Highlights of 2015 In Pictures

2015 was a good year for me with lots of opportunities to get out with my camera but the weather wasn't always obliging.

Here are some of my favourites pictures from this year.

Tree Sparrow

Starling nesting in a timber frame building - at least two babies fledged

Bee on Lavender

A friendly robin

Long Tailed Tit - Just fledged!

Red Darter

Migrant Hawker Dragonfly

Large Male Bullfinch

Gatekeeper

Pair of Bullfinches eating seeds

Painted Lady

Migrant Hawker - normally hangs down like this when resting

Holly Blue on a ....holly.

A beautiful toad

Bees loving our the lavender

Beautiful Sunrise on a Warm Winter's Morning...

Moving on from various shades of grey we finally had a beautiful sunrise this week.

The temperatures both night and day time are unseasonably warm and the result is blossom and daffodils starting to make their way above the grass.  We've only had one frost so far and it's Christmas next week!

Climate Central record and compare temperatures globally - they are "An independent organization of leading scientists and journalists researching and reporting the facts about our changing climate and its impact on the American public." So for Europe this is the graphic up until 2014. 2015 will likely match that trend as a number of records have been broken again, especially in December 2105....their will be impacts on wildlife and shifts in patterns, confusion for plants and trees, etc.

Examples of climate change patterns on record levels of rainfall this year put into question the use of the Environment Agency's 1 in 100 Year events for Planning purposes. 

Isn't it time to review trends and deviation statistics?

Here be Dragon.....flies

No, this is not a reference to Games of Thrones (which features dragons if you've never watched any of the epic series) but to the large number of Dragonflies we have had this year.

We've occasionally had them but not in great numbers. The mystery of why this sudden change in the pulling power of our garden was revealed yesterday when I visited my neighbour two doors away. As a horticulturalist she has an immense knowledge of plants and with an acre of mostly base lawned grass and hedging to play with, in four years she has transformed it into a wildlife mecca.  I wondered if I had stumbled into an alternate reality or some Disney cartoon with woodpecker and three buzzards coming in on cue. So many more bees than our garden which is a cottage garden and bee friendly but this was on another level.

Female Migrant Hawker - no longer an uncommon visitor

Added to the huge stocks of plants which fill the 10' deep beds the house suffered from a moat like feature which basically meant flooding almost up to the house itself. As a result, diggers and drainage was created to make a more permanent water feature of a long pond mirroring the ridge and furrow features in the adjoining meadow and in part of her garden. The wild irises must have remained dormant for years but this year sprung into life as a result of not being mowed out of existence.

The dragonflies followed.

I watched a Migrant Hawker dart and chase around the new "moat" and then head over the fence into our neighbours (and probably our garden was to follow).

The mystery was solved.

So here are a few photos I took before I knew why we suddenly had these amazing creatures flying around the patio.

Closeup of Female Migrant Hawker Dragonfly

Red Darter?

Male Migrant Hawker having a rest

Long Tailed Tits Piddle Brook Meadows

Walking in Piddle Brook Meadows last week.  A skylark was singing.  It's song was so sweet and carrying quite a distance. Looking high into the sky it was nowhere to be seen. I realised it was instead hovering low and with wings outstretched. Singing all the time. A beautiful sound.

Soooo many long tailed just fledged tits that I was spoilt for choice when it came to taking photos. It was early morning - around 7:30 in the morning.

A very cute little fella

Even the presence of my labrador, which is usually enough to scare most of the bird population out of camera taking distance, didn't phase them. There were maybe 10-12 of them (I counted 10 in one picture so there were probably more) and most of them looked like they were slightly in shock at being out in the big world beyond the nest.

Blue Tit possibly just fledged too

Cute!

Bad Hair Day

The tree was a recently dead beech so provided a nice contrast to the birds and meant the leaves didn't get in the way. They seemed to like picking at the unfurled leaves or beech nuts on the tree. Some were still very fluffy and a few looked like their feathers would be barely enough for flight. Undeniably cute.

