The diary entries for the 1st March reminded me
that the weather must have been mild because the following were all singing:
treecreeper, dunnock, robin, mistle thrush and song thrush and also a great
spotted woodpecker drumming. I was also
feeling energetic enough to be dropped off by Janet near the Loch Garten and
Mallachie car park to make my way back to the house, visiting some seldom
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| Orange fruiting bodies of Lachnellula subtilissima |
visited areas of Abernethy woodland along the way. Nothing too unusual was found apart from the
wee orange fungus found on dead Scots pine twigs last year (Lachnellula subtilissima),
reminding me that I needed some better photos of it if I could find a good
population which I did later in the month.
The last entry in my diary that day was that Pipsy, our dear old cat,
wasn’t looking too well, breathing heavily and not eating very much, but I’ll
spare you the details about loo problems.
There was no
improvement at 7am the next day and her breathing was getting
worse, so we agreed to phone the vets. By the time the vet arrived at lunchtime
I had already prepared her last woodland resting place. So ended an association
going back 17 years. We miss you Pipsy.
The next day I did the ‘long’ walk through the Dell Wood
reserve to go and get the paper and arrived back just in time for an
unannounced visit from the District Nurse to see how I was getting on and she
seemed pleased with my progress. After
lunch I got a bit carried away and with camera and
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| Rugose fork-moss (Dicranum polysetum) |
tripod slung over my
shoulder went off to Grantown to see if I could re-find the scarce rugose fork-moss
(Dicranum polysetum) where last seen for the one and only time in November
2009. The ‘starry’ appearance of the
moss is what I was looking for and with the aid of my GPS it wasn’t too long
before I re-found it, about five small populations within a few square
metres. A search of several well
established grey sallow bushes nearby failed to find any large willow aphids (Tuberolachnus
salignus), a species that has totally eluded me over the last couple of
winters. However, a few more scale
insects were found on the willow twigs but by now my body was telling me it had
had enough and it was time to stroll, slowly, back to the car. The brilliant Laura Trott provided the evening
entertainment as she once again claimed gold for Great Britain in the scratch
race at the Track Cycling World Championships at Lee Valley VeloPark.
Early on the morning of the 6th I was aware of
some movement out in front of the chalet and a big pine marten wandered into view
– complete with a radio collar. Sadly it
didn’t hang around long enough for me to get my camera out but a few checks
locally informed me that it had been caught
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| Frond of hard shield-fern |
nearby as part of a yearlong
tracking programme by RSPB staff, so one to keep an eye open for in the future. It has only been seen once
since. My outing to find the snow flea
at Slochd in last month’s blog had also produced another find which took a few
days to confirm – the hard shield-fern (Polystichum aculeatum). At the ferns location there were just short
sections of the fern, possibly as a result of deer grazing, making my first
identification a little more difficult.
For some reason I hadn’t taken a grid reference of the location,
requiring another visit which I didn’t mind as there
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| Peltigera britannica lichen |
might have been more snow
fleas. No snow fleas but a couple more
locations for the fern were found with ‘whole’ fronds present, a new location
for the fern with few records nearby. A
few ancient willows higher up the slope looked interesting so I slowly made my
way to them just as the Tesco 'LESS CO' liveried freight train rolled past
below. The willows didn’t disappoint
with a good population of Peltigera britannica on rocks and tree base, the
yellow/green Psoroma hypnorum on
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| Spot the hare tracks! |
mosses on the trees along with lots of Nephroma
laevigatum with the nearest records by yours truly from about six kilometres
away. Plants that could be identified
were also recorded and once back on the track towards the car I followed a
brilliant set of hare (mountain?) tracks in the snow nicely lit by the late
afternoon sun.
Driving over to Kincraig to do the Friday pick up of the
grandchildren from school, I had popped into Kinrara Estate along the way to
have a re-check of aspens and birches first visited several years ago. This area was also one I managed to get
access to for the Ancient Tree Forum and Woodland Trust members to survey and
measure some of the really big trees, and on the pre-visit outing I myself
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| Leptogium saturninum lichen on aspen |
realised that some of the trees higher up the hill were worthy of a visit. This was me eventually getting round to it! Confusion over which black leafy lichen I was
seeing saw me going back for a day’s recording.
