Rural Ramblings in Crosby Ravensworth Parish – July 2009
At Barnskew we have had grey wagtails nesting, and on the river the kingfishers have young, as we have seen them busy carrying food. The sand martins, who are first of the swallow family to come & first to go, have hatched and flown – they nest in the sandy banks of the river.
The dry spell we had in June ago makes dry ground, and this in turn creates hard times for badgers, snipe, curlews, and other birds, as they can’t
penetrate the ground for grubs and worms. However, earthworms come up to the surface at night, so badgers – being nocturnal – can grab a few during the dark hours. If you use worms for fishing, try creeping on to your lawn at night with a torch and grabbing them. You have to be quick and also tread very lightly – the lightest vibration sends them straight down their holes.
The last two years have been bad for butterflies; we now have a third year developing into a disaster. In ‘07 & ‘08 our commonest species had so much rain that they only managed to grab the occasional dry sunny day to breed. This year, although Spring was dry, we had a cold east wind dominating the weather preventing them migrating & breeding. I have looked at nettles all this summer for the caterpillars without success. I did see a few young caterpillars in Gloucestershire recently. There have been quite a lot of meadow browns and small heaths on the rough grassland and fell fringes, but small tortoiseshell, peacock and red admirals are in desperate short supply. By now – on sunny days – these should be feeling on our buddleias, creeping thistles and other nectar-bearing plants. The painted ladies migrating from Europe should have amved here, but have been prevented by poor weather Pray for a very hot sunny August, we – and the wildlife – certainly need it.
I managed to check one of our local rare wild flowers -perennial flax – there are only a handful of places where it still exists around here, it seems to be doing quite well. Our traditional meadows have produced a fine array of colour, but as they can’t be mowed until mid July, they are suffering from the rain; it’s now nearly August and the Raisbeck (Orton) meadows are still uncut.