5 March 2018

We went up to Apedale in the afternoon, the weather was cool, with lots of grey cloud but some sunny spells. It was really different to the last few days which were really freezing and snowy. There was still some tiny bits of snow on the ground in sheltered places:

Snow in a drainage ditch

There was plenty of evidence of rabbits:

Rabbit pellets

Rabbits eat about 80% of their own droppings to make their grazing more efficient. This process of double digestion is called refection. There are loads of rabbit warrens at Apedale:

A rabbit warren can be up to 3 metres in depth and can cover a large area, with lots of entrances. The warren will contain nesting areas, living areas, bolt runs and emergency exits to escape from predators.

There were some volunteers working in the woods, thinning out some of the trees, so that the remaining trees can have the space to grow bigger. They have left the smaller branches and twigs on the ground, in piles, to provide shelter for wildlife.

The bluebells are putting up their leaves amongst the moss. It will be interesting to see when the bluebells start flowering this year.

And in spite of the snow, the first primroses have started to flower:

The wild primrose prefers damp places and heavy clay soils, which makes Apedale quite perfect for it. One of its main pollinators is the bee fly Bombylius major – we will make sure to watch out for them later in the month.

We looked at the Jelly Ear fungus again – it had gone over and looked really floppy and dead:

This elder was absolutely covered in Jelly Ear – elder is one of its preferred habitats:

In Watermill wood we noticed, for the first time, how very mossy this tree is:

It rarely gets any sun and its branches are covered in thick velvety green growth. We think this is a sycamore tree – but we will check in the spring and summer.

Another sign of summer, are the buds of leaves opening on the hawthorn.

Hawthorn is a very common tree, but so important to wildlife, as the Woodland Trust’s website tells us:

Common hawthorn can support more than 300 insects. It is the foodplant for caterpillars of many moths, including the hawthorn, orchard ermine, pear leaf blister, rhomboid tortrix, light emerald, lackey, vapourer, fruitlet mining tortrix, small eggar and lappet moths. Its flowers are eaten by dormice and provide nectar and pollen for bees and other pollinating insects. The haws are rich in antioxidants and are eaten by many migrating birds such as redwings, fieldfares and thrushes, as well as small mammals.

The dense thorny foliage makes fantastic nesting shelter for many species of bird.

The birds were very busy – we heard green woodpecker(s) several times, and jays too. There was a buzzard flying around and there were loads of blue tits very busy in the trees.

This great tit was making a huge racket with his territorial call.

You can listen to the call on the RSPB site. As we walked down the hill back to the car park, there was another great tit making the same call – obviously it’s the time of year to loudly shout about where you are! There’s a lovely video on the RSPB page of a great tit pecking at a tennis ball to get fibres to put in its nest:

Winter at Apedale

We’ve had a fair few walks at Apedale over the winter, but haven’t been great at taking photos (too cold!). Now that spring is coming, we are planning to write regular posts again.

Here are some photos from our winter trips.

A snowy day – looking over Chesterton school to the Staffordshire Moorlands:

The sun on the snow was very beautiful.

There are signs of spring though – this photo of hazel catkins was taken on the same day:

The gorse is in flower, whatever the month. We enjoy smelling the blooms which have the aroma of coconut.

Some photos of another day in January when there was snow on the ground at Apedale, as well as over the distant hills:

The nature pond looked rather bleak:

But the pussy willow was starting to come out:

In the woods we spotted some Jelly Ear fungus:

This is an edible fungus (Auricularia auricula-judae), but it doesn’t exactly look very appetising. It is growing on an elder tree, which is its preferred habitat.

Watermills wood was pretty cold and grey.

But by the time we got up to the area we call ‘the Beech Copse’, because of the large beech trees amongst the elder and alder, the sun was shining low in the sky giving us a beautiful light:

The ivy seed heads are so attractive at this time of year:

And we spotted more fungus. We wondered if these were oyster mushrooms, but we are not knowledgeable about fungus to know for sure!

Here are some photos from a walk in mid-February.

First up some more jelly ear:

Some very familiar wildlife, having a sniff around:

Looking over from Apedale towards Wolstanton, which is quite close to where we live:

The very cheering sight of gorse in the sunshine – it was actually quite a warm day for February, although the temperature has sunk right back down again by the end of the week.