In this area there are two species rarely seen locally, Leptogium saturninum
and Collema furfuraceum, but both are present on some of the
aspens so this was a chance to try and fix
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| Collema furfuraceum lichen on aspen |
their differences in my mind. The first surprise was bumping into Ern
Emmett from the Highland Aspen Group, sitting on his bum whilst digging up
aspen suckers (roots) for propagating in the Groups tree nursery, with
permission from the estate of course. A
quick chat and I was off to check the trees, recording and photographing the
two lichen species as found whilst working my way up through the wood. A live, but heavily leaning aspen didn’t have
any of the target species but a good
population of a tiny pinhead lichen, Sclerophora
pallida along with piles of feather evidence of a couple of sparrowhawk kills
on the main trunk of the tree. About
this time a strange pain started to develop in my legs so time to sit down and
have lunch by which time it had eased allowing the last
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| Sclerophora pallida pinhead lichen and taking its photo top |
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| Sclerophora pallida purple reaction to potassium hydroxide (KOH) |
few aspens to be
checked. Sorting through the photos in
the evening the leg pain returned requiring a quick visit to the local health
centre the following morning. Legs
checked for blockages and all found to be okay and after discussing current
medication it was agreed to stop taking the pills started just four days
earlier. A bit of botanising along the
Dava Way near Grantown in the afternoon seemed to ease the problem and the
aches all cleared up after a couple of days.
A pity really because it would have been interesting to see what the
effect of taking Viagra for a month would have had. All linked to the recent operation –
honestly!
A week earlier an email arrived to say one of the Forestry
Commission staff had found what looked like an old capsule of the green
shield-moss on a fallen grand fir near Loch Ness. A photo of capsule and tree accompanied the
email and eventually a grid reference was also obtained. If correct the tree species would be new for
the moss so a trip to the site was made a few days later. Thankfully, the
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| Poor photo of old capsule of green shield-moss (Buxbaumia viridis) |
woodland was on the quieter
Foyers side of Loch Ness allowing the car to be parked by the road just below
the hill-side where the tree was located.
As the grid reference point was getting closer I entered a real jungle
of fallen trees, mostly grand firs and I had to crawl under some huge trunks
and walk all the way round others too heavily branched to climb over. The ‘Go To’ on my GPS was telling me I was
close to the original find but, with so many trees lying on their sides it was
becoming difficult to know which one might be home to the moss. Many trees close to the grid ref. were
checked and most looked like they could have supported the moss, but none was
found. In the end I switched off the ‘Go
To’ facility and walked, carefully watching the figures linked to the OS
National Grid until I was as near the reference given as possible. The nearest tree was searched but nothing
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| View over Loch Ness |
was
found. Thankfully, the capsule finder
had taken a photo of the tree but without the capsule location being shown, and
by finding the fence shown in the background of the photo I was able to find
the tree. All GPS machines vary in
accuracy and what I found was the reference given was a whole tree away from
the actual one! After three searches of
the main trunk I was about to give up, but that ‘one last search’ paid off and
I found what I was looking for and a new host was noted and photographed for
the record. In my Field Bryology article
way back in 2010 (see link below) 12 hosts were identified for the moss plus
one unidentified tree species. Since
then, 2 more hosts were found, oak and juniper with the Grand Fir (Abies
grandis) being the last to be added to the list. As I made my way back down the hill I could
see lots of skyward pointing branches of aspen trees close to where my car was
parked so a quick visit was made before the energy levels ran out. Despite many of the aspens being quite young
most were heavily endowed with lichens – hanging leafy ones and those growing
on the trunks – the result of being a bit further west than Strathspey and
growing close
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| Rear-view mirror close up of the Billy Bowie tanker! |
to the shore of Loch Ness.
Thankfully my bit of re-visiting at Kinrara Estate paid off and I was
able to name the Collema’s as I went from tree to tree. I also had an interesting experience as I
drove back down the A9, just after the dual-carriageway at Slochd summit. As I was driving along at the legal limit of
60mph, and with the average speed cameras monitoring my every move, a large
tanker artic drove up close and started to tailgate me despite supposedly
having a speed limit of 50mph. As I
pulled off for Carrbridge the tanker roared by and I could see from the advert
on its rear that it was a Billy Bowie tanker from either Kilmarnock or Leeds. Did they reply to my complaint – no chance.
