Nature Diary #6

Peg Loom Rug

 The weather has finally changed and ended April in a more traditional way – sharp showers, with some sustained periods of heavy rain, which has rather curtailed my walking this week. I’m sure no self-respecting wildlife would have chosen to be out and about during the rain, so I stayed indoors, too. This enabled me to finish a peg loom rug that I started a few weeks ago, and I am quite pleased with the results. It utilised some of the black/brown Zwartbles fleece that I have, in both raw and spun states, plus some other rather coarse yarn that I have had for over 30 years (I can’t actually remember exactly where or when I got it, but it has moved house with me many, many times!) and have never found a use for!

Our Whitelake Stream briefly turned back into a stream, with a definite flow, but the ground was so dry that it has now reduced to a sluggish trickle again, despite the fact that we have had a lot of rainfall in the last few days. Whilst out in the yard the other day I spotted a moorhen and a chick in the shrubbery – we had one here last year, too, so I got quite excited. I think they nest on the far side of the shrubbery next to the stream, in a patch of sedge. Imagine my surprise when, a few days later, I spotted another moorhen with three chicks! I have not been able to decide whether this is a pair of moorhens with four chicks or two females with separate broods. According to bird sites both the male and female raise the chicks, but it is noticeable that each bird has its own chicks. I can tell them apart as the one with only one, slightly larger chick, is lame. The chicks are so tiny that I worry about their safety, especially as the mums seem to have a very lax attitude to parenting, and we have a large population of nesting jackdaws at the moment. However, I don’t think I have too much to worry about as I saw one mum seeing off a jackdaw that got too close and, a couple of mornings ago, when I first looked out, she was trouncing a squirrel – she bowled it over, at one point and then chased it away! They are said to be quite aggressive birds!

Moorhen and chicks

There has been such a growth spurt in the vegetation since the rain, that the only flowers visible along the hedgerows now are the campion. The fields that were sown just a couple of weeks ago have now got a couple of inches of green all over, and I was wrong about it being maize, it looks like a legume of some sort, so I am guessing at field beans for animal fodder. The grass fields are like one big, green desert as they are not old, species-rich pastures but quick-growing rye grass for silage, with no other plants allowed to emerge. I could have been passing within a few inches of a hare today and not noticed it as the grass is so long – I expect they’ll do a silage cut soon.

So many of the trees have been in flower recently, too. I’ve never really taken much notice of tree flowers before but now that I am looking at things more closely, I have been surprised at the abundance and complexity of their blossoms. Obviously, some are quite noticeable, such as the horse chestnut ‘candles’, but a lot of them are green and blend into the foliage. No wonder people start suffering from hayfever in April/May with all that pollen floating around!

Goat willow flowers

Red Maple in flower

Unknown tree in flower!

Walnut Tree in flower

On a more domestic note, my vegetable garden is becoming worthy of the name, with both the potatoes and onions emerging from the soil on their patch, and the salad leaves and lettuces starting to put on some growth now. There are neat rows of leeks, although I have had to net them as something keeps pulling them out of the ground, and my overwintered onions are beginning to swell. I’ve still got some of my stored onions but it will be nice to have some more earlier in the season – a bit of an experiment, as I’ve not grown them before. My sole courgette plant is in a big tub next to a tub of peas and I hope to plant out some more climbing beans this weekend. My first ones got shredded by the high winds the other week, but look like they are putting out secondary growth, so I’ll probably have a glut this year! I also have outdoor tomato plants and a couple of outdoor cucumbers still to go in somewhere. My carrots had poor germination, so I shall have to plant some more and, because it was very old seed, I have only managed to germinate two parsnips! The fruit bed is also looking good with the three gooseberry bushes having set fruit, along with the blackcurrant bush and the two redcurrants. I’ve had several pickings of rhubarb and the loganberry is in bloom and setting fruit. I also have a thornless blackberry against the back wall and autumn-fruiting raspberry canes, not forgetting the strawberry plants in homemade grow bags on a shelf! I’m amazed at how productive this little garden has become when you think that everything is planted in raised beds constructed of railway sleepers, on a concrete yard, so there is only about 9-10” of soil depth!

Potato & Onion bed

The Veg bed

The Fruit bed

With so much time on my hands, I have been trying to process the fleeces that I have had stored in various bags in the barn for the last few years. So far I have washed, dried and packed away in plastic vacuum bags, a Jacobs fleece (brown and white), a Ryland fleece (greyish-white and very soft) and am now in the process of washing a dark brown fleece, that I have no recollection of acquiring! A couple of the fleeces have been ruined by moth attack and one had obviously been situated under a leak in the roof and rotted, but it was high time I sorted them. I’ve still got quite a few to look at and process and then I suppose I’d better start spinning them!

I’m sorry that there hasn’t been much in the way of ‘nature’ about today’s blog, but I hope it has kept you entertained nonetheless.

P.S. I’m not going to speak too soon, but I think Mr Swallow may have finally found a mate!