How to get away from it all in The Lake District on a Bank Holiday weekend

 

And not just any old Bank Holiday – the weather is beautiful, English lockdown domestic travel restrictions have been lifted, pubs and restaurants are open, and nobody can fly abroad. The whole world and his wife have come to the Lake District for the weekend. The Intrepid Local Guide, Jack the Navigator Hound, and I are off for a picnic. join us for a lovely, quiet afternoon, with hardly a soul in sight. How? Draw a line between any two lakes and find a place on that line where nothing is marked.

We'll park up (parking tip: if you want to drive home in the same vehicle you arrived in, park off the road. Emergency vehicles must be able to pass you at speed, and if it's a choice between saving a life and not scratching your paintwork, guess where the priority lies), and take a short stroll to where a trickling beck is rippling through this majestic valley. The first area to investigate is a bog, where Cuckoo flowers are growing up through the Sphagnum moss and Stoneflies are lurking among the grasses. Don't worry, they don't bite. These are another of those flies that aren't flies. They form the insect order PLECOPTERA (pp 44-45 in The Quick Guide to Creepy-Crawlies) and they are a good indicator of water quality. The nymphs are aquatic and the female will only lay her eggs in clean water. Look for segmented antennae, chewing mouthparts and two tails (cerci).

  

Having found a dry spot to relax with our pork pies and scotch eggs etc. we'll spend an hour or two crawling around in the sheep short grass looking at the world of the very small. No big, showy flowers here but miniature Milkworts, Lousewort and Tormentil, all under 2cm tall.

The beetles are about too. The iridescent chap on the left, which is either purple or green, depending on how the light hits him, is a Click Beetle of the ELATERIDAE family. These beetles have an ejector mechanism to avoid predation, and they bounce into the air with an audible click. Oops! There he goes. The other magnificent fellow is a Ground Beetle of the CARABIDAE family.

Retreat!! The problem with nosing around in the undergrowth for beetles is that you may finish up where you're not welcome, such as next to a skilfully hidden nest. Time to go back to our picnic site and watch from a respectful distance. Oh good, the mother has come back. She's a Meadow Pipit. I noticed that all three eggs were the same shape and colour which is good news, for their nests are one of the favoutite targets for the Cuckoo to lay their eggs in. Fortunately, Meadow Pipits are still fairly common up here in The Lakes but they have declined overall and are listed as Near Threatened by the IUCN.

Now, where did I put that bottle which I left cooling in the beck?

Steve

Steve's Nature Plus

Minibeast Monday * Podcast Tuesday * #CumbriaNature Wednesday * Foraging Friday * and other odd bits as they happen throughout the week.

Steve's Gallery

If you'd like to see some of the pictures in more detail, you'll find them in the gallery. These are also available for prints or digital downloads for commercial or scientific use.

Steve's Books

The Quick Guide to Creepy-Crawlies All you need to know to identify any type of insect, spider, worm or snail very simply and find out more about it. Yvonne: This was a gift for a family so that the children can understand what they see on days out. The second was for me. Logical and easy to use. If you know anyone who likes nature you can be confident that gifting this book will give years of pleasure.
The Eggs of Saramova You can listen to this book for FREE as it is being serialized on the podcast The Author Reads	£7.50 Paperback edition
Not Just For Twisted Women by Steve Daniels  A light-hearted look at life through the eyes of the fairer sex. Janet: If you are short on time but enjoy reading and are maybe not into long extended novels then Not Just For... Twisted Women provides readers with concise stories that stand alone and most certainly entertain with their ultimate twists. Loved it. Helen: A very good read! Well written and entertaining! Margaret: Each quick tale gives a glimpse into a character's life and has an often humorous twist at the end. I would love to read more. Yvonne: These days many people find it hard to find the time to read a novel, so this book of short stories is ideal to dip into. It is also makes a good gift.	£4.99 Paperback edition

Crete Nature Catch-up
Series 1 - Welcome to Lasithi	Series 2 - The Rhythm Of Life	Series 3 - A Journey Begins
Series 4 - The Milonas Valley	Series 5 - This Is Ferma	Series 6 - Upland Villages
Series 7 - The Forty saints	Series 8 - Sunday Strolls	Series 9 -Stormy Weather

