Bats in our Uckfield garden

As it's coming up to Halloween, I thought it would be a good time to talk about bats.

On a fine summer evening, we often see bats swooping and diving in front of our house. I think these are pipistrelles. The Bat Conservation Trust tells us:

"Common pipistrelle is one of the UK's most common bat species. It is a small bat which is found in a wide range of habitats including farmland, woodlands and suburban and urban habitats. It often roosts in crevices around the outside of houses and buildings.

The Collins Fields Guide - Mammals of Britain and Europe says:

Habits: "Leave roost c. 20 mins (2-35 mins) after sunset" and "Active at feeding sites for up to 8 hours."
Food: "Small insects caught and eaten in flight: main food is midges and caddis flies ..."
Breeding: "Births in June-Mid July."
Lifespan: "Max recorded 16 years 7 months."
Measurements: "Head-body length: av. 36-51mm." and "Wingspan: 180-240mm."

I've seen them on warm evenings from March to October. On October the 18th this year, at 6:15pm, there was a pretty flush in the early evening sky and 3 bats were swooping overhead, guzzling up pesky midges and other insects.

Sketch - 5th August 2005.

I've often seen the local cats watching the bats. You can see their frustration as they stalk but cannot catch these unreachable flying mice.

Sadly one long-eared bat was not so unreachable. I found its body on the path one day, presumably killed by a cat.

Long-eared bat - 19th Aug 2006.

The Bat Conservation Trust tells us:

"The brown long-eared bat is a medium-sized bat with ears almost as long as the body. It flies close to vegetation or in woodland, often using its large ears to listen for prey sounds and gleaning insects from the surface of foliage. It eats mainly moths, beetles, flies, earwigs and spiders."

I once saw one almost creeping round the trees in our garden searching for its food.

The Collins Fields Guide - Mammals of Britain and Europe says:

Habits: "Generally emerges in dark."
Food: "Insects, mainly moths ..."
Breeding: "Births in June and July."
Lifespan: "Max recorded 22 years."
Measurements: "Head-body length: av. 37-53mm." and "Wingspan: 240-285mm."

It notes that their "Habit of landing on the ground makes them vulnerable to predators."

The RHS has some advice about attracting bats to your garden.

Casulty 152461 - An injured pigeon in our garden

A while after I got home from Birmingham on Thursday, I glanced into the garden and saw a woodpigeon. There's nothing unusual in that but this one was lying on its back with its legs in the air. I checked it and it was still breathing. I decided to give it about 20 minutes to see if it would come round by itself.

The rescue
20 minutes spent watching for cats between mouthfuls of my microwaved meal and I was out again. The pigeon was still on its back, but clearly conscious and alive - it was blinking now and then.  The situation was clearly not going to resolve itself. Fortunately our area is well served by the East Sussex Wildlife Rescue & Ambulance Service (WRAS).

WRAS to the rescue.

I phoned up and was instructed to put the pigeon in a box, making sure that it was the right way up. I got a box from the loft, put on a pair of soft gardening gloves and squatted down by the pigeon. It looked at me with bright black eyes as I noted the lovely shading from pink on its side to almost white on its belly. As I cupped my hands around it rather plump body, it stretched out a protesting wing. It had a rather nasty wound on its back. I put it in the box the right way up but pigeon had other ideas and promptly rolled over again. I decided to leave it be and carried the box into the conservatory. I dropped an old towel over the whole thing, vaguely remembering that excluding light would calm a stressed, caged bird.

As I waited, I wondered what had happened. I think the most likely explanation is a sparrow hawk. We've seen some clusters of feathers on the ground recently and I glimpsed one in the garden carrying a rodent just a few weeks ago.  Some feathers from our pigeon, scattered over the grass, seemed to confirm this.

The ambulance arrived with two gentle but efficient rescuers. They asked me some questions and examined the bird while completing a form. Admin and examination over, they put the pigeon in a carrier. It snuggled into the soft pink lining, tucking its head into its wings as if it knew it was in good hands. They gave me a casualty number (152461) and information about the organisation including how to donate. I have already donated a few times. I remember giving when I heard about the cascade of baby hedgehogs they got over one winter then to the related Sussex Badger Vaccination Project. However, I've done the decent thing and texted a another donation.

Woodies in our garden

Woodpigeons are regular visitors to our garden. They are rather amusing with their self-important walk and are surprisingly agile when dangling from oak twigs to reach for acorns.  They sometimes build their untidy raft-like nests in our trees and I have occasionally found a discarded eggshell.


Woodpigeon in our garden - 21st May.

