Grimpo Nature Notes September 2010

Wading through the piles of potential recyclables to clear a space for my split kindling in the log shed I paused a moment and glanced upwards. There in the old roof rafters the cups of this years broods remained stuck firmly in place. I briefly debated removing one to have a look but suspected I would be depriving a wood mouse of a winter snuggle pit.

As I write the swallows are limbering up for the long flight south, so we are not the only ones responding to the change of season.

Tidying the garden the frog gave us a start, his triangular head poking skyward from the water filled bucket, we knew how he got in but he was going to need some help getting out. Frogs only need pools to breed in, the rest of the year feggy, thick and tussocky grasslands will do, we flushed out a plague of the striped and spotted fresks when clearing a knotted patch of bramble. Our frog was carried carefully to the most tangled corner of the garden and gently slid back to freedom. Moments later a familiar nerve-jangling cry let us know that a toad had been found, this time in a watering can, for him a release spot near the veg. plot compost heap, bad luck slugs!

Adorning so many trees and woody shrubs are the long awaited fruits, the product of those delightful blossoms earlier in the year. Orange haws, rowan berries, red hips, elderberries and blackberries are steadily stripped from their stems by hungry birds. It is in the early autumn that the hideaway antics of birds following the annual moult come to an end.  For the migrant bird the moult, a steady loss of old feathers to be replaced with new, has to be a quick process, a blackcap replaces it’s plumage in 35 days before embarking for the southern Mediterranean and north Africa. The resident Bullfinch takes its time over a leisurely three months.

Birds tend to avoid moulting during the breeding season, when food-stocks are low or whilst migrating, though there are so many exceptions as to defy simple classification. At a critical point during the moult all birds will experience an impaired ability to fly, and for some such as the willow warbler this occurs twice a year. The willow warbler spends its days in thorny scrub and consequently needs to revamp its flight kit more regularly. By now though our resident birds need to be fluffing nicely there is much work to be done as the temperatures drop.

Trying to make the most of the shortening evenings I headed out on the cycle, I liked the rustle of browned leaves on the road and gave my appreciation to a handful of late blooming wildflowers.

A sweet gang of Common Toadflax, also known as ‘Bunny mouths’, sent a yellow and orange peal down a grassy verge and will with luck still be showing off in early November. By the canal I encountered a number of Trifid Bur-marigolds, a scary name, I watched them for a while to check how firm rooted they might be before studying the small fire orange flower head. On the homeward leg a small powder blue patch of Harebell nodded from the hedge-bank, the Scottish bluebell. Contrary to my long held belief the harebell is not confined to the drier swards of the UK mountain districts but  is found widely, avoiding damp conditions but held aloft on thin stems out of chalky or acid soils, lamp-like in a bracken forest or as mine were, dangling from the ancient grass banks of a raised field bounding hedge.


The end of summer is a slow affair, none of the urgency of the spring round of territory grabbing, display and procreation, but rather a gentler fattening up and hunkering down. The migrants will head off and our hardy residents will take up the sometimes unequal task of out-staying the winter. So after readying my log pile to keep the family warm I headed to the bird table topping up the nuts and seed to ensure this gardens feeding station was ready and waiting for custom.

If you would like to share your wildlife reflections please email Pete at petewoodman@thewoods12.fsnet.co.uk
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