Lake View wildlife report for September 2010

This is written in mid-October, so a bit late with my summary of last month. September saw the end of summer and the beginning of an Autumn bumper fruit harvest. Like everyone, we've got plenty of apples, damsons and plums; come and get some cooking apples and damsons if you wish, both picked and pick-your-own. Some red admiral butterflies found some fallen plums and I took a photo of them eating the sugar.

Caz id'd a Chiffchaff for the first time here by call; it looked slightly different to the normal Willow warblers which would have already gone south. I took a photo of a bathing juvenile robin. The swallows gathered, like notes on a music stave, on our power lines. A swallow or two roosted in our shed, with the last overnight stay on 18th September.

Below is our smallish crop of onions and the remains of our broad bean patch. Our kale goes to seed each year and we string it through the field gate so we can see the birds feeding on them. As an experiment, I made a small haystack after a first late summer cut of the 'meadow' on the 12th. Our three compost heaps are still being used in rotation, with occasional replacement of the front boards; we seem to have stopped bothering to cover them up - my corrugated iron covers are a bit lethal.

We were given 3 more young trees by Wendy, which we managed to squeeze into our already pretty full patch. In shed I found an interesting bit of ironmongery, possibly a chimney access door, or an oven door?

We've helped out at the RSPB Haweswater, both taking down the battle-weary hide shed for the winter, and weeding in the tree nursery.

I took a turn round Swindale and Mosedale. If you look very closely at the photo of Mosedale cottage you can see tree guards along the top of the quarry containing junipers planted by the RSPB:

At the end of the month I bought a copy of Mosses and Liverworts of Britain and Ireland: a field guide - quite a thick book with 848 pages which I've yet to get to grips with properly, £24.95. I'm not sure if the binding will last though it is in plastic cover. I'd like an English names index. There's a brief introduction but I'd probably prefer that to be bigger to help the boggled aspirant.
Moths on 3/9/10: Antler 4, Common marbled carpet 2, Flame carpet 1, Lesser Broad-bordered Yello underwing 2, * Phoenix (f) 1, Rosy rustic 1, Large yellow underwing 1, Centre barred sallow 1, Dark sword grass 1.

The linked table below shows the maximum count of each bird species seen, along with best breeding code, primarily in our back garden near Bampton Cumbria in NY51 VC69 (and in our surrounding 1km square) in the period from November 2007 until September 2010, with a total count of 54 species, 24 this month.
Full Lake View Monthly Max Bird Count Seen table

Species	Sept-10
Blackbird	3
Blue tit	10
Brambling
Bullfinch
Buzzard	2
Carrion crow
Chaffinch	10
Chiffchaff	1 S
Coal tit	3
Collared dove
Curlew
Dunnock	2
Fieldfare
Garden Warbler
Goldcrest
Goldfinch	5
Great spotted woodpecker	4
Great tit	3
Greenfinch	2
Grey heron
House martin	2
Jackdaw	8
Jay
Kestrel
Lapwing
Linnet
Long-tailed tit	10
Magpie
Meadow pipit
Mistle thrush
Nuthatch
Peregrine
Pheasant	7
Pied flycatcher
Pied wagtail	1
Raven
Redstart
Redwing
Reed bunting
Robin	2
Siskin
Skylark
Song thrush	1
Sparrowhawk
Spotted flycatcher	1
Starling	1
Stock dove
Swallow	70
Swift
Tawny owl
Willow warbler	2
Woodpigeon	1
Wren	1
Yellowhammer
Total: 54	24

Lake View wildlife report for August 2010

Come and get both blackcurrant and plum jam from our gate, and raw plums as well! We desperately need more jars to make more jam.

Our bird species count was less this month (because we were away on holiday?) but we saw three species that we hadn't seen before at home: House martins, Pied flycatcher and Meadow pipit. (OK, mipits cannot be far away at Knipe Scar.)

We had a frog in the pond one day. I took some Marsh Marigold seed from Berneray in Scotland; I've sown them in a protected tray, which I'll keep damp before planting out any survivors next year near the pond.

The swallows in the garage second brood fledged on 3 August. Another swallow had been desperate to get into the kitchen shed, but we had kept the door closed. We finally relented when it was too late for another brood; a couple of swallows happily roosted there until the end of the month.

This summer has been very good for vegetables in the garden and fruit on the trees in the field. We had an OK crop of onions; perhaps the dry spell earlier hadn't helped their development and the damper July and August meant a hint of rot. The tatties were good, even some rogue Pink fir apples. As well as some cherry plums, the old plum tree "over the end of the world" did well. This was the tree that had been pruned by chain saw severely earlier on in the year; unfortunately, the weight proved too much and the main branch cracked. Perhaps the good year for produce was a result of the very hard winter; and perhaps the dry spring help. There seemed some less insects around. There were less wasps, though I still managed to get stung two times while mowing over a nest hole in the ground in the field.