Back on the 21st of March, I was surprised to see a juvenile bird. It must have been born at the start of that month. I understand that pigeons make a sort of milk that enables them to start breeding early in the year.  I was able to identify it as a juvenile using the information on the Pigeon and Dove Rescue site.

The post script

On Friday (23 May), WRAS put a post on Facebook outlining the tremendous number of rescues they had done on the day they collected my pigeon. They kindly told me that "He is still with us, doing ok but early days, he was trying to push himself up on the side of the towels we are using to support him earlier."

On Saturday (30 May), WRAS responded to a question on Facebook by saying "Was he the adult one falling on his back with the wounds? ... doing well. Early days for the adult as he has a lot of healing to do, but he is standing and more balanced and eating. It is woodie central at the moment"

2014's Garden visitors

I've been using a Bushnell trail camera throughout the year to find out more about the wild animals that visit our garden. This is similar to the recording I did in 2013 but a bit more systematic. This time, I kept the camera pointed at one area of the garden and put it out for nearly every day and night of the year. Average number of visits appear lower than last year but this is because I wasn't 'cherry picking' the best conditions and locations.

Fallow deer on the 25th of August.

How many visitors?

The following graph shows how many wild animals were "seen" by the trap camera per 24 hours.

Fox visits peaked in 3 months:

• February, just like last year
• August, again like last year - this is due to young foxes appearing in the garden as well as the adults
• December, which is new - in December 2013 we had few visits, maybe due to the incessant rain we had over that winter.

Badger visits were occasional treats in Spring, Summer and Autumn but not in the Winter when they would be staying in their setts. 

Deer visits were more frequent than last year due to a delightful pair of males, one light and one dark, who sauntered in and out of gardens in the area from April to August. They even appeared in daylight. After they disappeared for the rut, one returned in November and December to take advantage of the tasty leaves in our garden.

When do they visit?

This graph shows the times of these visits.

Again, patterns were difficult to discern:

• Foxes visit between sunset and sunrise but without any real pattern.
• Badgers visit between sunset and sunrise - this year they were more likely to come after midnight whereas last year they mostly came before midnight.
• Deer were much cheekier than last year - coming in the day as well as the night and often staying for long periods.

Although I haven't been able to draw any real conclusions, it's been lovely to keep opening up the camera and discovering new treats and surprises. In 2015, I intend to start experimenting with video.

References:
Month-by-month historic weather data - I looked at the Eastbourne figures.
Monthly averages - I searched by Uckfield, which gave me the nearest (unnamed) weather station.
Fallow deer rutting season.

Uckfield's Natural Jewels

Ghyll valleys, orchids and scraps of heath in a 60s housing estate, ancient lanes near the town centre. I never knew there were so many precious natural jewels embedded in our town.



Spotted orchids within earshot on the main road.

I am the newbie in the Environment sub-committee for the Uckfield Neighbourhood Plan and on Tuesday evening, in the Alma pub, we were colouring bits of the Uckfield map green. Our aim was to identify places where “places where humans and significant nature meet” I only really know about a few areas, close to me.  Fortunately through the power of Twitter and Facebook, there was plenty of knowledge at my disposal.  Thank you to everyone to helped, especially “Hex Tor” on Facebook and “SonOfShaleman” on Twitter. 

One of the most obvious places is the Hempstead Meadows Nature Reserve.  Sometimes, when returning to Manor Park from the town, I have cut through there and enjoyed walking through the lovely wild flowers, listening for birds that have come thousands of miles to visit us, and peering into the mysterious pools. On the way home, I walk through Hempstead Lane and Lime Tree Avenue. Old roads and paths like these are less obvious places for nature but they are full of craggy old trees that are both beautiful to look at and provide birds and other creatures with places to nest and live. At the feet of these giants there is a wonderful selection of wild flowers including primroses, bluebells, wild arum and many other favourites.

Belmont Lane - just a minute's walk from the bypass

Another old lane that has been engulfed by the town is Belmont Lane, which runs from Holy Cross Church to the bypass.  I took a quick look at it the other day and found that it is full of big old trees and leads down to an area of woodland containing a pond.

We have some terrific woodlands, most of which can be found on the Visit Woodlands map. I haven’t visited many of these and must make a point of doing so.  Some of the most intriguing are those that are not on map, like the “Riperian” (river bank) wood alongside the River Uck. I’ve been so close to this so many times, yet I’ve only seen glimpses of it.

The river Uck, an important wildlife corridor, in the Bellbrook Estate.

