Alien Smoothies versus Uckfield Roughs

We are still removing Himalayan Balsam from the Hempstead Meadow nature reserve, run by Uckfield Town Council.  Although the pink balsam flowers are lovely, the huge plants would simply swamp the wide variety of native plants in the reserve. The picture below shows a pretty, delicate looking crosswort, which in another week, would have been swamped by the nearby balsam seedling.

Cross wort (centre) next to Balsam seedling (bottom right)

The balsam plants are getting bigger now. Some of the biggest were two and a half foot high (about 70cm in new money) but seedlings are still coming through so we still need to look out for those. The plants are quite easy to pull out of the damp soil. The trick is to grasp them as near the bottom of the stem as possible and pull gently but steadily.  If you snatch at them their sappy stems just break at the joints.

Balsam plants left on the side of the path to dry out.

The young balsam plants are similar to many native plants so we have to be careful to pull out the right ones.  The photo below shows some of the differences.

Differences between balsam and similar native plants.

Himalayan Balsam	Native Species
Leaves - smooth Colour - light, sometimes has a reddish tinge, especially around the veins Stems - pale, smooth, and very sappy	Leaves - often rough, even if only slightly; or hairy Colour - often darker and I've not seen a red tinged one yet Stems - often darker, rougher

To sum up, the alien invaders are red-tinged smoothies while the Uckfield natives tend to be a bit on the rough side. What can I say?

There are a couple more work days to go (Saturday mornings, meeting by the Waitrose carpark gate at 9.00am). See the council website for more information.

Hempstead Meadow in June

I felt rather guilty about marching through Hempstead Meadow Nature Reserve on Saturday.  I had my hair trimmed and the grey touched out, which took most of the morning. Obviously it is the trim that takes most of the time! Unfortunately this meant that I couldn't join the working party who were removing the Himalayan Balsam as described in last week's post.

I did get a chance to look at the trees and June's selection of wild flowers.  Most of the blossom and the delicate spring flowers have gone but others have taken their place.

Hawthorn blossom and black poplar tree (just right of centre).

The first treat was the Hawthorn blossom. This is really thick on the bushes this year. The 5 black poplars that were planted about 15 years again are fine looking trees with shimmering shiny leaves.

Meadow Cranesbill

In the dryer meadow area, I found blue meadow cranesbills. This is a real treat, I have never seen one growing wild before. Once I get closer to the wet areas there is loads of treacherous white and frothy hemlock water dropwort.

Pulled up balsam

I have a quick chat with the working party and then move on. The pulled up balsam on the side of the boardwalk is clear evidence of their efforts.

It was a very short visit as I dashed back from the town to home, but that is the beauty of this local reserve. I can take in its beauty and tranquility without making a special journey.

May 2013 - Garden visitors

Below, I've summarised the visits in the camera captured during the 15 nights I had my Bushnell Trail camera out in May. I've allocated each visit to a 2 hour slot as shown below.

Animal visits while the camera was out in May 2013.

Oh dear. These results are quite frankly pathetic. The total number of visits (excluding cats) is down from 16 to 6 even though I had the camera out for the same number of nights, i.e. 15.  I have no idea why there were so few wild visitors. Maybe there were busy breeding, maybe I placed the camera badly. There was much less variety. No deer or badgers and just a few foxes.

A curious fox. I know it's a back view but it really amused me.

Exterminate! Ridding Hempstead Meadow of alien invaders

Each Saturday in June, starting today, there is a task day in the Hempstead Meadow Nature Reserve. The idea is to remove the pretty but thuggish Himalayan Balsam. A group of us located and pulled up seedlings to stop the adult plants overwhelming the native flora later in the year.

Himalayan Balsam seedlings, circled.

As the photo shows, at the moment the seedlings look small and inoffensive but later in the year the plants will be taller than me and causing all sorts of damage as described in TrUck's blog post on the subject. We have to be careful when doing this because we are 'invading' the nature reserve ourselves and are in real danger of tramping the plants and scaring the birds that live there. It was a rather lovely experience, methodically scanning the foliage looking for the slightly red tinged leaves of the balsam and listening to the bird song all around. Martyn Stenning, who was leading the group pointed out the song of several african migrants such as:

• garden warbler
• whitethroat

We have to be particularly careful not to disturb or damage the nests of these birds, which are found in vegetation close to the ground.

Balsam seedlings. Some of the tallest were already a foot high.

We took some time to peer into the clear areas of water next to the board walk.  I saw loads of wriggling tadpoles, about 3 sticklebacks, whirligig beetles, pond skaters and loads of caddis fly larvae. The latter are something I have often read about or seen on the TV but have never seen. They are strange little creatures that build an outer jacket out of bits of stick and debris. One, perhaps a caddis fly fashion victim, had decorated its brown coat with bright green disks of duckweed.

Further along the boardwalk we got a good view of Uckfield's primeval swamp.

Greater tussock sedges in Uckfield's primeval swamp.

Ancient plants like the tussock sedges and horse tail give the swamp a genuinely primeval feel. I almost expected to see a dinosaur lumber out from behind a clump of trees.  Returning to reality, we cleared the reptile basking rocks in case the resident grass snakes, slow worms and lizards wish to do a spot of sun bathing.  

There are more task days, running from 9am to 1pm each Saturday in June, so do come along. There is more info in my earlier post.