Not Safe in Taxis

Bird survey form (top section only).

Regular readers will know that I spend some of my time out observing local wildlife and I am quite keen to add any observations to the National Biodiversity Database. As part of this I count the birds on this 'farm' through the winter months and survey bumble bees on three walk-routes in the summer. This week is change-over week, when the birds finish (the survey only wants winter residents) and the bees start.

Last year's bee survey map. My three 'transepts'
are arrowed. I have to walk these three walks
at least once a month from March to October.

As well as these formal multi-month surveys, I also record any mammals I see (including road-kill), any birds and amphibians anywhere in my travels and input these to the database(s). I enjoy doing this 'observing' anyway (always have been a bit of a naturalist) and the database thing gives it an extra flavour of usefulness.

The sheep are currently on the front lawn - they have almost
eaten the East Field bare. This is Myfanwy. 

We have 'breaking news' in the pig department, though no photo's so you will have to put up with some wet sheep. Our breeder (Adrian) had a bit of a set back when one of the sows (Plum), who was due to 'farrow' in January failed to do so. She was last heard of being shipped back to Wicklow to be put back with the boar to either accept him (a sure sign that she was not pregnant) or to farrow a bit later than planned (just wrong dates recorded back in October). These things happen and it is always "in the lap of the gods".

(L to R) Rosy, Polly and Lily NOT enjoying the constant rain.

We (and Sue and Rob, who are also in the market for piglets) had to stand down and wait for the 2nd sow (Iris) which was due in March. Well, better news this time, says Adrian - Iris is due on 5th March (tomorrow) after her 3 months, 3 weeks and 3 days and she is showing all the signs, restless nest-building, full of milk etc. Nobody count any 'chickens' just yet as nothing is certain but we MIGHT, just might, get word and a photo soon and then a collection date for our gilts at the end of April. Woop woop!

Polly is unimpressed by the rain. The ewes are on the front
 lawn for the grass but there is no shelter-building for them
to retreat into. 

Meanwhile, Friends of the Blog will know that I had been trying to introduce our three young ducks to the established adult pair, who happen to be their biological Mum and Dad. I gave them a couple of hours (loosely) supervised a couple of days ago while Liz was at work and the drake (William (of Orange)) spent as much of it as possible chasing his 'children' around intent on mounting them and giving them the benefit of his amorous appetites.

Puddle Central here at present. 

When I reported this to Liz via text, she clocked the fact that the youngsters are probably not just his children but also his DAUGHTERS, so he is something of a wicked aul' pervert and, as she phrased it, "Not safe in taxis". We'll get round it. New animals always get chased around by your existing adults just as part of establishing dominance and 'pecking orders' and the drake will, in the end, accept the new-comers into his harem. Ducks are known for being a bit boisterous and drakes in particular can be bullies and rapists. It's all part of being a duck. I've not seen any attacks with intent to wound in these encounters.

Slicing up the fallen tree. 

Finally, a 'schoolboy error' with which I have confused Vendor Anna. The tree blown down here by Storm Doris had been cleared from the drive and I have sliced up that section for logs but the top 55 feet or so is still lying on the lawn with its nice cut end looking at you as you walk down the drive. I didn't think, and counted the tree rings on this end before reporting the age of the tree as 53 years. Anna was rapidly back on saying that this must be wrong as her father (TK Max on this blog) planted no trees at any time around 1961, so this must be a self-seed. Unlikely for a black spruce.

The base of your tree is a much more sensible place to count
growth-rings. 

I realised that this cut I was looking at was made 10-12 feet up the tree and would include no rings created when the tree had not yet reached this height. Ooops. Having dropped the tall stump and being able to now see the cut surface of the base, the growth rings are less clear but there are more like 65-70 giving the tree an start date around 1946. That might fit better with Anna's memories of her father's tree planting projects.

That is probably enough for this post. I am sure you do not want to hear about our rain, rain and more rain.

A Very Clever Idea

Now, here's a very good idea, I think you'll agree. Regular readers will know that I get involved in surveying bumble bees for the Irish 'National Biodiversity Data Centre'. Along with many hundred other beginners and a few experts around the country, we go out spotting bumble bees from 1st March to 30th October and input our records into a database using which the team at Biodiversity attempt to update (and keep up to date) their distribution maps for all the bumble bee species. What they would like, but have come nowhere near yet, is a recorder/surveyor in every 10 km grid square on the Ireland map; they tend to end up with, as you'd expect, many volunteers in the well populated East and the cities, but not so many out here in the sticks.

Another egg glut. I may need to pickle some more.

Many of us are very new and inexperienced and we are struggling to get to grips with the different species. Biodiversity have come up with a good way of helping us out, saving us going armed with big thick entomological 'tomes' with complicated ID keys in the front. There are only 20 species of bumble bees recorded for Ireland, 14 'true' bumbles and 6 of what are called "cuckoo" bumble bees which do, as you'd expect from the name, a sneaky parasitic job laying their eggs in the hard-won nests of true bumbles and letting the true-bee workers do all the rearing. If you want to make a key for the 14 true bumbles and 6 cuckoos, the most likely start point is going to be tail colour. You are already down now to a neat short list of  four white (or pale buff) tailed. Go to your 4 white swatches and there find more detail (yellow striping on abdomen and thorax etc) allowing you to get down to a final species.

Our almost spherically pregnant 'yow', Polly, steams gently in the
frosty morning sunshine.

