Kroustas Forest

Last week we were looking for Griffon Vultures on the heights above Lasithi Plateau. We found some but they were flying very high. This week as we gathered on the forest road we were treated to the inspiring spectacle of nine of these magnificent birds not fifty feet above our heads. Standing half as tall as a man and with a nine foot wingspan they truly are awesome birds. Like all vultures they feed on carrion and will often circle around elderly animals that seem to have difficulty moving. As this accurately describes quite a number of our Sunday Strollers we considered it wise to move into the cover of the trees without further delay.

Kroustas is primarily a pine forest but it was the Juniper that caught the group's interest. Possibly because I informed them that a handful of juniper berries, when added to a bottle of the local moonshine and left to steep, gave a result that was (to paraphrase Douglas Adams) something that was almost, but not quite, entirely unlike gin. With Christmas not so far away they fell upon the bush like a swarm of locusts. Still on the Christmas theme, high above our heads Mistletoe was growing in large enticing balls. Although parasitic it does very little harm to the trees and is a net benefactor to the forest. Its berries attract birds, small mammals and insects which increases the biodiversity of the area. An American study showed that twice as many juniper bushes sprouted where mistletoe was present compared with areas where no mistletoe existed. The seeds of both plants being distributed via the digestive systems of birds and small mammals and mistletoe is better at marketing its presence than juniper.

We emerged from the forest onto a rocky outcrop with tremendous views over the lower forest and the Gulf of Mirabello. I placed three of our gentlemen on said outcrop in the hope of enticing the vultures back and went off to study butterflies. Last week we saw the Painted Lady (Vanessa cardui) and this week it was her sister, the Red Admiral (Vanessa atalanta), who was following us about. So, if your name is Vanessa, you are named after a beautiful butterfly. After that, of course, you have a choice of being a burly Russian seaman or a Portsmouth lady of the night, so it's probably best to stop at butterfly.

We then moved off to a different part of the forest, the location of which I will not reveal. The reason being that Steve Lenton, our semi-resident botanist came across a small plant which looked as if it had been dreamed up by the makers of Dr. Who. This was the Cretan Biarum (Biarum davisii) a flower (honestly) that is on the IUCN list as 'near threatened'. The reason it is near threatened is because the major threat is from avaricious rare bulb collectors and hence the reason for not publishing its exact location as it has never been recorded in this area of Crete before. Rare bulb and rare animal collectors are the scourge of biodiversity and should be put up against the wall and shot in my opinion.

Dragonflies were also darting around us, which may seem odd in a habitat that had no rivers, streams or ponds, as dragonfly larvae are aquatic. But all dragonflies have different requirements. Some like to lay their eggs in running water and some in standing water. This particular dragonfly, the Red-veined Darter, lays its eggs in shallow puddles as do all in the genus Sympetrum and when it rains in a forest, shallow puddles become particularly abundant.

The Taverna Bit

Having completed two strolls in one morning we repaired to lunch at the Matraia taverna in Kroustas village to replace any calories which we may have inadvertently burnt off in the preceding couple of hours. A lovely liver in red wine sauce was the special of the day so quite few of us opted to top up our iron and antioxidant levels.

Diary Dates

Stroll #4

Sunday 14^th October

11 am

Almyros Wetlands, south of Agios Nikolaos

A chance to see amphibians, dragonflies and migratory birds.

Stroll #5

Sunday ^21st October

11 am

Bramiana Reservoir

(Details next week)

Not Just For Twisted Women by Steve Daniels  A light-hearted look at life through the eyes of the fairer sex.  Kindle Edition 1.99 pounds sterling (or equivalent). Paperback edition will be available in time for Christmas. Read snippets, samples and stuff at Steve's Books

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LINKS:

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

Explore the region with the #CreteNature interactive Hiking and Nature Map

Cretan Flora

Flowers of Crete;

BIRDS OF CRETE

Crete Birding

Greek Butterflies and Moths

Aquaworld Aquarium

Visit Greece (National Government Tourist Office)

How to Help a Planet

Painted Lady

We had a wonderful year together in 2014 looking at all the fascinating aspects of nature in the South East of Crete and sometimes beyond. Identifying plants, birds and insects and finding out a little bit about them. There will be more of the same this year but we’ll be looking deeper into what happens and why in the natural world. So be prepared to get your hands and knees dirty as we get down close and personal with nature.

