Spring feel

In the last few days the gloomy, short winter days are noticeably growing longer. Birds seem to have felt this and many species are now singing. A clump of wild primroses (Primula vulgaris) in the University grounds are now bursting with buds, and the first pale lemon colour flowers are now open. Both the latin and common name of this flower refer to how early they blossom. They are the 'first roses'.

Looking forward and looking back

Come January and I eagerly seek the first signs of spring. This has been a very cold winter so far, so my first sign of spring, the flowering of Hazel, is delayed. The Hazels in Pearson Park Wildlife Garden would normally flower on the third week of January. Look what we saw today:

Today's best catkins, tightly shut!

The fully open catkins two years ago on the same day

I don't think they are going to open in January at all this year.
The second event to come is usually the first song of the Song Thrush. A few winters this thrush has sung all through December and January. I haven't heard the first song yet.

Busy song thrush, but no singing

The third event is the Lesser Celandine flowering. This is a very unique plant. Its foliage dies out in the summer and the only surviving part of the plant is its finger-shaped thin tubers. In November, the new shoots start growing and the flowers appear in January- early February, when there are few other flowers around. Their shiny yellow flowers brighten up the dullest winter day. No signs of flowers yet. Sadly, no signs of spring to report.

Lesser Celandine flower

Patch of Lesser Celandine in March

Summer Lesser Celandine tubers (end of may 2009)

First shoots of Lesser Celandine last November

Holly Days

Female Blackbird picking a Holly berry

In the last few days I have watched a pair of woodpigeons and a Blackbird feeding on holly berries. This time of the year, Holly berries are an important source of winter food for of all British thrushes, including the Blackbird; robins, blackcap and woodpigeons also regularly feed on them. It is Holly tree defence by Mistle thrushes to feed on the berries that has the highest ecological significance. Holly berries keep very well even after strong frosts, and this makes them ideal trees for Mistle thrushes to defend. Mistle thrushes defence of the tree can be overwhelmed by flocks of hungry birds on periods of frost when the tree can provide emergency food than otherwise wouldn't exist. Berries on successfully defended trees can last until July, whereas undefended ones are already devoid of berries in January.

Holly berries

A bush or small tree, Holly can reach up 10 m of hight, it flowers in May and June and it is dioecious, which means that there are male and female trees and only female ones produce berries.

A large female Holly growing on a street in Hull

Holly male flowers and buds in early May

Hollies are pollinated by bees and bumblebees. Holly Blue butterflies also visit the flowers and in April the females of the Holly Blue can be seen laying their eggs on young shoots and buds at the tip of the branches.

Female Holly Blue laying eggs

Given that they are evergreen and well defended by their hard, spiky leafs, Holly is also used for shelter and as a good nesting tree by many birds.
Sources: Snow, B. and D. Snow (1988) Birds and Berries. T&AD Poyser, Calton.

A new wood for Hull: Wilberforce Wood

An oak sapling just planted

Today it was Tree O'clock, an attempt to beat the world record of most trees planted in one hour. We took a few oaks with us, some saplings we had grown from acorns we collected in Sherwood Forest three years ago, and some others we collected in a garden centre as part of the scheme. The day was promising, sunny sky, no wind and relatively mild. We chose to join forces with The Woodland Trust to help create a new forest in Hull, Wilberforce Wood. A few years ago the site was agricultural land with strongly boggy tendencies, according to the satellite photos by Google Earth, as it is right on the floodplain of the river Hull, in North Carr. We planted mostly Alder, a native species well suited to wet areas and that grows quickly. In all we managed to plant 1600 saplings in one hour, together with around 20 other volunteers. Many holes - filled with water to the rim - had been dug in advance so it wasn't back-breaking work, just very muddy. Many wolf spiders were active, Meadow Pipits and Goldfinches chirped and there were even some flowering buttercups to enliven the day.

A view of the site

Creeping Buttercup, Ranunculus repens

How to get there

View Larger Map

The Deep

It's windy, cold and one feels more like hibernating than like going on a walkabout. A wonderful alternative is going to The Deep, OK, I am in the fringes of what I have allowed myself to write about in this blog, but The Deep is a good excuse to wander off limits. The Deep is Hull's aquarium. When it opened in 2002 it had what it used to be the deepest tank in the world (not sure if the record still holds now). A wonderfully colourful reef tank is still my favourite place. You can sit on the floor and imagine yourself diving in a bright, shallow tropical lagoon with rays, small sharks and fishes of all colours and sizes.

Nautilus

Giant Isopods

 The Twilight Zone is also quite good, with a tank with several Nautilus, fish with luminescent patches, and deep sea giant isopods and the life cycle of the jellyfish.