The River Uck and its surroundings contain waterloving plants and wildlife. Because riversides are often left undeveloped they are important wild life “corridors” and breathing spaces. One of my most unexpected Uckfield wildlife moments has been the sight of hares near the Plumbing Centre on the Bell walk estate. Other rivers and streams are important too. The Downlands Farm area has the Ghyll, which meanders from West Park to Budletts. There is also the Ridgewood Stream, which passes the Millenium Green with its great crested newts and glow worms.

Of course people are important too. Here I’m going to take a moment to tip my hat to the marvellous people who have created Selby Meadow, a community garden near the hospital. Their Facebook feed tells how their garden, bug hotels etc. have attracted all sorts of creatures including butterflies and bats to their garden.

Fallow deer bucks in a Manor Park garden.

On Manor Park little areas of green and people’s gardens have created an environment so friendly to wildlife that deer and badgers roam the estate.  Bushes with berries have often provided much needed snacks to waxwings and redwings from Scandinavia. In some of our harsher winters, I have seen fieldfares prospecting across the Dene before coming to our garden to eat some discarded apples. I am told that there is a little area with natural “heath” type vegetation and really must seek it out.

I've been amazed by the variety of habitats in and around our little town. Once again, thank you, everyone, for your help. There is clearly much to discover in our town and I'm sure I'll be picking your brains again soon.

Red Arrows, Devils and Admirals over Uckfield

What a summer it has been for aerial wonders.  In just a few weeks we have had an amazing series of flypasts by aircraft of all sorts. Closer to the ground, birds and tiny insects have been joining the display too.

Belgian Red Devils over Manor Park, Uckfield

On July the 26th the Belgian Red Devils display team flew over Uckfield to mark the unveiling of the memorial to Eugene Seghers. While I waited for them in the garden I enjoyed watching the butterflies, which I had been counting for the big butterfly count, fluttering round our flowers. 

Emperor dragonfly - similar to the one seen in our garden.

As we moved into August, we were honoured by almost daily visits by an emperor. It flew in glittering circles for several minutes at a time, bobbing and dipping as it hunted its prey.  Anything that escaped the attentions of the dragonfly and was still flying at dusk may well have ended up as a meal for the bats that fluttered and swooped round our front garden.

Hoverfly (Volucella Inanis) on our Marjoram

While I was waiting for the Red arrows team to come over, I was entertained by colourful hoverflies buzzing round our flowers.  I’ve been looking at them more closely this year and have identified 10 different species – and those are just the ones that are big and slow enough for me to get a photo.

The Red Arrows - not a great photo but I was pleased to get a camera on them at all.

Towards the end of the some days, swifts screamed overhead. Apparently they never stop flying, not even in sleep.  As summer drifts into autumn, these summer visitors have started their long migration to Africa.

Comma butterfly - a sign that autumn is on its way?

After the wonderful, idiosyncratic procession of aircraft coming away from Shoreham at the end of August, we start to see V’s of geese flying to and from their feeding grounds. Newly minted red admirals and colourful commas herald the coming of autumn.

Garden Bio Blitz 2014

The idea of the annual garden BioBlitz is to list of all the wildlife found in your garden over a 24 hour period. I first heard about it on last year’s BBC Springwatch but didn't get round to doing anything about it until this year. Really it was Ryan Clark (do yourself a favour and look at his photos) whose tweets and retweets encouraged me to have a go this year.

Two male fallow deer - Photo from Bushnell trail camera.

I thought I knew about the wildlife that visits and grows in our large and rather shaggy garden. We know we get deer, foxes and badgers because we have seen field signs (that's poo and footmarks to you) and photos from the Bushnell. Also, I was confident that we have a couple of dozen species of wild flowers, frogs and a small assortment  of "creepy crawlies".

However there were plenty of surprises for me:

• the sheer number and variety of species in our garden
• how beautiful and strange grasses are under a magnifying glass
• we have liverworts between the paving slabs - the last time I paid attention to one of those, I was studying their weird lifecycle at school more than quarter of a century ago
• the wonderful and colourful variety of insect life in our garden and how little I know about it.

Mint moth - about 13 mm - tiny with beautifully intricate markings.

The BioBlitz really encouraged me to look at plants and creatures in the garden properly. For example, it had never really occurred to me to try and identify the tiny brown moths we find in our garden. A few minutes with UKMoth’s keyword search showed me that they are mint moths and I was able to add them to my list.   In the end I found and identified 105 species.

It is very motivating knowing that there are hundreds of others doing the same thing. Also the BioBlitz organisers had set up mechanisms to help people identify their finds via tweets or the iSpot website.

Extract from BioBlitz Info Centre (5th June 2014).

