The main difference between the valley this month and last month is the weather. For this week, at least, we have the return of summer, and the sunshine is casting a glaze over all the foliage. The reed canary grass toppled over after flowering but is now sprouting fresh green blades. In previous years I haven’t noticed this second ‘crop’, but I am not expecting it to flower again. Bursts of colour come from the purple loosestrife, which is still flowering.
Below, I have pasted the picture for June, so you can see the difference from the beginning to the end of summer.
More things that got away – I had to mow the pathways down in the watermeadow yesterday, as it was my only chance for the next couple of weeks. My back was well enough as long as the mower’s motor assisted me. I tried not to think about the wildlife I was rampaging over. Many grasshoppers hopped out of my way as did a couple of frogs which I was peeved about as I didn’t have my camera with me. There were three huge spiders guarding webs across the left-hand pathway, but they scuttled back to their anchorage points before I came barging through and I know they will soon build more cobwebs. I missed a beetle on the ramp and a red dragonfly, which might have been the Common Darter, but it flew off before I could examine it close-up. I straightened one of the stone steps and a centipede scuttled away. I went back down with the camera a little later and didn’t see as much that time, though I got an excellent photo of a green-veined white butterfly and one of the disgruntled spiders’ cousins whose web in the middle of a grass patch remained undisturbed. Lots of carpet moths and speckled wood butterflies and swarms of dung flies of various sizes.
PROJECT UPDATE – I have just realised that at this point, I am a quarter of the way through the year that started on 5th June 2023. So how’s it going? My goal was to record 260 species in the year, which is 65 per quarter and I have recorded 120 so far, which on paper looks way ahead of schedule!
However, there are lean times ahead! The meadow will be flooded for a month or two during the winter and, yes, I could paddle, but I don’t want to turn it into a quagmire. During that time, I can try and spot birds from the decking or the house and I can record the rest of the trees – alder, willows. Also, I have some photos that I still haven’t identified, like grasses, docks, and toadstools.
There will be a fresh scattering of flowers in the spring, and I hope to be able to do some pond-dipping. The pond and stream are too overgrown to get to at the moment, so I haven’t recorded any pondlife at all as yet, but I know it’s there.
So, until then, I’ve got to keep my eyes open and my camera clicking. There are probably tiny plants that I have been overlooking, the centipede that got away and there will undoubtedly be more fungi in the autumn. I wasn’t expecting to see any during the summer – and I still haven’t identified what I saw.