little grebe also was seen with a youngster
demanding food and, without seeing or scenting me, a roe buck wandered out to
the edge of the loch to feed. All told,
13
bird species were recorded and, once again, I was treated to a brilliant
sunset as I was making my way home. As
mentioned last month, permission had been given for me to protect the stumps of
hazel trees which had suffered quite a heavy bit of felling. Some trees were left as just stumps whilst
others had a single stem and all were trying to regrow but were suffering from
heavy grazing by roe deer. Sheep were
excluded from this important aspen/hazel wood over a decade ago so installing a
rylock fence circle round the hazels could give them a chance to re-grow. Unlike hazels in the south of England,
coppicing wasn’t a practice carried out very often in the Highlands and the
north and west of Scotland and the mature trees in some areas are home to
common and rare lichens. Davie, a local
fencing contractor, had given me several end of rolls of rylock, but several
whole rolls would also be needed to protect most of the hazel stumps, along
with suitable wooden stakes to hold the ‘rings’ in place. David Mills at the local BSW sawmill in Boat
of Garten was also very helpful and provided the last 30 stakes I needed to
complete the job. In the few days
available before heading south, there was just time to add additional stakes to
the trial ‘circle’ and to order the wire and stakes with most of the
installation work taking place next month.
The visit to add the extra stakes was
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| Twayblade top and wild basil |
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| Small nettle |
beneficial in another way allowing
me a chance to check on the population of twayblades growing, but hidden away,
in the deep bracken and grasses next to the River Spey. After a bit of searching 22 flowering spikes
were found and, on the way back to the car I popped over the roadside barriers
to find that a population of wild basil was still present and flowering really
well, along with a tiny population of small nettle (Urtica urens). With the sun shining the next day
there was just time to walk the monthly butterfly transect near Grantown on
Spey (same route as the breeding bird survey) before finally packing up for our
holiday. Four species were seen,
green-veined white (5), small tortoiseshell (1), small heath (1) and ringlet
(30) with the temperature averaging 220C.
Our recent trips south have benefitted from having an early
start to make reasonable progress down the A9 whilst keeping a careful eye on
the first 100 miles being watched over by ‘big-brother’ average speed cameras. Good progress was made until we turned onto
the dreaded A66 from the M6 at Penrith where, in front of us, we could see the
traffic starting to queue. After sitting
in the queue for over 20 minutes Janet got out the map and suggested we turn around,
head just a few miles back along the A66 before turning off towards Appleby,
stopping for our lunch in Colby, just on the edge of Appleby. Brilliant.
A quiet road (though quite a few folk were using it to avoid the problem
on the A66) and a first chance to record a few flowers whilst sitting on the
village green enjoying our
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| Lunchtime knapweed (Centaurea nigra var radiata) |
butties. We
spent about an hour in Appleby to stretch our legs and, with map on my
navigator’s lap, we enjoyed a leisurely drive along country lanes via Kirby
Stephen, over the tops of Birkdale Common where we stopped to admire the views
and find round-leaved crowfoot (Ranunclulus omiophyllus) in a pool next to the road. Keld, Gunnerside and on into Reeth where we
were to spend the next couple of weeks.
The
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| Round-leaved crowfoot |
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| Reeth |
rented house where we were staying was up a wee ginnel running
between two pubs, and, having managed to get the car close to the house front
door, we off-loaded all our gear before parking up on the village green in
front of the two pubs. This would be the
last time car and house would meet again until it was time to depart. Just time for a walk around the village to do
a bit of shopping before heading to one of the pubs (a real pub!) for drinks
and an evening meal.