On Sunday morning I got most of the results into iRecord. A few days later I finished off and checked back on the site to see what other people had recorded. I was delighted to find that I was in the top 20 of the Recorders League. Then I spent a little time browsing round the site, and found that someone was doing the BioBlitz only a couple of miles from me. 

Recorder's League. Extract from iRecord, 5 June 2014.

At some point I will go back and set up a filter so I can see what local people are recording and I'll definitely spend some more time in the garden finding out what's there and putting it on iRecord.

So next year, I’ll be back. Meanwhile, this is me, recording wildlife in our garden ...

   

Garden visitors - January 2014

We have just had one of the wettest Januarys on record. We have also had very few fox visits captured on our Bushnell trail camera compared to the colder, drier January last year.

One of the few fox visits captured in January 2014.

I have got no idea if the wet weather is the cause. Maybe, in the mild weather, they can find all the food they need closer to home. Maybe they are as enthusiastic as I am about being on a North facing slope in driving, cold rain.  The figures are:

Month	Nights camera recording	Fox visits recorded	Fox visits per night
Jan 2013	6	8	1.33
Jan 2014	12	3	0.25

Last year we also recorded one badger visit on a cold, frosty night.  So that's it. A bit of wet weather and the little turncoats disappear.

Big Garden Birdwatch - 2014

It's that time of year again. Time to do the RSPB's big garden birdwatch. Otherwise known as big migrations of birds to somewhere that is not my garden. The idea is to count the birds that land in the garden during a one hour period.

It was very damp and misty and, at first, I thought I wasn't going to get anything at all. I had heard some bird song when I left the house to fetch the paper but no sign of any birds landing in the garden.

While I was doing my birdwatch, I was amused by the starlings that perched just outside the garden. I wasn't so happy about the magpies that frightened the little birds off.

So here are my numbers for this and a few previous birdwatches.  This year, during a spell of record breaking wet weather, we had fewer species than previously but we had greater numbers of individuals thanks to our starlings boucing back from last year's poor showing.

	2011 Saturday, 29 Jan	2012 Sunday, 29 Jan	2013 Saturday, 26 Jan	2014 Saturday, 25 Jan
Start time	8.45 am	8.45 am	9.07am	8.50 am
Weather	dull, icy		cold, bright	damp, misty
House Sparrow	3	4
Blue tit	3	3	2	3
Starling	8	9	2	8
Blackbird	2	2	3	3
Woodpigeon	1		1	2
Great tit		1
Chaffinch	2
Robin	1	1	1	2
Collared Dove	2	1	1
Magpie	2	2	2	2
Pied Wagtail	1	1	1
Song Thrush	2		1
Dunnock	3	1
Coal Tit		1
Goldfinch			1
No of species	12	11	10	6
No of individuals	30	26	15	20

If you are reading this on the weekend I wrote it, you can still fit your hour in. Just spend an hour noting the birds that land in your garden or other patch of ground and submit your results using the RSPB website.

2013's Garden Visitors

I've been using a Bushnell trail camera throughout the year to find out more about the wild animals that visit our garden.  Note that I barely had the camera out in November.

Badger visting on the 10th of October.

How many visitors?

The following graph shows how many wild animals visited per night.

Number of visitors per night.

The peak number of visits was in August, when we often saw two young foxes together.  There is a trough in May, perhaps when young animals are being born or when there is more food available in the woods. November and December show another trough - perhaps because the weather is so filthy! 

When do they visit?

This graph shows the times of these visits.

Times of visits

I've tried looking for patterns in the timings but cannot really see any. Note that the gaps in the data above simply represent times when I did not put the camera out.

October and December garden visitors

October and December garden visitors

Again, I've been remiss with my blog. Blame the day job.

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

October 2013

The camera was out for 12 nights and captured 20 animal visits (excluding cats). The species captured were foxes and badgers. The peak time was 11 pm to 1 am.

Animal visits while the camera was out in October 2013

 December 2013

The camera was out for 21 nights and captured 17 animal visits (excluding cats). Just foxes now.

Animal visits while the camera was out in December 2013

July to September garden visitors

Ah. I've been very remiss and not blogged for 3 months.  Time to catch up with my garden visitors.

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

July 2013

The camera was out for 13 nights and captured 13 animal visits (excluding cats). The species captured were fallow deer, foxes and badgers. The peak time was 9 to 11 pm.

Animal visits while the camera was out in July 2013

August 2013

The camera was out for 10 nights and captured 21 animal visits (excluding cats). This time, it was all foxes - there appear to be two fox cubs visiting regularly and hanging around in the garden. There is not really a peak time.

