A Year in the Valley

Above picture: The greater-spotted woodpecker has started visiting our bird-feeder.

I have learned to be more patient and observant outdoors.  I’ve enjoyed spending time in the watermeadow more than ever, except during Lockdown, when I was in the garden every day.  I have learned how challenging it can be to identify similar-looking species and have been amazed by the sheer number of species and sub-species to choose from.  While I didn’t delve deeply into every living thing I spotted, I did learn a bit about each one, and I would explore further if something piqued my curiosity.  Finally, despite hearing about declining populations, I was buoyed with hope at the numbers of butterfly and beetle species that live in or visit the watermeadow.

The project took a lot of time, even over the winter when I was only posting three times a week.  Walking round the watermeadow and taking photos was the fun bit.  Putting together a post and uploading images and a paragraph of text, was the quick bit.  Scheduling posts helped too.  The slow and sometimes tedious bit was identification and research.  Sometimes I would spend a couple of hours on one bug or plant and reach a conclusion only to find I’d missed a feature that ruled it out – and I’d have to start again.  However, I think it would be beneficial to repeat the whole project in five years’ time to see if anything has changed.  So watch this space…

Above picture: A sparrowhawk breakfasting on the lawn.

Things I didn’t include

• Barn owl – the photo I used as an icon for my blog was taken in January 2023, when it was a regular visitor at dusk that winter.  We haven’t spotted it since.
• Earwig – spotted 16 July 2023.  I didn’t count it because I wasn’t happy with the photo.  Actually, there’s nothing wrong with the photo. 
• Greater spotted woodpecker – spotted 28 July – turned his head away as I took the photo. 
• Bat – spotted throughout the summer.  I finally got a photo with a couple of bats in it on 9 September, but the bats were just blurry smudges, and I wouldn’t have been able to identify the species.
• Tiny slug – photographed on 23 September – but I couldn’t find any information on it.
• Green woodpecker – spotted 1 October.  I thought I would get a better photo, but I didn’t.
• Hart’s tongue fern and tree ferns – I could have included these, as although we planted them, they are commonly found growing wild in Cornwall. 
• Black redstart – spotted 23 October on the balcony railing so it couldn’t be counted.
• Weasel – Mr C spotted it on 26 October, but it got away.
• Unarmed stick-insect – spotted 27 January 2024 – but I couldn’t count it because it was in the front garden.
• Water plantain, wandering pond snail and fool’s watercress – all spotted in May 2024 – photographed but I wasn’t confident in my identification.
• Horse flies – very common, especially down by the stream.  They are too fast to photograph, but I could have snapped a bite, as evidence.  I didn’t think of that!
• Plus grasses, plants and sedges that remain unidentified.

Other Visitors … Past

There were some species, like the barn owl, that visited in our first four years living here, but not during the year of my count.  Or at least, if they did, we weren’t looking at the right time to see them. 

• A roe deer spotted a handful of times in the early morning in April 2023.
• The coal tit, nuthatch, greenfinch, chaffinch and bullfinch.  We spotted the bullfinch in next door’s willow just before the count started!. 
• A snipe on the bank of the stream – 19 January 2022.
• A kingfisher – 8 February 2022.
• Pigmy shrews, along with the mice and voles, were regularly spotted in the undergrowth while we were gardening.

…and Present

Afterwards, during the rest of June, I spotted a bright red cinnabar moth flying across the watermeadow on the bank, and some scarlet pimpernel blooming on the ramp. 

Today, I spotted this jay in the alders. I managed to get a shot as it flew off and was astonished to see that its wing pattern looks like the face of a fierce animal.

I logged a total of 279 species over the year.  But, when I was compiling a book of this blog, I noticed that the burdock gall fly had been incorrectly identified and was, in fact, a yellow dung fly.  So the total has to be adjusted down to 278.  But, if I were to add up all the species that I actually saw in the watermeadow (not the top garden or front garden) from 5 June 2023 to 4 June 2024, it would come to well over 290, with unidentified grasses, plants and sedges.