Atlantic Mudskipper

A reconstruction of the lobe-finned fish Tiktaalik

Recently, they have installed a new Mangrove swamp tank for Mudskippers, fantastic to watch too, and an exhibit with a  reconstruction of Tiktaalik, an ancient fish which was in the evolutionary line to the evolution of tetrapods. The exhibit is so realistic that you wonder from a distance if the fish is alive. These are the last part in the Evolution of Seas exhibit.

Clown fish and anemone

Garden Eels

A reconstruction of the jaws of Carcharodon megalodon, a giant fossil shark which dwarfs the Great White Shark

 Other attractions are a shark tunnel, garden eels and a North Sea tank. From The Deep's restaurant there are wide views of the Humber estuary and the mouth of the river Hull and its impressive tidal barrier.
The Deep Website

East Park

The Chestnut Walk

The weather forecast was sunny for the morning, so I headed off to East Park. Not many people around, some dog walkers, and parents/grandparents with young children. The wildfowl approached us, looking hopeful for a little bread, but they were disappointed.

I hadn't been to the little zoo for a while. The Rheas seemingly bred earlier in the year, and their young were forming a little group of 4, a little taller than a peacock. There was also a young, cream coloured alpaca amongst the grown up ones.

Usual birds for the season. The highlight were three pairs of Goosanders, which kept close to the island, therefore the photos were not great. They were preening and diving.

Mirror Mute Swans

Deer feeding

Goosanders

Feral pigeon enjoying the sun

Black-headed Gulls

Confiding Coot

Birds

1. Crow, there are lots, it is easy to count 10 visible at any one time 
2. Black-Headed gulls, the most common in the park, everywhere 
3. Woodpigeons eating on the grass near the trees 
4. Magpie 
5. Canada Geese 
6. Blackbirds feeding in rowan and hawthorn 
7. Greylags, large flock on the feeding area 
8. Wren, "Chrrr!" 
9. Starlings 
10. Coot, lots about 
11. Mallards 
12. Herring Gull immature flying over the lake 
13. Moorhens, 2 
14. Tufted Duck 
15. Swans, pair, swimming with stunning symmetry. 
16. Blue tit 
17. GOOSANDERS, 3 males and 3 females, between the island and the bridge. 
18. Pochard 
19. Common gull, I see one. 
20. A duck in the island I cannot ID, with white band on body, likely a Drake Teal 
21. Collared dove

The (almost non-existant) Holderness ancient woods: a virtual tour (1)

This is an unusual post. I haven't been out today, or the last few days. It's been raining a lot. Frustration. I usually vent my frustration of not being able to be out and about with two things - my favourite computer games if you like- : Google Earth and Geograph. Virtually flying over satellite imagery of the earth is the best thing ever if you like looking at maps, and I can spend hours looking at maps. Enter Geograph, where you can see down to earth photos of most sites in the UK, for free, and I am hooked. So I put together this virtual tour of the few sites thought to hold the last remaining ancient in the Holderness peninsula according to English Nature:
"Holderness was at one time cloaked in forests. From the initial colonisation of birch as the glaciers retreated, to a high forest of oak some five thousand years ago, early human settlers would have been faced with an extensive wildwood..."
Unfortunately, the soil left behind after glaciations is extremely fertile and the plains of Holderness are prime agricultural land (you struggle to see pastures as well as forest). This means most ancient woods were felled to make room for agriculture. A few tiny jewels survive

Burton Bushes

A satellite view of Burton Bushes, courtesy of Google Earth

Burton Bushes is the last remnant (11 ha) of the old Beverley Westwood, nowadays a surviving common land usually grazed by cattle. The horizontal bar is equivalent to 100 m to give you an idea of its size. The following excerpt gives some information on the puzzle of why the wood is now pasture and the bushes is the only significant area remaining of the wood:
"Near Beverley stood, some years ago, an extensive range of thriving oak-wood, though not of large size, called "The West-Woods." These were held under the See of Durham, and regular falls were taken by the lessees, or the Bishop, at stated periods, by which means a perpetual succession was preserved; and while the timber and underwood remained in an uniform state, a regular income arose from them to the See. But these woods were, by some means or other, taken down a few years since, though not without having become an object of legal investigation; but whatever might have been the decision of the law, the law could not make the woods grow again, or the land revert to wood; consequently it is now cultivated, and some one has thus obtained the whole capital value of the wood, who had only a right to the annual income arising from it, and with it has obtained the annual income of the land into the bargain."
(From A general view of the agriculture of the East-Riding of Yorkshire By H.E. Strickland, 1812; scanned by Google Books)
Still today there is some ecological interest in this tiny fragment of ancient forest and the place is a SSSI (Site of Special Scientific Interest, see this for more info).

Blue Bells in April. Photo by Carolyn Metcalfe from Geograph.

A description of a walk around the Westwood, inlcuding Burton Bushes, can be found at the Walking the Riding website (under "Beverley Westwood Bounds).