Animal visits while the camera was out in August 2013

September 2013

The camera was out for 19 nights and captured 21 animal visits (excluding cats). The two fox cubs are still visiting and hanging around. Badgers are appearing on some nights. Peak time is 11pm to 1am.

Animal visits while the camera was out in September 2013

A shriek in the night

Last week was busy. Very busy. On Friday, I finished work and got to bed sometime after 11 pm and, just as I was dropping off, heard the most horrible shriek. It sounded like a small but very loud animal. It seems that nature's food chain was busy right outside my window.  I couldn't see anything, because the security lights were off. This morning, I saw a few sad bones on our grass. Just a length of spine and some ribs. At this point, I half heartedly poked them with a stick but was too squeamish to investigate further. 

I've just investigated the contents of my Bushnell Trail Camera. I wasn't expecting much because the camera was pointing away from the front of the house. However, I found some fox activity that roughly matches the time of the shriek. The sequence starts at 11:56pm BST.  There are two foxes in the frame. Fox 1 is crouched quite defensively. It is blurred as if it is moving. Fox 2, further up the slope is looking down at fox 1. The next shot, below is clearer.

11:56pm - One second after the initial shot, fox 1 is now sitting.

One second later, it is obvious that the fox is eating something.

14 seconds later, fox 1 has temporarily left its meal to meet fox 2.

20 seconds after meeting fox 2, fox 1 has taken it's meal down the slope.

After this fox 1 disappears back up the slope, taking its meal with it. The last photo shows it roughly in the place where I found the bones this morning.

So that's mother nature being ruthless.  I don't know what was killed. I found it upsetting to find the bones but it didn't look like someone's pet or livestock.  I'm not even sure if the fox was the killer. There are plenty of potential culprits that visit our garden and foxes do like to scavenge others' kills.

A funny place to find a nest

In an earlier post, I mentioned the blue tits and blackbirds nesting in our garden. We know that the blue tits nest in the box at the back of the house but have never tracked down a black bird nest, even though we regularly see babies around the garden and get considerable abuse when working in certain parts of the garden.

Young blackbird sunbathing on wall, 2011

When pruning the pyracantha that wraps around the front of the house I found a nest.  From the information in How to Identify Garden Bird Nests, I decided that it was most likely a blackbird nest.  It was about 1.5 m off the ground and the cup was 10cm across.

Nest built between branches and down pipe.

Neatly woven grass

I don't know if the nest was actually used. It is in a crazy position, between the wall of my bedroom and the front path. I would have thought that someone would have noticed birds there. That said, there have been loads of blackbirds around the front garden this year, so maybe they have used that nest.

A wild patch in an Uckfield garden

I'll confess that parts of our Manor Park garden are rather dishevelled. This is partly by design - we want a wildlife friendly garden. It's partly by accident - we don't always keep up with the weeding and tidying. This year, the late spring seemed to compress gardening time to just a few short weekends. One of the areas that has minimal attention is the wild patch. Usually I act as a referee between competing plants, so the more vigorous ones don't swamp the others and encroaching grass is kept firmly in its place. This year, I blatantly gave up.

The wild patch

The result is a riot of yellow common bird's foot trefoil and common St John's-wort, shocking pink bloody cranesbills, red valerian and many, many more wild and wildlife-friendly plants. The grass that I usually remove has added a golden fuzz of seedheads between and above the flowers. The wildlife loves it too. The patch is full of bees, beetles, moths and butterflies.  Some larger visitors nibble the vegetation and weave their way through the long grass.  In the last few nights we have had a visiting badger, deer and fox. The foxes and the badger seem to have made quite well worn paths in the long grass. The following photos show these animals slightly away from the patch because once they are in it, they are partly hidden from view.

A badger trundles across the slope just below the wild patch

A fallow deer browses for tasty plants.

A fox trots through the grass

June 2013 - Garden Visitors

Below, I've summarised the visits in the camera captured during the 14 nights I had my Bushnell Trail camera out in June. I've allocated each visit to a 2 hour slot as shown below.

Animal visits while the camera was out in June 2013

 
This month's score (12 excluding cats) is much better than May's 6. The peak is happening earlier  - 9 to 1 rather than slightly later in the morning but the mix of species is about the same as before May's dip in results.  A pair of fox cubs have been seen in the garden but, naturally, did not walk in front of the camera.

Badger trundling up the slope.

It it always lovely to see the badgers trundling round the garden. They have been making distinct paths in the long grass. Other field signs (yes - I mean poo) have indicated several visits by deer.