The group are therefore wonderfully conducive to the use of a small fan of plastic-card swatches, and that is what Biodiversity have developed. They may not have 'invented' the idea but this is the first time I'd seen it done and the swatch sets were only €6 or so. I now go out armed with my swatch and when I eventually see a sleepy queen emerging , blinking, into the frosty Roscommon March sunshine I will be able to nail it properly.

My own bees are definitely waking up now. On each of the recent sunny days, although Met Éireann are giving us average temperatures down in the 7ºC area, the sun shines warm on the front of the hive and the girls all break cluster and go out foraging. I saw plenty today returning well loaded with pollen. I wondered immediately whether this might the coming from impressive drifts of snowdrops along the lane in Una's garden, so I nipped round to look. No such obvious solution - plenty of flowers still open but not a bee to be seen. Down in the bog-land north of us, however, we can see that the gorse is starting into good bloom all along the banks of the stream-ditch which runs by here on its way to the River Lung. That could well be where they are hunting.

Melted Camembert. Sort of OK but we are not convinced we are
just ruining a perfectly good cheese.

It is a good sign, anyway. Pollen is the high protein food which gets fed to bee larvae (brood food) so it is a sure sign that we HAVE larvae, and therefore must have a queen merrily laying eggs. Bee eggs hatch in 3 days and she is unlikely to have stopped since three days ago. Soon we will be allowed to crack the hive open and inspect it properly, but if you do this when air temperatures are below 17ºC you can kill the brood (the larvae) by chilling them into hypothermia. The standard here seems to be "not till the flowering currant is in flower (Ribes sanguinum)" and we are a way off that yet with our own plants. A good month at least, I should think but the hive will keep. It looks fine to our 'external' eyes. We are confident that we have survived the Winter and never complacent.

Rough Winds Do Shake....

Quince blossom.

We are neither of us very impressed by this weather and we would like to be able to hand May back in and stick with our April, if that is OK with everyone. The lovely warm days of April have been replaced by a continuous fitful Sou'Westerly bluster which brings in showers and long bursts of that heavy drizzle that only seems to happen in Ireland and which they call 'soft'. A good bit of our fruit is currently in bloom and it is being badly blown about - rough winds indeed DO shake the darling buds of May.

Apple blossom (Red Windsor, here)

The poor quince has a lot of big leaves on by now so it seems to catch more wind than the top fruit, the tree rocks about so that I debate whether to stake it higher up and the big, soft, delicate blooms quickly get brown edged wind-burn to the petals, as do trees like Magnolia stellata. I worry that the blooms will manage to get pollinated before they are reduced to wet brown rag. There are very few bees of any kind in this breeze and no hover flies either but there does seem to be a good population of a narrow, black, soft-bodied looking fly in among the flowers; perhaps they will pollinate the trees by sheer weight of numbers.

Winter cress (?) growing as a weed in our raised bed. 

Talking of bees, we have finally received our first copy of the magazine of the Federation of Irish Beekeepers' Associations (FIBKA). This mag, called 'An Beachaire' (The Beekeeper) contains an article about doing pollinator surveys for the National Biodiversity database (similar to what we do with the birds and mammals). These people need you to agree to walk a set route at least once a month and record the bumble bees you see, and they supply you with a wealth of info and pictures which will help the beginners (like me) to identify them and know which species to expect.

The ex-Hastings fig may only be 18"
high but it is still trying to fruit!

They seem to be happy to have some seriously doubtful data while you are learning and getting your eye in, and do not expect you to dive straight as able to tell queens, workers and drones across the 20+ species. Well, I walk the dogs every day and I am quite happy to keep my eyes open for bees as I stroll along. Indeed, since we have been interested in honey bees I have been doing this anyway and mentally trying to distinguish my Garden Bumblebee (Bombus hortorum) from my white-tailed BB (B. lucornum) and my buff-tailed BB (B. terrestris). I have had to submit my 2 favourite dog walks as 'transects' to be used in the study. Thank you, too, Pud Lady who sent me in the post a "Bee Saver" pack which came to her house from Friends of the Earth promoting something called the "Bee Cause" but which included a load of charts and pictures about making your garden bee friendly AND an identification wall chart. I call that timely.

A bit frayed by the wind, Cambria's old "bob"

Meanwhile, barking up a completely different tree, I need to thank my old chums from the Sailing Barge Cambria (for which project I still maintain the website, keep blogging and now 'Tweeting' and, with Liz, produce their Newsletter ( http://www.cambriabargecharter.co.uk/?page_id=1211 ). The winter re-fit of this lovely old Thames 'sailorman' (108 years old in theory, but mainly now a very young 3 years of age!) involved the replacement of her "bob". This is the flag flown at the top of the main rig which was partly to advertise the company colours but also to work as a 'burgee' telling the helmsman the wind direction and strength.

Cambria flying the bob from the topm'st head (arrowed)

When Cambria was in trade, the (Everard's of Greenhithe) bob would have been red left and right, white top and bottom. When she was sold off by Everard's to her famous and final Skipper-in-Trade, Cap'n Bob Roberts, he chose blue and white. Now 'we' (The Cambria Trust) have her the Board decided to go with red white and blue combining both the stages of her story, but then a bit of green to denote that we were engine-less and therefore a green form of transport. The first of these flags went on when she first sailed as a re-launched restoration and had been out in the weather getting shredded by the winds (rough and otherwise!) for the first season, after which it was claimed by colleague, Dave B. I am honoured and delighted to have been chosen by the Team to receive the 2nd one, an important piece of barge history. I will treasure it and keep it safe and sound. It might look like a tatty ol' bit of flag cloth to you but it certainly isn't to me. Thank You the Cambria Trust.