Recent news from Underway Meade

The Moorhens have been successful on the pond again this year and are currently raising one chick.It is quite active and follows its parent and demands food, though it can feed itself, but it keeps out of sight most of the time hiding in the thick reeds as the rather wobbly video below shows!

There have been some interesting plants appearing in the Meade recently, such as this Water Figwort, which as the name suggests, likes to be near water. This one is growing alongside the stream and will be polinated by common wasps.

The more well known Foxglove has also been appearing alongside the hedges and in small clumps on the mound. This is a biennial so takes two years to go from seed to flower. It is loved by bees, which feed on its pollen by delving deep into its trumpet like flowers.

It is poisonous if eaten but can be used to produce digitalis, a drug used in the treatment of heart failure and high blood pressure.

Another plant that has been quite prolific on the mound this year, probably as a result of the sheep having grazed last year and the scrub clearance, is the birds foot trefoil.The bright yellow flowers are followed by seed pods that look distinctly like bird's feet or claws, ( look carefully at the second picture below!), hence the common name. It is a food plant of the caterpillar of the Common Blue, Silver-studded Blue and Wood White butterflies, so keep your eyes open and you may be lucky enough to see them on the wing around the mound!

Birds in the garden and seen on my local daily walks

For the first time in many years starlings have begun visiting our garden. In fact a family of them have been coming in to the garden and their parents have been busily feeding them in and around the ground feeder.

The parent is the speckled bird with the metallic sheen, the male is often oilier than the female and has a bluish beak, whereas the femaile's beak is pin.The young one, below, is almost plain brown with a black beak.

Don't mistake the young starling (left) for a young blackbird. She is also brown but has a orange/brown beak (below.) rather than black and appears more speckled on the front.

This one that visits our garden regularly has a deformed leg, and has an odd posture. It is too tame for its own good, scarcely moving a I go out to to put out more bird food,  but she is managing to feed ok so far.

Another bird we only get occasionally in the garden is the Stock dove. A relative of the wood pigeon, feral pigeon and the collared dove but it is often overlooked .It lacks the white neck ring of the adult woodpigeon, has a dark eye and, unlike the woodpigeon, it is a protected bird.

The unmistakable call of the Mistle thrush, a harsh rattling noise, usually alerts you to the bird.

This one was squabbling with another bird when I walked along Scrapton Lane recently.

It is larger than the Song thrush and tends to prefer the open fields rather than edge of a garden.

In the winter, when the Mistletoe or the Yew tree has berries, one of its favourite foods, it will often defend this food source if other birds try and come in and start to feed. Watch out for it in the churchyard!

Bugs and creepy crawlies

Various flying insects have been on the wing recently but some have been easier to photograph than others.

The St Mark's fly, named after the saints's day on 25th April, when it generally takes to the wing, have been seen in large numbers recently, especially in the shady areas along Greenway. They are black and fly with their legs dangling, so are quite distinctive.
You will need to click on this to zoom in on this picture to try and see them though!


















Various damselflies have also been emerging recently, such as the large red damselfly (left) and, what I believe is a blue-tailed damselfly. 
The difference between these and dragonflies is that their wings are closed at rest whereas the dragonfly's wings are open when at rest.

One or two other interesting insects that I have seen recently included this Orange striped stonefly. (Thanks to my friend Colin who identified it for me!). Its wings have a beautiful pattern and I don't ever recall seing one before. Apparently they are widespread in the SW and like to breed near fast flowing streams.

Not so great to have seen as it is a non native invasive pest, is this red lily beetle. It devours lily leaves and stems and I saw this one on the Stonydown footpath, so if you have lilies in your gardens watch out!













I'll end this post on a spider. I think it is a woodlouse spider and this chap was actually in our house but I evicted it as it is one of the few british spiders that will give you a nasty nip! . 

More night time garden visitors

I have continued to put my night vision trail cam out in the garden, apart from on very windy nights, and the pictures I have caught have been mainly cats wandering through and often spraying the vegetation. (note to self to always use gloves when gardening in future!).

However, last night I was surprised to find, amongst the cat images, these two clips taken about 40 minutes apart, one at 1.30 am and the other at 2.09 am. Something seems to have spooked it but nothing else appeared in the rest of the night's clips.

I realise that not everyone might be delighted to have badgers visiting their gardens, but I am, although I hope they don't put the hedgehog off visiting again as badgers are their main predator and hedgehogs will usually avoid areas where badgers live.

Some recent views of the Parish

Over the last few weeks of lockdown the local countryside has changed from bare trees at end of the winter to full blown spring and busy farming activity, and the views have been beautiful throughout.

In this post I have decided to just post a few views, in no particular order, that have made my recent daily walk feel so worthwhile, and to remind me why I am so lucky to live here!

Birds, butterflies and flowers

I have seen some newly arrived summer migrant birds in the last few days such as Whitethroats, which I have found at three different sites for within ten minutes or so from the centre of Combe. I could be wrong, but this seems to be more than in previous years.

This one looks like he/she has some nest building material in its beak so they are wasting no time in setting up home.

I have also heard a garden warbler singing in its rather breathless way near Sticklepath, but try as I might, I couldn't get a picture as it seemed to be skulking in the centre of a bush! I did record its song but it is a video which is too big to upload!

Speckled wood butterflies are beginning to appear now, as are holly blue butterflies, but apologies for the photos, they don't stay still for long, like many of  the other species I've already mentioned in earlier posts.

A flower that doesn't seem to thrive in many places around the village area is the White Campion, so I was pleased to see this patch along the main road at the top of Stantway. This is not a route I would usually walk but the current lack of traffic makes it quite possible without the usual fear of being run down!









One flower that is in abundance at the moment though is Ramsons. The flowers are really pretty, but don't be tempted to pick them for a floral arrangement or you will find the house reeks, as this is of course wild garlic!

The last flower I will mention today is Yellow Flag which is now in bloom in the Underway Meade pond. It is just a small patch but a welcome sight anyway.

The wildlife is getting bolder!

On my walk yesterday there were plenty of squirrel sightings and this one posed beautifully before dashing off and up the nearest tree!

Later in the day, when the sun was really warm, this slow worm spent some time moving along our conservatory wall before finding a new hole in the wall to take refuge. It was the biggest one I have even seen in our garden, at least 50cm long, and once it got moving, it was not slow at all!

The more time I spend at home or just going on local walks, the more interesting wildlife I find.