Mum managed this picture of a buzzard in flight:

And a better picture of a blue tit, singing as loud as he could, at the top of a hazel tree:

These are alder catkins, which are darker and longer than the catkins we see on the hazel trees:

We call this tree, the elbow tree:

We spotted leaf miner tracks on the bramble leaves:

The remains of a fox’s meal – looks like it might have been a wood pigeon:

The ivy, climbing a silver birch, brings a real note of colour:

And finally more catkins (hazel this time) showing spring is hopefully just around the corner:

 

19 September 2017

We went to Apedale in the morning, it was a very foggy morning indeed, although the sun was trying to break through a bit by the end of our walk.

The view back towards the nature area and car park was obscured by fog.

Everywhere was absolutely covered in cobwebs:

Hawthorn leaves covered in webs.

Cobwebs on a teasel.

All the spiders had obviously been incredibly busy:

This web, we think, is made by a sheet web money spider (Liniphiidae), because it has a flat platform section plus a pyramid section above.

Here’s a another web – this time you can see the spider right in the centre, if you look closely. This web was quite high in a tree, so I could get underneath it to take a photo. Again it is a Liniphiidae spider of some kind.

This ghostly looking gorse bush is absolutely covered in webs – we wonder if some of them might be the webs of gorse spider mites (tetranychus lintearius), but we couldn’t any closer because the bushes are on the other side of a fence in a wildlife conservation area.

This fly has met a very sticky end….

We were on the look out for galls on oak trees again:

We are not sure about this funny looking gall, but wonder if it might be a cola nut gall created by the gall wasp Andricus lignicola.

Autumn is well underway – the leaves are starting to turn. 

In spite of the huge numbers of galls this year, some beautiful acorns have managed to come through! 

This slug was enjoying the very damp weather! We aren’t sure on the ID of this one –  it could be a tree slug (Lehmannia marginata) or a juvenile leopard slug (Limax maximus).

The eyebright is still going strong, although will probably last only a bit longer now, it flowers until the end of September.

The automatic sensor on mum’s camera thought that this was a sunset, because of the lovely rusty orange colours of the rose bay willow herb. 

There were loads of goldfinches flying around in gangs – a group of goldfinches is called a charm. Mum managed to take this slightly rubbish photo of 3 of the group. 

Two seven-spot ladybirds on the dead seed head of wood angelica. Ladybirds often overwinter in the hollow stems of these plants. 

Finally we have some fungi for you:

We spotted these puffballs in the woods.

This tiny fungi on a decaying tree stump is called Candle snuff fungus (Xylaria hypoxylon).  

We also spotted these 2 strange fun guys in the fog:

As yet, we have been unable to identify these weird creatures… 

12 September 2017

We went up to Apedale in the morning – it was quite sunny and fairly warm, although it had been very rainy overnight.

Ash tree looking lovely in the sunlight

The moon was very bright and easy to see against the beautiful blue sky:

We have been noticing all the different galls on the oak trees, especially since we saw the TV programme about them. It seems that it is a very good year for gall wasps, but maybe not for oak trees!

These little galls on the underside of an oak leaf are called silk button galls and are made by a gall wasp called Neuroterus numismalis.

This one is a knopper oak gall, again on an oak tree, but this time on where the acorn should be. The name knopper comes from an old German word for cap or hat, probably because it sits on top of the acorn like a hat. They are caused by the Andricus quercuscalicis wasp – these are a recent arrival in Britain – only appearing since the 1960s.

 

This one is an artichoke gall, for obvious reasons. It is caused by the artichoke gall wasp – Andricus foecundatrix. 

There aren’t so many flowers left for hoverflies – this might be why they were all crowded onto this flower head:

We can see 8 hoverflies feasting here. 