*********************************************************************

LINKS:

Share your nature thoughts, photos and comments on Naturalists (the facebook page that accompanies this blog)

Glasson Moss and The Other Fossil Fuel

 

We all know the three major fossil fuels; coal, oil and gas but today we're off to a peat bog. Peat is sometimes referred to as the forgotten fossil fuel and is rarely used outside of Scandinavia and the British Isles. It's an amazing material formed by partially decayed organic matter and, what's more, it's terrific at storing carbon. So terrific that the International Union for the Conservation of Nature have calculated that peatlands store more carbon than all other vegetation types in the world combined. The important plant in this ecosystem is this Sphagnum moss. The green bits that you can see contain the usual photosynthesising plant calls, but underneath they have special, barrel shaped cells that soak up water like a sponge, thus creating the bog. Bogs are very acidic and only certain plants, like the Hare's-tail Cottongrass that you can see dotted about, can tolerate these conditions.

Another plant that loves these acidic conditions is Heather which is why we're seeing a lot of Oak Eggar caterpillars about. Despite its name (which derives from the fact that its coccoon is said to resemble an acorn) its preferred caterpillar plant foods are Heather and Bilberries. We also have a Wall Brown butterfly making a flying visit and a small moth hiding in the heather that I can't identify.

To stop our feet getting wet, volunteers have laid hundreds of metres of boardwalks, and as these warm up in the sun, Large Red Damselflies and Viviparous Lizards come out to bask. How do you tell a damselfly from a dragonfly? Dragonflies rest with their wings outstretched, damselflies fold them back in line with their bodies. (One of the many tips to identification that you'll find in The Quick Guide to Creepy-Crawlies).

As we come to the edge of the bog we come into a small patch of Silver Birch. On some of the dying stumps of trees we have Birch Polypore bracket fungi growing. These grow almost exclusively on birch trees and are also known as the razorstrop fungus because that was what they were traditionally used for. And for those of you who don't remember the days before the disposable safety razor, razor blades used to resemble single blade penknives and had to be regularly sharpened by whetting the blade, back and forth on a strop. We also have a number of small beetles on the leaves. I haven't had them confirmed as yet, but I think that they are Heather Beetles, Lochmaea suturalis.

I haven't mentioned birds yet, but they've been about. Mainly Chaffinches and a few Blackbirds but for most of the morning we've been accompanied by the call of a cuckoo, the first I've heard this year. And for those of you who only read this blog for the birdie bits, here's a Wood Pigeon taking a bath on the track into the nearby village of Glasson.

Steve

Steve's Nature Plus

Minibeast Monday * Podcast Tuesday * #CumbriaNature Wednesday * Foraging Friday * and other odd bits as they happen throughout the week.

Steve's Gallery

If you'd like to see some of the pictures in more detail, you'll find them in the gallery. These are also available for prints or digital downloads for commercial or scientific use.

Steve's Books

The Quick Guide to Creepy-Crawlies All you need to know to identify any type of insect, spider, worm or snail very simply and find out more about it. Yvonne: This was a gift for a family so that the children can understand what they see on days out. The second was for me. Logical and easy to use. If you know anyone who likes nature you can be confident that gifting this book will give years of pleasure.
The Eggs of Saramova You can listen to this book for FREE as it is being serialized on the podcast The Author Reads	£7.50 Paperback edition
Not Just For Twisted Women by Steve Daniels  A light-hearted look at life through the eyes of the fairer sex. Janet: If you are short on time but enjoy reading and are maybe not into long extended novels then Not Just For... Twisted Women provides readers with concise stories that stand alone and most certainly entertain with their ultimate twists. Loved it. Helen: A very good read! Well written and entertaining! Margaret: Each quick tale gives a glimpse into a character's life and has an often humorous twist at the end. I would love to read more. Yvonne: These days many people find it hard to find the time to read a novel, so this book of short stories is ideal to dip into. It is also makes a good gift.	£4.99 Paperback edition

Crete Nature Catch-up
Series 1 - Welcome to Lasithi	Series 2 - The Rhythm Of Life	Series 3 - A Journey Begins
Series 4 - The Milonas Valley	Series 5 - This Is Ferma	Series 6 - Upland Villages
Series 7 - The Forty saints	Series 8 - Sunday Strolls	Series 9 -Stormy Weather

*********************************************************************

LINKS:

Share your nature thoughts, photos and comments on Naturalists (the facebook page that accompanies this blog)

Frozen!

