DOES ANYONE REMEMBER WHEN IT WASN’T STORMY?

It’s fair to say that I’m struggling to remember when the last time we had some calm weather, given we’re experiencing storm after storm hitting the UK.

And, if there hasn’t been a named storm, then we’ve been hit be continual low pressures or the windy edge of a high pressure.

The fields are soaking, and large ponds of water are now forming and not draining at all.

Even the stream alongside the lane regularly breaches the banks when we’ve had a few hours of rain.

These videos are taken one day last week, then below are two mages taken the same time, on the following day.

To see all that in one go, here’s a collated image. What’s not shown is the water on the lane is gradually damaging the surface and there’s not a day goes by when the lane doesn’t have large puddles dotted along it.

 

The wildlife is not appearing to be affected by the weather, well from what I can see and hear.

The dawn chorus has been getting stronger each day recently, although the storm and wet mornings have limited activity.

During the day we’re now hearing more territorial songs from the robins, blue tits, great tits and also the odd chaffinch.

The breeding season is largely dictated by the day length, but I do wonder how the storm will affect it long-term.

If the butterflies and moths, which lay eggs that then turn onto the caterpillar food for the small garden birds, get impacted by the storms, then how will the birds cope?

That will also impact some the birds of prey in the area, but we can only wait and see how that all plays out.

If the stormy weather continues for a while, then our summer migrants might also be impacted; so swallows, house martins, swifts and cuckoos.

Again only time with tell, until then we’ll continue to batten down the hatches and hope the water levels gradually drop.

BADGERS AND BUTTERFLIES

The weather and temperatures have picked up this month, but not to heatwave levels – and certainly not enough to prevent the heating being required on some nights.

The warmer and sunnier weather has brought out plenty of butterflies, and a new butterfly has been seen in the garden.

A speckled wood was seen on the ivy, sunning itself, and I managed to grab a quick picture before it fluttered away.

I also managed to capture a red admiral too, although they have been seen many times, feasting on the buddleia.

They have more than made up for the lack of bird activity, albeit a small flock of house sparrows are now roosting in the wall climbers – something that seems to happen quite often at this time of year.

They are literally about a foot above the front door and can be seen and heard about an hour before sunset.

It’ll be a few weeks before they need to find a new roost site, when the leaves start to leave it fairly exposed.

Our summer visitors have definitely not been sticking around for this warmer weather, even if it would be feast time for them.

The garden wildlife is undergoing the usual transition as autumn starts to take hold, and it might be a few weeks before the birds are regularly seen.

However, I can’t help but feel that the stupidly high level of cats in neighbouring houses, along with feral cats that are being fed by the same neighbours, are having an impact on the birds being seen around.

I saw one of the cats with a small vole only yesterday morning, which does make you wonder if this small area of countryside is being restrictive to many species of wildlife, because the cats are either killing prey or the animals themselves.

There might be one saviour in this though. For the first time ever, a badger visited the garden, the closest badger I’ve seen to the house by about 500 metres.

I’d noticed a few small holes in the grass verges on the lane, which can now be put down to foraging badgers.

Great news for them and also my girls who managed to see a ‘real life’ badger right by our house.

It helps bring the closer to wildlife and hopefully encourages them to take a keen interest in wildlife when they grow up.

SUMMER ACTUALLY BEING SUMMER

After a couple of weeks away, mainly avoiding the short bursts of rain, the warmth (even heat) of summer is returning again.

The hosepipe ban might have been called off for now but, with little rain in the current forecast, it might be back later this month.

Not much to report on the wildlife, aside from a few butterflies in the garden, while the flora is certainly blooming given the recent rain and warm conditions.

There are even some tomatoes coming through, while the broad beans will need picking this weekend – and should be quite a crop.

The sunflowers are not bad this year, although not as high as some years – they’ll definitely be providing a good source of late summer early autumn seeds for the birds, who’ll return to the garden after their summer excursions around the countryside.

The only other thing to note was the suspected predation of a roosting blackbird in the garden by an owl.

I was out in the garden around midnight when I heard a woosh, followed by a bird brushing against leaves, before a blackbird alarm call was abruptly stopped.

A minute or so later I heard the calls of a tawny owl in a nearby field.

Without night vision goggles or a camera I can’t confirm any of this, just the noises helping put together a picture of what happened in the darkness.

THE BREEDING SEASON HAS SPRUNG INTO LIFE

In my last post I posed the question about swallows returning, speculating they would probably come this weekend, but little did I know they were much closer than I thought.

I spotted the first on Saturday 07^th April, a day earlier than last year and another one was sighted on Monday.

The previous dates for the first swallow sighting have been:

2017 – 08/04

2016 – 10/04

2015 – 21/04

2014 – 19/04

And they couldn’t have timed their arrival better as the weather is expected to rise dramatically next week.

The wildlife must expect it because the blue tits are constantly hanging around the most popular nest box, while the one nest box that has never been used, aside from a small wasp nest a few years ago, is seeing nesting action!

Not only that but it’s a bird I see around the garden, but has never nested there before.

A wren has been spotted taking nesting material into it and I’m delighted because I’ve spent the last few years training ivy to grow around it and offer a hidden nesting spot. Blink and you'll miss it on this video.

While I don’t expect all seven nest boxes to be used this year, if the wren does use and build to use it’ll mean all have been used at least once and take the number of species up to five – blue tit, great tit, robin, house sparrow, tree sparrow and now wren.

The flora is also showing signs of growth, with the lawn growing fast and the trees and bushes finally realising that winter is finished – well for now!

The robins and blackbirds have gone quiet in and around the garden, but a female blackbird has been spotted with nesting material out the back, so it’s all go on the nest building front, which means egg laying is close.

Insect movement is increasing with the odd butterfly and bee flirting with the garden, finding which flowers have bloomed and taking great interest in the growing tree blossom.