Folklore Notes and report back on Great British Garden Bird Watch

Our January Great British Garden Bird Watch was a huge success with over half a million people participating in the survey, eight and half million birds being reported, with 73 different species being spotted.

This winter with its particularly cold weather, which is still ongoing – though I understand it is relatively normal to have snow in Scotland, Wales and Ireland at this time of year – has been very bad for the tiny birds, who have no body weight and thus few reserves – so the wren, coal and blue tit are having a tough time, and we are being encouraged to feed them.

Greater Spotted Woodpecker

In the past 30 years there has been a dramatic decline in house sparrows and starlings, while species normally found in the fields have come into the villages and towns – the yellowhammer, redwing, bullfinches and fieldfare.

The report back can be seen here in the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds website, while this year’s top five (all pictured in my previous post – clever me!) are:

1) House Sparrow - maintained top spot for 7 years, but have declined by over 15%
2) Black Bird (see below for their song .. lovely – give it a listen .. only a few seconds of pure natural bliss)
3) Starling - dropped to 3rd place after being in top two for 10 years
4) Blue Tit
5) Chaffinch

Blackbird Song, Garden Birds too - YouTube video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=997RTKzc39c

Now that we are terribly slowly coming into Spring, no doubt it will be magnificent once the warmth gets turned up a little, we can keep our eyes open for a few more turns of nature – the woodpecker (on warm fine days – where are those?) should be out drumming on the large, old trees.

White Horse Chestnut - the conker tree (late April/May flowering)

After selecting a hollow branch or trunk of a dead or dying tree – they set to: 40 blows every second! You might think that they would get a headache – the equivalent to you and me of repeatedly hitting our head against a wall at 26 km per hour (16 mph).

Evolutionarily they have adapted to this method of attracting a mate, and maintaining their territory: their skulls are thick!, their brains are very tightly packed inside to reduce the effects of shaking; while they also have spongy tissue around their beak which acts like a car’s shock absorbers. Their eyes too close just before the beak hits the tree, to avoid being damaged by flying bits of bark.

Quite honestly this year .. some of the lore seems to be a bit haywire .. the saying goes that:

“If March comes in like a lion,
it goes out like a lamb .....
If it comes in like a lamb,
It goes out like a lion.”

March was just icy, snowy, cold and very arctic windy .. the lambs were struggling & I’m absolutely certain the lion would have been hunkered down somewhere!

Cornus florida berries encased in ice (Flowering Dogwood, USA)

While in February I totally agree as it’s now April!

“That as the days lengthen,
So the cold strengthens.”

Why I’m whingeing when I live on the south coast of England, I have no idea .. but if it’s cold here – then it must be utterly miserable further north and further abroad as in Mongolia, as the news tells us. (Since I wrote this - it is definitely warming up: I'm pleased to say!

However Spring only arrives when you can put a foot on 12 daisies .. and I do not think I can do that yet – there is an odd daisy or two .. but not a little patch. Daisies apparently are among the first flowers to respond to the warming sun and the rising sap, but many Springs do not really start until April or May – this year is one of those I suspect. I remember about 8 years ago sitting outside in 30 deg C having a roast lunch on Mother’s Day (March 30th that year) .. so we English have our own personal weather lore!

Once the daisies do appear then we just have that wonderful juxtaposition of vibrant, verdant greens, bushy growth, blossoms and candles, also red, orange or yellow stemmed with greening buds of the dogwoods.

We need to protect this new life so it is here for future generations and all to share and wonder at, as we do now. We need the hedges, for which this country is (was) renowned, with their complete holistic habitats, the field margins, the scrubby woodland pockets at field edges, the dirty puddles – these breeding grounds for wild plants, for wildlife – insects, flowers, weeds too, hidey holes for beetles, insects, invertebrates – more stocks of food (seeds, leaves, nectar), pollinators .....

... after this year .. we really need to do our little at home and round about – protect this life ahead, so we can all see the horse chestnut candles, the bumbling bees, our smallest birds, and our own food growing in a wonderful cross-hatch of field colours containing all the plants in a rainbow –

R – for a field of red poppies
O – oranges of ripened corn, wheat and barley fluttering in the balmy breeze
Y – sunny yellow daffodils at the start of Spring
G – verdant greens of new shoots
B – sky blue of the linseed fields, above which the lark sings
I – Indigo – to remind us of our Greek and Roman connections, who had coined the word from India and its use of the first ‘royal purple’ indigo dyes, millennia ago
V – Violet – violets in the verges, amongst the woodland floor peeping out

Bless this world with all its vibrancy and all it offers – let us do our part and encourage our families, relations and friends to do their part – now at the start of another year and Spring, or as we wind down to Autumn to remember cleanliness is not all – let’s do less garden spring cleaning next year! – encouraging all life: from lichens, fungus, snails, slugs, bugs and beetles et al .. so we do see the colours of the rainbow, and we can eat the rainbow foods, to keep us in this rainbow land.

Dear Mr Postman – things are looking up a little – my mother suddenly was quite bright and cheerful – which was lovely to see. She then went back to sleep! However she’d looked at the flowers her great friend had sent her .. well I had instructions .. tulips, daffodils, and some red dogwood sprigs (left): Mum commented on the white tulips making the difference – bringing the other flowers to life .. there were pink and purply ones too; then there are some hyacinths I found – and the blue ones have come out – giving a really lovely scent, the pink ones aren’t far behind – so that’s a success from Elizabeth. Mum also commented on the new ‘posters’ and said they amused her .. so that’s good – a successful day.

Hilary Melton-Butcher
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