In Northern Europe the Red Admiral is one of the last butterflies to still be seen before the cold of autumn really sets in. This one was enjoying the sun on a bramble leaf:

This specked wood butterfly was also out and about – this one was resting on an alder leaf, quite high up in a tree. Apparently this is what they do when they are defending their territory:

The brambles were also a good place for these baby snails:

and finally, also on the bramble leaves, we spotted these two:

The shield bug is a spiked shield bug (Picromerus bidens), you can just see the spikes on either side of the pronotum. This shield bug is very predatory and likes to eat the caterpillars of other insects. There’s also a seven spot ladybird – which is probably getting ready to hibernate in October.

 

4 September 2017

We visited Apedale in the late afternoon, it was a showery day, but the sun came out, off and on, whilst we were there.

There were signs of autumn – we spotted these apples ripening:

And there were lots of seed heads – we think these are white-lipped snails. There were absolutely loads of snails all over these dying plants:

We were very excited to see this caterpillar, which was absolutely HUGE:

It is the caterpillar of the Elephant Hawk Moth. We think it was looking for somewhere to pupate – apparently they do this over winter, under leaves near the base of plants.

We were taking pictures of these galls on a young oak tree, when we noticed the amazing parasitic wasp – Torymus bedeguaris – on it. This is a female because you can see the long ovipositor – she uses this to inject her eggs through the gall, into the larva of the Cynipid parasitic wasp that’s already in the centre of the gall. By complete coincidence, we were watching Life in the Undergrowth today, and it had a piece all about these wasps.

It’s also a great time of year for spiders. Sadly we couldn’t identify this one – maybe next time:

We think that this one might be a Large-jawed orb web spider:

Here’s another picture of the same spider:

We think this one is a Garden spider – if you look closely, you can see some insect-prey that has been wrapped up ready to eat:

Here’s another wrapped up piece of insect-prey:

And another spider tucking in:

We were lucky enough to spot these two Common Darter dragonflies sunning themselves on a hand rail. We think that these might be immature males or females:

In this photo you can see their amazing eyes:

We saw this very young blackbird, lunching on some blackberries on a lovely mossy bed. It looked very comfortable:

In spite of all the autumn sightings, there were still plenty of flowers around, including this low growing plant called tormentil. It’s a useful plant in September because it provides nectar for solitary bees.

We were also on the lookout for toadstools and mushrooms. We saw these in the copse of beech trees near the top of the hill:

These are called Sulphur Caps and they are NOT good to eat because they’ll make you very sick with stomach ache and vomiting.

1 August 2017

Purple loosestrife in the nature pond at Apedale

We went to Apedale in the morning, it was quite cool and breezy, and there wasn’t much to see, until later in the walk when things started to warm up a bit.

Danny took a lovely photo of this honeysuckle near the railway line:

There are loads of these yellow flowers around, that could be mistaken for dandelions. They are actually called hairy cat’s ear, or false dandelion.

We also saw lots of these purple flowers which we had previously mistaken for thistles. Of course they are not thistles because they aren’t prickly – it’s actually called knapweed:

A fly photobombed our arty shot.

We saw lots more examples of oak apples:

As we’ve mentioned before these are caused by the larvae of the parasitic gall wasp. Here’s a CT scan of the wasps developing inside the oak apple.

Mum spotted this lonely sloe berry – the fruit of the blackthorn. We are hoping to find lots more of these later in the years.

This is a European larch – it is the only native deciduous conifer tree in central Europe and was introduced to the British Isles in the 17th century.

There’s also lots of this very pretty yellow flower with spiky green leaves. It’s called lady’s bedstraw (galium verum) – because it was used to stuff mattresses (especially the beds of pregnant women), because its odour (caused by the chemical coumarin) repels fleas. It was also used in cheese-making to coagulate the milk (but this is a lost skill, amazingly), and is used to colour double Gloucester cheese.

Danny took this great photo of the very intertwined trunk of a sycamore tree.

We were able to get a photo of this leaf hopper because it was stuck on a web, otherwise they are really hard to photograph because they are really fast and hop off!

Green leaf-hopper 

We also spotted a whole clutch of soldier beetles on some (of course) ragwort:

Also hovering round the ragwort was this hoverfly, which we think is a tapered drone fly:

This insect, which has very bright lime green undersides, we think, is a tenthredo mesomela sawfly.