Blue Tits Feeding Chicks

2015 was a productive year in the garden for the birds.

Within a 5 metre radius we had nesting starlings, robbins and blue tits. The starlings used one of the holes that had been carved out by a green woodpecker when we were on holiday in February for their nest. Apparently it is not uncommon for starlings to beat the green woodpeckers up in order to get their brood the best slot.

The other holes that the woodpecker had made in the timber frame (probably six in total!) were filled with oak timber specially carved to fit while the starlings nested in the highest hole which we left open while their offspring were fed on a schedule that was tiring just to watch.  Relentless in pursuit of grubs and larvae from the field next door.


The blue tits made the most of the nesting box and there were probably four blue tits fledged.
One of the blue tits looked quite battered, its feathers on its head missing with a bald patch. Its focus was clearly on feeding its young.

Winter Retrospective and Sloe Gin Production

Some photos I didn't post from back in December include these Redwing pictures. The Redwings are migratory and visit the UK in October. Most will have left the UK by now - we generally see them around the fields around Naunton Beauchamp, particularly in December and January.

These photos were taken on a beautiful winter's day in December.

Here is a bit more about them on the RSPB site.

Red Wing in Flight

Sloes were really good this year - beautifully plump and plenty of them. The Local Nature Reserve at Piddle Brook Meadows and the public footpath along the Piddle is a great place to pick both sloes and bullace. Last year we made Sloe Gin and Bullace and Sloe Vodka. 

After maturing for several months it is now time to bottle the Sloe Gin ready for Christmas 2015!

The job of pricking the sloes was made easier this year by using the felting needle tool from Clover Japan which is ordinarily used for dry felting! Brilliant for pricking sloes although lots of people just pop them in the freezer and apparently this has the same effect.

A friend from Scotland gave us a bottle of Sloe Gin for Christmas last year and it was the finest Sloe Gin I have tasted. I've used her recipe this year so fingers crossed ours will be as good.

Springtime in Worcestershire

As Marcel Proust said "The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new lands but seeing with new eyes."

Apparently there has never been a greater disconnect between the average bod in the street and the countryside as there is right now.

As someone who was fortunate to grow up in the countryside of Warwickshire but who has lived in four of the biggest cities in the UK, I can understand this. The question has to be asked "Does it matter?" 

Living in the countryside and working in Birmingham gives me that transition from countryside to city every day that I work. It is why I felt it more important than most that to develop industrial scale farming here was something that I had to protest about and, if possible, stop.

So far so good. However, the battle will continue because population continues to grow apace, the majority of the population in this country are disconnected and do not value the countryside and more importantly, don't understand it or even really care. Meat is pre-packaged and in fact most people don't want to think about where it comes from.

In the meantime, after many years of travelling and visiting some of the most beautiful places in the world, I see the place I live, here in Worcestershire, with new eyes and say a "thank you" to all those who campaigned against the chicken farms at Upton Snodsbury for being able to do so.



The Spring is well under way and here are some photos from a beautiful Easter weekend in Worcestershire.

Robin singing his heart out

Lesser Celandine

According to Gilbert White, a diarist writing around 1789 in the Hampshire village of Selborne, the plants came out on February 21, but it is more commonly reported to flower from March until May, and is sometimes called the "spring messenger" as a consequence.

Local Nature Reserve Piddle Brook Meadows

Lovely - an early Peacock

Very new!

Reflection of Lesser Celandine in Piddle Brook

 D H Lawrence - "...going down the hedgeside with the girl, he noticed the celandines, scalloped splashes of gold, on the side of the ditch. 'I like them' he said 'when their petals go flat back with the sunshine. They seem to be pressing themselves at the sun.'And then the celandines ever after drew her with a little spell."

Warbler? Not sure what this is.

Plantlife is celebrating its 25th Anniversary this year. The charity which campaigns on various issues including wildflower meadows such as the ones that we have locally is currently collating votes on the nation's favourite Wildflower - to find out more click here. 

It's a tough one...Bluebell versus Primrose?