8 July
We explored Reeth a bit more and then headed off to
Richmond. Janet spotted a craft fair in
the town hall so we popped in to check out the competition and enjoyed tea and
cakes before following the paths around the castle. High above the River Swale and on the path
right below the castle ramparts
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| Small tortoiseshells top and pollen beetles below |
were lots of ragwort flowers several of which
were covered in small tortoiseshell butterflies along with the occasional
green-veined white and ringlet. On many
other flowers there were masses of tiny black beetles and it was only after a
few days that we realised these were pollen beetles (Meligethes aeneus). The path options eventually took us down to
the river and, being a hot, sunny Sunday, the river was full of folk either on
the river bank or floating about in the water with the maddest sets of
inflatable buoyancy rings some of which must have taken most of the day to blow
up! We thought a visit to the castle
would get us out of the sun for a while, so we paid the entrance fee and made
our way into the castle and up to the top to admire the views. Looking down, we could see the outline of
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| Richmond Castle and the drought-exposed foundations |
the
foundations of some old buildings caused by the sun as the dryness killed off
the grass growing on the shallow soil above the remains of the foundations. One of the guides told us that this was the
location of an army barracks, built around the 1850s and knocked down in
1931. A cell block though has been
retained and inside there are walls of graffiti from prisoners, mainly
conscientious objectors from the 1st World War. Sadly, the cell block was closed to visitors
due to work being undertaken to repair and preserve the graffiti, so we were
only able to see a selection of photos showing some sections of it. Back at the house we had a couple of flies
which kept annoying us and, yes, these were the annoying house flies (Musca
domestica)!
9 July
A none car day and a walk along the River Swale. A footpath by the river took almost into the
village of Healaugh where a set of stepping stones allowed us to cross the
river and return along the other bank.
Early on, a fairly natural field produced big populations of betony (Betonica
officinalis), salad burnet (Poterium sanguisorba), red campion, and the choke
fungus (Epichloë baconii) on an Agrostis species of grass. By the river a kingfisher was heard but not
seen and a tall yellow plant turned out to be yellow loosestrife (Lysimachia
vulgaris) something I can’t remember seeing before.
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| Yellow loosestrife |
Almost back at Reeth and just below the
bridge taking us back across the river was an enormous bank of river shingle
which was covered in flowers so as Janet sat on the riverbank enjoying the sun
and a passing family of goosanders, I visited the shingle. The shingle bank was quite amazing, a big mix
of native plants but also a mix of garden escapees. Most of the latter would have been washed
down from riverside gardens during river spates and perhaps the most unusual
ones were early pampas-
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| Early pampas grass top and giant scabious |
grass (Cortaderia richardii) and a new vice-county record)
and giant scabious (Cephalaria gigantea ) just the second VC record). The plant species were so diverse that as
England played Croatia in the World Cup on the TV in the following evening, I
made a second visit to the site to try and list as many species that I could
identify and ended up with 65, with a 7-spot ladybird and alder tongue fungus
adding to the total.
10 July
Listed in my notebook as ‘up’t thill day’. From the village green in Reeth you can see
an imposing hillside called Fremington Edge to the north-east. Lots of the disturbed hillside is visible
where Chert quarries were worked in the past, and the road/track from the
village headed up through several of these.
It was a hot day and in full sun, so wide brimmed hats and sun-cream
were the order of the
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| Looking down on Reeth and Janet descending |
day. We passed a
couple coming down the track as we made our way up and, to avoid the heat, they
had set off hours earlier and were on their way back down! Highlights of the day were seeing lots of
carline thistles (Carlina vulgaris) and field after field with nests of the yellow
meadow ant (Lasius flava). However, despite
checking many nests, once again no active ants were seen. Small copper and red admiral butterflies were
also seen. A pint in the Buck Hotel was
most welcome once back in Reeth.
12 July
On arrival in Reeth I typed “nature reserves in Richmond
area” which produced an interesting site, Foxglove Covert Nature Reserve
located in the Catterick Army Garrison.
Working out the way in on the map was fun and as we got to the garrison
we had to stop at a sentry point and explain where we were going. Once in the garrison we met another soldier
who unlocked the gate to let us drive into the reserve. Despite being just 100 acres in size the mix
of species rich habitats is pretty amazing, natural and plantation woodland,
moorland edge, flower-rich meadows, small streams and a small lake. The reserve is also used regularly as a
mist-netting site to catch, ring and monitor breeding and
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| Small skipper on betony flowers |
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| Alder tongue on alder cone |
migrant birds. 23 species of butterflies have been recorded
from the 2680 species of plants, birds, butterflies and other animals so far
recorded, so it was nice to see small skippers, small tortoiseshell, large
white, ringlet, speckled wood and meadow brown.