Here’s another pic where you can see its green striped legs:

We photographed a common wasp – buzzing round a thistle – this is another insect that is so hard to photograph because it moves around so much and so quickly!

We spotted another dingy footman:

The final insect for today is this ichneumon wasp. We think this might be a female ichneumon extensorius.

We are not good at identifying or taking photos of birds, but Tom and Sandy spotted a couple of very noisy jays that flew away as we approached.

Finally, the dog report! We only met one dog, but it was a new one to us – a beautiful black and white large Münsterlander, called Loki (after everyone’s favourite Avengers villain).

24 July 2017

We went to Apedale in the morning and had a brief walk from Apedale Rd (near Thorp Precast) up beside Watermills Wood for a little way and back down through the wood. The weather wasn’t particularly warm or bright, although it did get warmer as we went round. This is the gate into the wood:

The first thing we saw were these amazing teasels, they were covered in bees.

Here’s a buff-tailed bumblebee covered in pollen:

Danny spotted and photographed this poor moth/butterfly which had come to a sticky end, on a thistle:

Danny also photographed this huge marble gall on an oak tree. These are caused by oak gall wasps, the larva lives inside the gall.

We spotted this rather large black beetle – we believe it is a galeruca tanaceti:

We also spotted another beetle – a cream spot ladybird – which none of us had ever seen before. Unfortunately this one was dead, which is a shame, there are so many aphids on this plant for it to eat!

We noticed that the brambles are starting to ripen already – in a week or so, we will be picking them to make jam and cordial.

There were also some wild raspberries – but we will leave these for the birds, they are so much harder to pick, and we have some in the garden!

In amongst the brambles, were loads of harvestmen (Leiobunum rotundum) – in this picture the female is on the left and the male is on the right.

As usual, we spotted something really interesting on our favourite flower – the ragwort. These 2 moths were beautiful, resting on the flowers – sadly they have a name which doesn’t do them any favours – they are called dingy footman moths. The larvae of this moth feed on lichens.

Also on ragwort, another insect with a funny name – this one is called the marmalade hoverfly:

On the other side of the woods we spotted this lovely horse in the paddock opposite some of the houses on Apedale Road:

Snails are so hard to identify, but we think that this is a white-lipped snail. Brown lipped snails and white lipped snails both generally have brown and white striped shells, but with a white lipped snail, the band round the opening of the shell is white, and it’s brown on a brown lipped snail. We think that we can just see that this one is white.

The final photo is of a spider we can’t identify, but is rather spooky-looking. We will keep looking to see if we can find out what it is.

There weren’t many other people around because it was quite early, but we did meet two golden retriever/labrador type dogs, called Ella and Abby – the owner told us that they were half-sisters. They were sweet dogs with beautiful amber-coloured eyes.

 

 

18 July 2017

We had a morning visit to Apedale – it was a very warm day, although there was quite a lot of high cloud, and it was early so maybe not so many insects about! We walked to the little lake/large pond at the Knutton end of Apedale. Here’s where it is on the Ordnance Survey map – it’s just between the ‘S’ and ‘T’ of Newcastle-under-Lyme:

It’s very pretty round the pond, but sadly quite spoiled by the amount of litter around about, and evidence of fires. We spotted mallard ducks resting on the island in the middle:

And there was a buzzard flying around overhead – it was quite a breezy morning so it was very hard to get a photo!

We spotted some ragwort that was absolutely covered in the caterpillars of the cinnabar moth. We will have to look out for cinnabars next time we are there.

We also managed to capture this picture of a gatekeeper butterfly.

It soon closed its wings because of the breeze:

We also spotted this moth, again on some ragwort:

We aren’t sure about the identification of this one, but wondered if it is a ghost moth:

We also spotted a 7 spotted ladybird (Coccinella septempunctata):

As we got back to the car we spotted this female red-tailed bumblebee gathering nectar from a pink thistle, and absolutely covered in pollen!

There are two hoverflies in this photo, we only managed to identify the one on the left:

We think this is a Leucozona glaucia.

There was lots of meadowsweet (Filipendula ulmaria) down by the Lyme brook, which runs near the path along to the lake. Not surprising because apparently meadowsweet loves damp conditions:

We also saw some common centaury (Centaurium erythraea) – a very pretty pink plant. It is a member of the gentian family, and closes its flowers in the afternoon.