A few firsts for the year occurred mid-month, the first
mosquito was on the wing on the 19th, we saw our first frog spawn on
17th and I had my first two ticks on 22nd, a few days
after Janet had one whilst working in the garden. Oystercatchers were by the River Spey and we
had the first small
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| Common frog with spawn nearby |
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| First small tortoiseshell butterfly 10 April in Nairn |
tortoiseshell butterfly in Nairn. As the snowdrops came into flower I did a
survey of the number of clumps along the River Nethy between the Spey and the
village. Some may have become
established by being washed down the Nethy and others, growing with daffodils
and crocuses had probably been planted. Plants
with single and double flowers are all recorded as Galanthus nivalis, but in
the village there is a clump of green snowdrops (Galanthus woronowii)
identified by having much wider leaves and slightly different flowers. A few plants, still standing and with
seed-heads, of figwort
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| Green snowdrop in centre with normal snowdrop left and right |
were spotted by the Nethy and as I walked back through
the village a big group of (probably) opium poppy heads caught my eye as most
were covered with circles of a black fungus, probably a mould, which, to date,
has eluded identification. Perhaps
another one for the ‘to do’ pile at Kew.
The same day (24th) a heavy cold started to develop, not
helped by me spotting a new group of mature aspens by the old railway line on
the edge of Grantown on Spey the following day.
The aspens looked
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| Poppy head and fungus to be identified |
interesting so I just had to visit but not having set
out to go recording, I was a bit under-dressed, lacking the heavier Paramo
jacket and dressed in just a lightweight waterproof. The visit though was very worthwhile producing
a new location for some of the rarer lichens and finding one of the biggest
population of the rare Fuscopannaria mediterranea lichen on one tree. With the cold getting worse I stuck around
the house for the next few days but was tempted out to attend the first plant
recording
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| Fuscopannaria mediterranea lichen black crust with yellow patches |
outing with Ian on the Saturday.
This was to visit the River Findhorn near Forres to check out the known
sites for the yellow star-of-Bethlehem (Gagea lutea) the plant I looked for a
year previously to try and find the leaf fungus Vankya ornithogali. The fungus was one of the species highlighted
by the Kew ‘Lost and Found’ project and when I did find it last year at just
one of the many plant locations visited, I think this was the only UK record in
2015. Would it be there again this year
– I just had to forget the cold and join Ian et al to find out. Being quite early in the season there were
few plants in flower, but the list grew as we wandered along and totalled
almost 60 species for the day. First
find was actually the common star-of-Bethlehem (Ornithogalum umbellatum subsp. campestre)
with
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| Yellow star-of-Bethlehem flower and Vankya ornithogali fungus on leaves |
white flowers and as we walked it was the Alliums that tested everyones
identification skills as most clumps comprised just the leaves, the flowers
having yet to appear. There was ramsons,
keeled garlic and few flowered leek or garlic. In places, the first flowers of
moschatel were appearing. The patches of
Yellow Star-of-Bethlehem started to accumulate as we walked but all lacked the
leaf fungus and out of the 16 patches found only the one that had the leaf
fungus last year was displaying it again this year. Another good outing – thank you Ian. That night the clocks moved forward by an
hour, and with the cold no better the last few days of March were spent close
to the house and catching up with getting my records into Mapmate.
The month ended with the retirement from RSPB Abernethy of
another of the long-term members of staff with everyone gathering on the 31st
to say thanks and cheerio to Desmond Dugan.
Desmond
arrived as the warden of the Forest Lodge section of the reserve
in 1988 ahead of the amalgamation of Loch Garten, Forest Lodge and Upper Glen
Avon to form the current Abernethy Forest Reserve (NNR). So, important times as new faces appear to
take up the new challenges that lie ahead.
Also on the 31st I received an email informing me
that there appeared to be some fellings taking place in the important aspen and
hazel wood by Spey Bridge on the edge of Grantown on Spey. What I found on the 1 April has taken up a
lot of my time since and is one of the reasons why this blog is a little late
in appearing. The horrors of what I
found will be covered next month and, despite the date, there was no joke.
Enjoy the read
Stewart and Janet
Highland Aspen Group (HAG)
Buxbaumia viridis in Abernethy Forest and other sites in
northern Scotland by Stewart Taylor. Field
Bryology Volume 100
Billy Bowie tankers
Lost and Found Project (see Project Reports and Archive)
NBN Gateway
Fungal Records Database of Britain and Ireland (FRDBI)
BSBI – Botanical Society of the British Isles
Highland Biological Recording Group (HBRG)
and how to join HBRG
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| Tooth fairy time for Archie |
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| The long wait is over! |
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| Honey bees collecting pollen from Janet's crocuses |
Photos © Stewart Taylor
