Signs of spring at last!

I had a walk around the Meadows yesterday to look for signs of spring. To me it seems to have been a very long winter with snow again this morning. However there are a few signs of improvement.
The first sign that things are at last beginning to change was the sound of two Chiffchaffs, one at either end of the Meadows. I did manage to see one of them. A Great Spotted Woodpecker looked a bit odd perched on the trunk of a very small oak sapling which was only about three feet high. Several Redpolls were in the hedge by the railway track and a couple of Reed Buntings were in the bushes behind the pond. Two male Mallards were at the back of the pond and were photographed later by Joan and Geoff Tyndall.
Lots of other birds were singing, Blackbirds, Song Thrush, Blue and Great Tits, Nuthatch and Chaffinches were all defending territory. High above a pair of Cormorants circled two or three times before moving off.
There is a large patch of frogspawn in the pond, I hope it survives, but it has been frozen a few times.
The plant life seems weeks behind where it usually is by now but there are signs if life.

Mallards on the pond - Photo by Joan Tyndall

The Oak Tree

I saw a TV programme about trees recently and it said that trees can be aged by measuring the diameter of the trunk and doing a simple calculation. This gives an approximate age for the tree. This morning I went down onto the meadows and tried this method out on the big oak tree.
The calculation came out at about 130 years, meaning that the tree began its life in 1888, so its a Victorian!
If only it could speak and tell us what it had seen in all those years.

Our Victorian Oak

 

Winter weather

The last few days have been a taste of real winter with a fall of snow and really cold temperatures. The pond is completely frozen over but the ice is pretty thin so no skating!
Birds were a bit thin on the ground this afternoon save for a few blackbirds and a very vocal nuthatch.

Late afternoon by the pond

Pond looking better

Its a shame that July and August have not been much like summer but at least the rain has filled the pond up and it is looking much healthier.
This afternoon there was a fair bit of dragonfly activity with Southern Hawker, Brown Hawker, Common Darter and Blue-tailed Damselfly all on the wing.

Immature male Common Darter basking on the platform

Another male Common Darter

Female Brown Hawker egg laying

Butterflies returning

WARNING - This post contains pictures that some people my find disturbing.

There have not been many butterflies on the meadows this year but this morning things were looking a bit better. There were quite a few Meadow Browns and Ringlets with smaller numbers of Small Skippers and Small/Large Whites. Also 3 or 4 Commas of which more later.
I had a look at the pond and only found two Azure Damselflies, the water has almost dried up again. Several orchids were in full bloom around the pond looking lovely in the sunshine.

Orchids

Some butterflies can be difficult to recognise when they become faded and worn, like this Meadow Brown.

Faded Meadow Brown

This Ringlet was in much better condition.

Ringlet

There were a few Small Skipper butterflies this morning, including this mating pair.

Small Skippers

I found a snail on a thistle, I will have to find out what sort it is as its quite striking.

Snail on thistle

Some dog owners still do not see the need to remove their dogs poo, even when it is in the middle of the path. Unfortunately this pile had attracted a beautiful Comma butterfly to feed on it. There are plenty of more attractive things on the Meadows for the butterflies to feed on!

Comma on dog poo

A much more attractive view of a comma

Pond coming back to life

The recent rain has refilled to pond and life is returning to it. Yesterday I saw an adult female common newt in the middle of the pond and several damselflies were to be seen, mostly Azures but also one Blue-tailed Damselfly.

Azure Damselfly

There were a couple of Speckled Woods but no other butterflies.

Good news and bad news

First the good news. Our second ever Garden Warbler was singing away this afternoon, as was a Whitethroat, Blackcap and Chiffchaff. Four warblers on the site is pretty good. As for the bad news, I'm not sure whether the Blue Tits have fledged from the new nest box on the big oak tree. Looks as if someone has been having a barbecue under the box!
The other potentially bad news is that the pond is nearly empty, so unless we get a lot of rain (which I doubt if many of us want) it will have dried up in a few days time.

The start of summer

I have been on the meadows frequently during the last couple of months. Many birds are well into their breeding season. There are a pair of Blue tits in one of the new nest boxes and other boxes may be occupied too. A male Whitethroat has been singing from the central hedge and is almost certainly breeding.
Butterflies seem to be off to a slow start this year with just a few Orange Tips and other whites noted.
For some reason there seems to be no dragonfly activity in the pond so far. It may be due to the fact that it completely dried up for a while last year and we may have lost most of last years larvae. We may have to wait for the pond to be recolonised and hopefully as it is now a bit deeper in places it won't dry out quite so quickly.

Spring has well and truly sprung

What a beautiful day it was today, lots of signs that spring is here. One thing I noticed though, was that most of the frogspawn has disappeared. I saw a Mallard on the pond the other day and I suspect that he has eaten most of it!
At least 3 chiffchaffs were singing around the meadows together with all the usual birds. I notice someone has been busy putting up nest boxes, lets hope for some success with them.
A real bonus today were my first two butterflies of the season, a small tortoiseshell and a comma. The marsh marigolds around the pond are now in bloom and all the trees are covered in buds.

Chiffchaff

 

Comma

Small Tortoiseshell

Woodpigeon

New nest box

Some signs of spring

Although it is unbelievably wet on The Meadows there are now some signs of spring beginning to show. This morning I noticed a few daffodils in flower and many other plants beginning to show through. As I approached the pond there were many little splashes and ripples, they were caused by many frogs hiding from me. There is now quite a large mass of frogspawn near the far end of the pond and I suspect there is more to come.

Frogspawn in the pond