Left to Right: Skylark, Stone-chat, Chaffinch

But first, some phenology. There are a few birds that I recorded in January between 2004 and 2010 that I haven’t seen in January since. These are: Chaffinch, Dunlin, Pied Flycatcher and Kestrel.  So let’s go down to the olive groves near Long Beach where the undergrowth is not too dense and see if we can find some Chaffinches and maybe a Flycatcher. Here we are and what a pleasant greeting – a pair of Painted Lady Butterflies pirouetting in the sunlight. You toddle off over that waste ground where there are plenty of posts and things which make good vantage points for Flycatchers to ambush unwary insects and I’ll scour the olive grove for Chaffinches.  We’ll meet back here in an hour and compare notes. What have you found? Plenty of White Wagtails and a nice Stonechat but not a hint of a Flycatcher, Pied or otherwise. No matter, it’s all useful data. I’ve had a little more luck. I’ve found some skylarks running around but also three or four Chaffinches. 

Red-veined Darter (female)

While we’re here I noticed a damp hollow with a couple of red dragonflies darting about. Both the Common Darter and the Scarlet Darter are on our “to find list” for January so let’s go and see if we can identify them.  That’s a bit of a surprise, a Red-veined Darter. She’s rather an elderly lady which is only to be expected as I generally see them no later than November. See the yellow patch at the base of the wing? That’s one of the identification keys. The Scarlet Darter has a bright orange patch and the Common and Southern Darters have none at all.

The micro world of Moss

Back in Victorian England in the nineteenth century there was a passing fad for creating Mosseries, either in the garden or in glass jars called terrariums, and I thought we’d have a go at reviving the fad by starting our own this winter (you can all join in with this one. I’ve put some simple instructions up in the Naturalists Group on Facebook). Mosses are plants of course and along with Hornworts and Liverworts make up the phylum Bryophyta. Mosses are totally distinct from flowering plants in a number of ways, one of which is that they start life as spores rather than seeds. 

These spores develop into thread like structures called protonema and become sexually mature as gametophytes. These are responsible for producing sperm and eggs and produce the familiar carpet of moss. The long stilts which poke up from this carpet are called sporophytes and the capsules on the end (called sporangia)  contain new spores which starts the whole cycle again.

Insect Eggs

It looks like our mossary may become an insectarium as I’ve just discovered some little yellow eggs in amongst our moss scrapings. I haven’t a clue what they are although I’d hazard a guess at some sort of fly. We’ll just have to wait and see if they hatch. 

This is a brief taste of what’s to come this year. We’ll be out and about together trying to fill in the gaps in the phenology record and making a lot of new observations (and maybe some new discoveries). I’ll be starting a few projects to get your teeth into (and they’re not just for children – there’s no reason why an erudite professor of physics or a CEO of an international company shouldn’t have a mossary on their desks); and I dare say we’ll have more lunches and a few courtyard chats like we did last year.

As a species we need to know a lot more about the planet we live on than we do at present. If we are to continue to evolve and survive the sixth mass extinction into which we have put ourselves and all other life on Earth with reckless abandon then every scrap of information counts. So get photographing and get involved with data collectors such as iNaturalist or Project Noah and add your observations. One to add to your New Year’s Resolutions this year: make a contribution to world knowledge. Until next week – happy hunting.

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LINKS:

Naturalists (the facebook page that accompanies this blog)

Flowers of Crete;

BIRDS OF CRETE

Crete Birding

Greek Butterflies and Moths

Dragonflies 

Aquaworld Aquarium

Visit Greece (National Government Tourist Office)