We met a lovely Border collie type dog, but sadly didn’t get his/her name. (S)he was much more interested in a ball than humans!

14 July 2017

We went for a walk at Apedale on a Friday morning – the weather was cool and cloudy – definitely needed our fleeces/jackets. We walked up past the nature area, and the first thing we photographed was the amazing teasels (Dipsacus fullonum). These will be a feast for small birds – especially goldfinches (there are a lot of goldfinches at Apedale) later in the year.

We also spotted a baby oak tree:

Next up was this creepy plant, just opening up. ID coming soon!

Then we spotted this ladybird pupa:

Mum took this close up picture of the larvae of the alder leaf beetle. We saw these beetles mating back on 23 May!

Danny took this shot from further away, showing the size of the larvae – they are pretty small, although they still look big to turn into the very small leaf beetles!

There are loads of alder trees at Apedale. The alder is a pioneer species – moving quickly onto vacant land, so it’s not surprising that there’s so much of it at this former industrial site. This one has a touch of alder rust fungus:

The alder is a really interesting tree because it fixes nitrogen from the air into the soil as it grows, so it is known for increasing soil fertility. It will not thrive at Apedale as other trees take over, because its seedlings need more light than is available on the woodland floor.

There are also lots of rowan trees – these fruits (they aren’t berries!) will provide food for birds later in the year, especially thrushes and waxwings (hopefully).

Mum spotted this tiny snail, working its way along a reed. It was definitely a day for snails rather than bees or butterflies, we hardly saw any.

Towards the end of the walk when the weather warmed up a bit, we did spot some hover flies that started to come out:

ID hopefully coming shortly!

The yellow ragwort is in flower – and there’s loads of it. Ragwort is a rather smelly plant (its common names also include stinking willie or stinking nanny and mare’s fart!), and is poisonous to mammals. It provides food for about 77 insect species in the UK – including this lovely red soldier beetle (from the Cantharidae family).

Later on we spotted a pair mating – also on a ragwort plant:

We also spotted a couple of wildflowers to identify:

Mum said hi to Pepe the dog, who we’ve met before.

30 June 2017

We visited Apedale in the morning – it was a greyish morning, quite murky and muggy, and it had been raining in the night.

View over Newcastle towards St Margaret’s Church

View towards Chesterton (with Danny)

We saw quite a few bees and hoverflies, and some other bugs too.

This is a buff-tailed bee on some cow parsley:

Dad has identified this hoverfly as a volucella inflata – or the Cossus hoverfly – he’s enjoying some brambles:

We think this is a tapered drone fly – Eristalis pertinax – another hoverfly:

An easy way to tell the difference between a hoverfly and a bee is hoverflies have very big eyes.

We think this is a tapered drone fly again – this time on some thistles:

We spotted another scorpion fly on the brambles:

Here’s another hoverfly – this time we think it looks a bit like a wasp. We think it might be a migrant hoverfly – eupeodes corollae: It is flying into the trumpet of  some greater bindweed or white convolvulus:

Another hoverfly -two pics of the same insect:

This is Epistrophe grossulariae:

This little beetle is some kind of Altica beetle – maybe Altica lythri or Altica palustris (which apparently are almost indistinguishable).

There were lots of ringlets and meadow browns fluttering around, but it is very hard to get a photo of a meadow brown, they don’t stay still for long. Here’s a ringlet:

And two ringlets mating:

We uncovered a nest of yellow meadow ants. They were running around to collect their eggs, after we accidentally picked up the snail shell on the top of the nest:

There were lovely patches of rosebay willowherb (Chamaenerion angustifolium):

And the bees were flocking round the common self-heal (prunella vulgaris):

Danny did some climbing, and found it very hard to get back down the tree because the branches were so slippy, but he got down safely eventually.

A willow tree – photographed by Danny

We met a lovely labrador-type dog called Pepe (who was named after a clown) and then two other big dogs (one a Weimaraner), and Tom gave one of them a little dog biscuit, but we can’t remember what they were called. We must remember to make a note of the names when we get home!