Lunch in one of the hides overlooking a reed-bed produced a brief
sighting of a stoat and on a small lake there were families of little grebe and
tufted duck. Conversion of farm fields
to wildflower meadows was very impressive and though at an early stage, the
populations of the grass-suppressing yellow rattle were immense. In the alder wood the seeds were developing
the red, alder tongue fungus (Taphrina alni) and something growing in the small
stream had us scratching our heads until we realised it was the greater
spearwort (Ranunculus lingua) and the “odd aquatic” listed in my notebook
turned out to be an introduced species Canadian waterweed (Elodia canadensis),
a submerged aquatic originally native to North America. Close by we could hear members of the army
practicing on the shooting range or possibly on an active exercise.
13 July
We spent the morning inside due to RAIN, quite heavy between
12 and 2pm. As it eased, we headed to
Barnard Castle just a few miles up the road.
We parked up and explored the main street through the town before
heading towards a wood by the River Tees popping into a garden allotment along
the way. However, with a hosepipe ban,
the vegetables looked to be struggling a little. An information
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| The 'burdock fly' Terellia tussilaginis |
board told us we were entering
Flatts Wood and by the sign I noticed a few flies visiting flowers on a burdock
plant and just out of interest took a photo.
Probably less than a hundred metres into the wood Janet was pointing at
something growing from the masses of enchanter's-nightshade (Circaea lutetiana),
a helleborine, a rare plant on this holiday.
Checking the plants features we had found a single broad-leaved
helleborine though sadly the flowers hadn’t yet opened. A wall by the small
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| Enchanter's-nightshade top and broad-leaved helliborine |
Percy Beck stream was
well-off for ferns with brittle bladder, hart’s-tongue and maidenhair spleenwort
with the find of the day close by, remote sedge (Carex remota) and with an
orange ladybird (Halyzia sedecimguttata) thrown in for good-luck. Back at the house a laptop search for ‘flies
on burdock plant’ turned up the name Terellia tussilaginis, a gall fly, with
few records this far north (Yorkshire).
By the end of our holiday we had probably tripled the number of
locations for the fly in this area, so obviously not rare!
14 July
The day’s outing to Marske Beck and Clints Wood proved to be
one of the best days out for species seen and recorded. The wee burdock fly was seen again and during
the walk six species of butterfly were recorded the best being comma and as we
left the woodland to walk between farm meadows lots of yellow meadow ant nest
mounds could be seen many actually along the track verge. As we
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| Yellow meadow ant and nests top and Janet with fungus |
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| Musk mallow |
stopped for lunch Janet took shade
under and ancient, hollow ash tree whilst I hopped over the fence to explore an
old quarry area. With the very dry
weather a patch of rockrose was hardly identifiable being so small, but a blue
cranesbill type flower had me puzzled and turned out to be musk mallow (Malva
moschata). As I approached Janet, she
appeared to be wearing a very strange ‘hat’ which turned out to be an enormous
bracket fungus having fallen from the ash tree, Dryas saddle (Polyporus
squamosus). The meadows had good
populations of carline thistle and a few small skipper butterflies were
seen. At Orgate Farm we turned to walk
back along a minor road where goat’s beard (Tragopogon pratensis) was found, similar
in appearance to a tall, stately dandelion but usually quite difficult to see
amongst the roadside grasses. Close by
was a yellow shell moth (Camptogramma bilineata) and a fast flying red
admiral. The find of the day though was
found as we left the road to
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| Small-leaved lime leaf and galls |
cut-back across fields and woodland where a lime
tree caught my eye, and, remembering finding an unusual gall on the leaves of a
lime near Grantown, I started to check the leaves on this tree. Amazingly, there were the galls but, with the
lime leaves looking rather small I wondered if I was dealing with small-leaved
lime and therefore a different gall (Tilia cordata and the gall Aceria
lateannulatus). I found out later that
there were just 5 previous records in the UK, only 3 of which have been
confirmed as ‘correct’. Phew!
17 – 19 July
The last three days saw us continue to enjoy the hot dry
weather with a visit to the River Swale at Keld, with my map-reading seeing us
both almost requiring ropes to get up the steep hillside and
back to the track
we should have been on. The river by
this walk is famous for it three waterfalls, one of which requires a bit of a
scramble to see the best of the waterfall.