 

During the week, for those of you who are following News From The Old Cornmill, we were looking at the emergence of the first crocuses, heralding the arrival of Spring, a mere four weeks away. Up in The Lakes, however, it is still decidedly Winter. Not only is the human population in lockdown but it seems as though nature is too. Even the water, draining off the fells, has been stopped in mid flow. With the dashboard temperature registering 1^oC outside, and a light rain starting to fall, were off to try and find some shelter in White Moss Woods.

There is a track leading up a hill which, needless to say, our Intrepid Local Guide and Jack The Navigator Hound have already started to make an assault upon, but we're going to explore this rocky outcrop and see if there are any invertebrates sheltering in the crevices. The lush greenery upon which we are walking is provided by two species of moss. The pale green one is a member of the true mosses (Class Bryopsida), whereas the dark green one is a member of one of the other seven classes of moss, the Polytrichopsida. Despite the name of the woods there is no white moss (Leucobryum, another of the true mosses) to be seen.

There are also plenty of lichens about, such as this Evernia. Lichens are curious things as they consist of two entirely unrelated organisms that have merged to form something entirely new, in much the same way as the two highly inflammable gasses, hydrogen and oxygen, when merged together, form water, a liquid capable of putting out fires. It is know as a symbiotic relationship and, as with any relationship, the whole is significantly greater than the sum of the constituent parts.

At last, having turned over a number of rocks and logs, we've found an invertebrate. All the others seem to have buried themselves deep, where the soil is warmer. It's a Shiny Woodlouse, Oniscus asellus, and those pale patches that you can just about see is where the calcium is stored for constructing the new exoskeleton when it moults. Woodlice moult in two halves, back end first followed by the front end, and then, as the shed exoskeleton is full of calcium, they very often eat it.

And finally, another sign that Spring is not too far way, the Hazel catkins are out. These are the male reproductive parts of the tree. They are wind pollinated, that is, the wind blows the pollen in all directions and some of it lands on female flowers which are small and red, and from which, the hazelnut is eventually formed. The rain has started to fall more heavily now, Jack and the ILG have returned from their jaunt up the hillside, so it seems like a good time to cosy up in the car with a mug of hot soup.

Follow me throughout the week on News From The Old Cornmill, or failing that, I'll see you next week, all being well.

Steve's Books

The Quick Guide to Creepy-Crawlies All you need to know to identify any type of insect, spider, worm or snail very simply and find out more about it. Yvonne: This was a gift for a family so that the children can understand what they see on days out. The second was for me. Logical and easy to use. If you know anyone who likes nature you can be confident that gifting this book will give years of pleasure.
The Eggs of Saramova A science fiction novella for those who don't like science fiction. A fast-paced thriller that is, literally, out of this world (and it starts right here in Crete). Too new for reviews yet!	£7.50 Paperback edition
Not Just For Twisted Women by Steve Daniels  A light-hearted look at life through the eyes of the fairer sex. Janet: If you are short on time but enjoy reading and are maybe not into long extended novels then Not Just For... Twisted Women provides readers with concise stories that stand alone and most certainly entertain with their ultimate twists. Loved it. Helen: A very good read! Well written and entertaining! Margaret: Each quick tale gives a glimpse into a character's life and has an often humorous twist at the end. I would love to read more. Yvonne: These days many people find it hard to find the time to read a novel, so this book of short stories is ideal to dip into. It is also makes a good gift.	£4.99 Paperback edition

See sample pages of all my books and latest blogs, and keep abreast of latest publications here: http://author.to/SteveDaniels

Crete Nature Catch-up
Series 1 - Welcome to Lasithi	Series 2 - The Rhythm Of Life	Series 3 - A Journey Begins
Series 4 - The Milonas Valley	Series 5 - This Is Ferma	Series 6 - Upland Villages
Series 7 - The Forty saints	Series 8 - Sunday Strolls	Series 9 -Stormy Weather

Share your nature thoughts, photos and comments on Naturalists (the facebook page that accompanies this blog)

The Ice Fields of Kilnhill

 

Another cold January morning up here in The Lake District, but Bassenthwaite, surrounded by snow capped peaks, looks marvellous. An eldritch feel to the shoreline, with mosses threatening to engulf the young saplings, Hairy Curtain Crust Fungus, Stereum hirsutum, colonising the sawn wood, and a pair of Mallards, Anas platyrhynchos, out on the lake. The lake itself, is beginning to freeze, with ice extending about a metre from the bank. The temperature is hovering around the 0^oC mark, but the morning sun is providing a little warmth.