Out in the field my planted cornflowers did well. I transferred some cowslip seed into the field; hopefully they will come up next year.

We walked round Riggindale Haweswater on the 29th, stopping off initial for a quick view of the Golden eagle, helpfully located by expert volunteers Pete and Debbie. Then (Caz mostly) identified lots of plants en route round the valley - see the list below. Apparently the eagle flew in the afternoon but we missed it. On the way back down, we stopped at the weir at Blea Tarn; the water was rushing over the weir at regular intervals, say every 30 or 60 seconds, presumably as the tarn was being agitated by the wind. We were just too late down to offer Pete and Debbie some (you guessed it) plum cake.

Riggindale walk: Butterwort, Tormentil, Hare bell, Ling, Lousewort, Other heather, Bedstraw, Eyebright, Scabious, Round-leaved sundew, Hawkweed/bit, Sphagnum, Broom, Bilberyy, Cowberry, Milkwort, ?Scorpidium scorpidiodes, Dor beetle, ?Fairy flax.

Moths 5/8/10: Antler 5, Common Wainscot 9, Snout 1, Large yellow underwing 33, Muslin footman 1, Dark arches 16, * Least yellow underwing 2, * Dotted Clay 3, Burnished brass 2, Scalloped Oak 1, Common footman 3, * Lesser broad-bordered yellow underwing 2, Lesser common rustic 1. Sexton beetle 1 - covered with lots of mites.

Moths 7/8/10: Brimstone 2, Large/Lesser yellow underwing, Antler 2, Burnished brass 1, Grey chi 1, Lesser broad-bordered yellow underwing 3, Common wainscot, Dark arches, Flame shoulder 1, Tawny speckled pug 1, Least common rustic 2, Flame carpet 1, * Broad-bordered yellow underwing 1, * Fan-foot, Rosy rustic 1, Rosy minor 2. Sexton beetle 3

Moths 25/8/10: Yellow underwing 4, Dark acrhes 1, Lesser broad-bordered yellow underwing 2, Flame carpet 1. 3 others.

Moths 29/8/10: Grey chi 2, Rosy rustic 2, Silver Y 1, Antler 1.

The linked table below shows the maximum count of each bird species seen, along with best breeding code, primarily in our back garden near Bampton Cumbria in NY51 VC69 (and in our surrounding 1km square) in the period from November 2007 until August 2010, with a total count of 53 species, 25 this month.

Full Lake View Monthly Max Bird Count Seen table

Species	Aug-10
Blackbird	3
Blue tit	5
Brambling
Bullfinch
Buzzard	2
Carrion crow
Chaffinch	6 S
Coal tit	2
Collared dove
Curlew
Dunnock	3
Fieldfare
Garden Warbler
Goldcrest
Goldfinch	1 S
Great spotted woodpecker	3
Great tit	4
Greenfinch	3
Grey heron
House martin	5
Jackdaw
Jay
Kestrel
Lapwing
Linnet
Long-tailed tit
Magpie
Meadow pipit	6
Mistle thrush
Nuthatch	1
Peregrine	2
Pheasant
Pied flycatcher	1
Pied wagtail	1
Raven	5
Redstart
Redwing
Reed bunting
Robin	1
Siskin
Skylark
Song thrush	1
Sparrowhawk
Spotted flycatcher	1
Starling
Stock dove
Swallow	34 NY
Swift	1
Tawny owl
Willow warbler	1
Woodpigeon	1 S
Wren	2
Yellowhammer
Total: 53	25

Moths in trap 25 June 2010

Here's the list of moths etc in our 80W MV Skinner trap on overnight on 25 June 2010. Any suggestions for the photos below very welcome.
* means first sighting here.

Previously on 19 June, I trapped an Elephant Hawkmoth for the first time.

Common Swift x 1
Silver-ground Carpet x 10
Spectacle x 7
Map-winged Swift x 2
The Flame x 1
Peach Blossom x 1
Beautiful Golden Y x 7
Small Magpie x 1
Flame Shoulder x 2
Gray Dagger sp x 1
Coronet x 1
Double-square Spot x 1
* Garden Tiger x 1
Poplar Hawkmoth x 1
* Buff Ermine x 1
Green Carpet x 1
Heart and Dart x 1
* Marbled Minor x 4
* ? Tawny Marbled Minor x 2
Dark Arches x 2
Pale-shouldered Brocade x 2
* Lychnis x 1
Brimstone x 1

Green Carpet

Grey Dagger sp

Marbled Minor

Lychnis moth

Double Square Spot

Buff Ermine

Map-winged Swift

Garden Tiger

?Tawny Marbled Minor

Elephant Hawkmoth