Though nothing too unusual was found over 70 species were recorded just
as we walked along and it would have been good though if time had allowed to
spend half a day right up by the limestone cliffs just to see what we might find
there.
The next day we headed to the edge of Richmond and,
convincing Janet that there wouldn’t be steep hills to climb (again) we head
off towards Whitcliffe Wood and Scar.
The first half an hour was a steady plod up a track(!) towards the wood
where we saw several comma butterflies along with 8
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| Small teasel |
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| Peacock butterfly |
other species of butterfly,
several red admirals and a peacock. The
burdock fly was recorded again and, in the wood, small teasel (Dipsacus pilosus),
a new species for us. Exiting the wood,
we were back into yellow meadow ant territory with lots of nest mound and, at
last, nests were the ants were seen. In
the distance we could hear the thud, thud, thud of the rotor of a big
helicopter and sure enough a chinook appeared almost overhead and appearing to
land/hover on a hillside on the other side of the River Swale, well into the
military exclusion area. A few minutes
later it reappeared and
hanging below it was a landrover and trailer! There was obviously an exercise taking place
and half an hour later two ‘normal’ helicopters passed overhead and spent the
rest of the time we were on our walk popping up and disappearing in the same
area as the chinook. As we walked it was
becoming obvious that we had another hill to climb (up to 1000’) to get to the
path that would take us back along the top of Whitcliffe Scar before dropping
us down to our starting point.
For our last day out we really should have had a good look
at our map, again. The woodland on the
map (Hudswell Wood and Calfhall Wood) probably disguised the contours and once
again we climbed steadily through the National Trust woodland until we reached
the road into Hudswell
village and the George and Dragon pub where we had an
enjoyable lunch. However, we had seen a
footpath sign which said there were a couple of hundred steps to follow to get
back to the river – and they weren’t joking.
Along the way we saw the biggest individuals and populations of
hart’s-tongue ferns ever and another patch of musk mallow. Oh, and don’t forget the wee fly on the
burdock plants!
The next day we packed up and headed north driving across
country to Brough and the dreaded A66 and yes, it happened again, a long
tailback of vehicles so we turned off and followed a minor road running
parallel to the A66. Then it was
Penrith, M6 and heading north arriving home at 6.30pm. Janet then sorted everything out for a craft
fair in Aviemore on the Sunday ensuring we dropped back into the run of the
mill tasks as though we hadn’t been away.
Three days later and we were back on the A9 at 7am heading
back to Lancashire for a family wedding (niece Abbie marrying Mike) on the 28th. Early in July Janet’s mum had been in
hospital to try and cure a serious foot infection the outcome of which meant
she would be moving into care just
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| Janet's mum and the family visit |
before we arrived for the wedding. A couple of days were spent helping to sort
out her flat along with daily visits to the care-home and then it was time to
dust off the best clothes and drive off to Immanuel Church to join all the
family members awaiting, with Mike, the arrival of the bride. What
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| The brilliant wedding and a happy grandson Harry at the wedding feast |
a day, an amazing church service
complete with a live orchestral quartet and wedding bells and then off to
Waddington for the wedding meal, speeches, celebrations and toasts to the bride
and groom. A day later and we were all heading
back north again to be greeted by four pine martens on the house deck in the
evening. A replacement Lumix camera had
also arrived via Amazon whilst we were away, the package having been left on
the back-door step where it had got damp before a neighbour rescued it. Once again, the box was open and there was no
packing inside. It was returned to
Amazon the next day without being unpacked!
That’s it for another month, and still trying to catch up!
Stewart and Janet
Richmond Castle including the cell block
Foxglove Covert Nature Reserve
NBN Atlas
Strathspey Weather
Parkswatch
Badenoch and Strathspey Conservation Group
Mapmate recording database
Fungal Records Database of Britain and Ireland (FRDBI)
BSBI – Botanical Society of Britain & Ireland
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| Town crier in Richmond |
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| Speckled wood |
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| Aspen watering has ended! |
Photos © Stewart Taylor