Going east, into the farmlands, gives us an opportunity to see a bit of the local bird life. Common friends like Wood Pigeons, Columba palumbus, and Carrion Crows, Corvus corone, are our constant companions, whilst a Mistle Thrush, Turdus viscivorus, observes our progress from an overhead wire. Higher still, a Common Buzzard, Buteo buteo, quarters the sky. Meanwhile, back on the ground, the flooded fields have become ice rinks and Jack the Navigator Hound goes through his routine for Dancing On Ice, which is somewhat worrying as he's only got little legs and I'm not sure how thick the ice is. Luckily, it's thick enough to support the weight of a Jack Russell!

Into a flooded woodland now, somewhat reminiscent of the Florida Everglades, but without the heat. A lovely bank of snowdrops greet our arrival. There are five different UK species, plus subspecies and hybrids. There is an excellent guide to identifying them here. Up in the trees, outcroppings of an Ascomycete fungus, probably Witch's Broom of the Taphrina genus, adorn the branches. This is the same genus that causes some leaves and catkins to curl and are part of the wonderful world of fungi, without which, nature as we know it would not be nature. Incidentally, there is a fantastic book by Merlin Sheldrake called Entangled Life, which I'm reading at the moment, which is a real eye opener.

And now we emerge out onto the road into the village of Kilnhill, with the snowy fells behind us. Back in the summer, you may remember that we counted 43 different plants and 22 different insects in a stretch of hedgerow like this (see Fell Walking For Wimps 1 - Slate Fell). Nothing in flower today and no insects but it's a good time to look for last year's bird nests and if you look inside, you can see this year's Spring growth taking advantage of the nutrient rich nest floor and the shelter that the nest provides. Nothing is wasted in nature, even this crevice between the branches provides a cosy nook for this Garden Snail, Cornu aspersum.

Back to the car now for a reviving cup of hot soup which our Intrepid Local Guide has been lugging around in her backpack all morning for some reason best know to herself. Personally, I'd have left it in the car.

News From The Old Cornmill

Minibeasts are a bit thin on the ground in the UK during the winter months, so I was delighted beyond reason when this Ground Spider (Gnaphosidae family) turned up in my bathroom this morning.

And finally... some important news: there is far too much going on to fit into one little blog post, so now you can join me throughout the week at the Old Cornmill by subscribing to updates from my brand new web site: Steve's Nature Plus

See you there,

Steve

LINKS:

Steve's Nature Plus Join me at The Old Cornmill and follow me throughout the week for all the news that doesn't fit into the blog.

Share your nature thoughts, photos and comments on Naturalists (the facebook page that accompanies this blog)

The Puddle Hills - Crummock Water

 

As we are in the Lake District, it’s high time that we visited one of these overgrown puddles to see what all the fuss is about. About 8 miles to the south of Cockermouth lies Crummock Water, and it is there that we shall take a stroll to Hause Point [pronounced Haw’s], one of the lower promontories which won’t tax the leg muscles too much. It’s a beautiful day, so let’s see what we can find.

We’ll start by walking towards the back of this block of rock, known as Rannerdale Knots, then follow a beck down towards the lake, before finishing up on that little hillock in the middle distance. There are a couple of very common flowers that you’ll see all over the place at the moment: Tormentil, the little yellow one with 4 petals in the shape of a cross; and Harebell, the blue droopy, bell shaped one. The tall job, with the yellow flowers drying to brown is Woodland Germander, sometimes known as Wood Sage. Don’t bother picking the leaves, it’s a totally different plant to the sage in the kitchen. Same family, but that’s as far as it goes.

This is Squat Beck, looking like it’s posing for a calender, and dancing about in that Willow tree that we just passed was an Ichneumon Wasp. These really are good guys as far as the human race is concerned. They lay their eggs in other insects, such as the beetles that infest the crops that we grow to eat. The big problem is that we don’t know how many types there are, or which ones control which harmful crop pests. If we did, we could manage our farms to encourage the right Ichneumons in as pest controllers, and not have to spray the crops with goodness knows what. The world needs more biologists and less financial analysts. Enough soap-boxing, I’ve just spotted an Oil Beetle scurrying into the grass. They’re called oil beetles because they release tiny droplets of oil, which can burn the skin, if you pick them up. They aren’t so useful to us, as in the larval stage they attach themselves to bees and eat the bee’s offspring. Now, if we knew which ichneumon fly attacked the oil beetle that attacked the honey bee… the world definitely needs more biologists.

There’s Hause Point, up there to our left, but we’ll go round and take the easy way up. We often chat about flowers on our walks, but before flowering plants came into existence, about 140 million years ago, ferns had already been about for a couple of hundred million years and mosses probably about a hundred million years before that. They really are successful organisms. This one, growing in the wall, is a Parsley Fern, because its fronds look like parsley leaves, and this, at the base of the wall is Haircap Moss. What looks like a tiny red flower sticking out of it is a spore bearing capsule. No pollination required as ferns and mosses reproduce in a simpler way (but still too complex to go into, here and now).

Here we are, back at the water’s edge and that seventeen hundred foot pile of rubble on the far side of the puddle is Mellbreak. Ah, how sweet; a Robin has come to join us. Terrible things really, fiercely territorial, probably why they have red breasts, doesn’t show the blood. You wouldn’t want one as a neighbour, if you were another robin, that is. You see that tree, along the bank? There are a couple of Canada Geese foraging around the base of it. The first pair of these geese came to live in St. James’s Park in London in the late 17^th century, where King James II kept his waterfowl collection. They bred and spread, slowly at first, but now there are over a hundred thousand of the beggars in the country. I use the term advisedly because, although they are naturally herbivorous, searching around for choice plants as these two are doing, we have taught them to beg for food. For city birds, we have become their chief source of sustenance. They, in return, give us a rich source of fertilizer (a fact not always appreciated when you tread it into your carpet back home).

So, having walked along by the waterside, and up the gentle slope, we have now arrived at Hause Point. A commanding view over Crummock Water, from which the River Cocker flows down to Cockermouth. I have to admit, for all I mockingly call them the puddle hills, The Lake District truly is scenically spectacular.

Until next week

Stay safe and be happy,

Steve

Steve's Books

The Quick Guide to Creepy-Crawlies All you need to know to identify any type of insect, spider, worm or snail very simply and find out more about it. Yvonne: This was a gift for a family so that the children can understand what they see on days out. The second was for me. Logical and easy to use. If you know anyone who likes nature you can be confident that gifting this book will give years of pleasure.
The Eggs of Saramova A science fiction novella for those who don't like science fiction. A fast-paced thriller that is, literally, out of this world (and it starts right here in Crete). Too new for reviews yet!
Not Just For Twisted Women by Steve Daniels  A light-hearted look at life through the eyes of the fairer sex. Janet: If you are short on time but enjoy reading and are maybe not into long extended novels then Not Just For... Twisted Women provides readers with concise stories that stand alone and most certainly entertain with their ultimate twists. Loved it. Helen: A very good read! Well written and entertaining! Margaret: Each quick tale gives a glimpse into a character's life and has an often humorous twist at the end. I would love to read more. Yvonne: These days many people find it hard to find the time to read a novel, so this book of short stories is ideal to dip into. It is also makes a good gift.

See sample pages of all my books and latest blogs, and keep abreast of latest publications here: http://author.to/SteveDaniels

*********************************************************************

LINKS:

Share your nature thoughts, photos and comments on Naturalists (the facebook page that accompanies this blog)

Explore east Crete with the #CreteNature interactive Hiking and Nature Map

Crete	Cumbria
Cretan Flora Crete Birding Greek Butterflies and Moths	Cumbria Wildlife Trust Cumbria Bodiversity Data Centre Carlisle Natural History Society