May - be... — Liddells

Before further forgetfulness - Images from Easter Day

Liddells has contributed the beech branch to this decoration made by Sue W

Further follow-ups to April’s blog post:

Congratulations to those of you who correctly guessed that the Alphabet Bridge is so named because it has 26 logs in its span. A special mention to Barbara R who suggested that the mystery creature surfacing in the pond maybe one of John’s lost hearing aids. It could also be a newt. Hmm - preferred explanation? No contest.

1st May

John noticed that three of the brooms on the Crag are in flower. This is the first year they have flowered and as you can see, they are growing well. Maybe the tubes will need to be removed, however that will leave them vulnerable to browsing so alternative protection will have to be provided.

John continued wrestling with the challenge to fix guttering to one end of the sheds so that rainwater is directed into the bowser - not as easy as it sounds. Maybe it will work.

2nd May

Derek G has generously spent considerable time researching the history of Liddells for us. Today John and Clare joined him at the County Archives at Woodhorn and spent happy hours poring over old maps, documents relating to the Enclosures Act and Estate records. Derek maybe able to create a timeline of ownership included in which will be a Miss Mary Tulip who was born in 1719. The current sports writer for the Hexham Courant is Joseph Tulip - maybe a relation.

3rd May

John and Clare continued this year’s onslaught on the weeds on the path in the Top Strip. Clare thought that weeding the path before members of the Tynedale Community Choir visited (see below) maybe like cleaning the house before guests arrive. They did not finish the path - draw your own conclusions. During the weeding, they were visited by a mystery insect. Clare thought it was maybe a mayfly however Keith-who-knows-everything-about-nature is investigating further.

The algae is the big pond is diminishing so maybe the barley straw is working. Fresh barley straw added today. While John and Clare were coming up from the ponds to work on the Crag, they noticed a hare running up ahead of them towards the Top Grazing. During their work - clearing fallen wood - they noticed a hare running from the Wetland into the Pit Wood and shortly afterwards a hare running along the top of the Crag. It is possible that hares, being considered by some to be divine, maybe have the quality of ubiquitousness and/or maybe that they move in mysterious ways. John and Clare prefer the more prosaic possibility that maybe there are two hares on Liddells. Maybe they are romantically attached.

The first Cuckoo Flowers are out on the Meadow - maybe one day we will hear the first cuckoo here.

The trail camera has captured more footage of deer in the Pit Wood. One video shows a doe browsing on hawthorn, the second shows a buck anointing a branch in his path. Further footage showed his antlers are clean so he’s not fraying off the velvet. The last clip has been sent to Keith-w-k-e-a-n. Any ideas what may be making the sound? (For a follow-up to this question, see the entry for May 10th.)

6th May

Tynedale Community Choir, in which Clare sings, has for several years now, indulged in the habit of singing to the sunrise from the bandstand in the centre of Hexham on the Monday May Bank Holiday (the Morris Men dance there on May 1st). Many maybe consider this to be a bit bonkers. Participants then breakfast together in the Community Centre. Clare has sometimes followed this with a post-breakfast-chorus walk (this is usually at about 7am) round Liddells. This year she invited any choir members who felt so inclined, to join her. It was cold and wet, however, neither avian, nor the small bunch of intrepid human singers were deterred. A good time seemed to be had by all, though maybe that was due to the delicious biscuits John M provided. Liddells and baked goods seem to have an excellent relationship. (Thanks to Jane B and Sue R for photographs.) Maybe the Liddells muse joined us as Sue R was inspired to write.

Clare is thrilled that the Willow Warblers were performing as if on cue

9th May

Both ponies were shampooed today. Paul has an infestation of lice (not transferrable to humans thankfully) and had scratched bare patches on his face. This had happened before in the very wet winter of 2017/18. Both ponies were reasonably tolerant of the process, Paul rather more than William, however as soon as they were free to go, they indulged in some mutual comfort grooming.

10th May

John chose a walk around Liddells to check all the nesting boxes as his birthday treat. Clare is relieved he is so easily catered for. You can see the results of the survey here. Clare has noticed that the results for the previous year do not appear to have made it to the Surveys page - maybe they have disappeared into the Liddells Triangle, along with box 25, which this year has completely escaped John and Clare’s searching. (May 31st - Clare and John have realised that they didn’t carry out a nest box survey last year. They were still in the unsettled aftermath of John’s DVT.)

Maybe laid especially for John’s birthday survey

John has been working away on wall repair on the northern boundary.

Wall repair, maybe more than half completed

Keith-w-k-e-a-n not only proved to be uncertain about the insect that alighted on Clare’s arm, but declared “I divanaw, man” about the mysterious sound on the trail camera (Keith’s soubriquet will be rethought). John pointed out that Keith-w-k-?-a-n had not even hazarded a wild guess. Maybe one of John’s suggestions is correct - a barn owl on a vuvuzela - a lover's tiff between stoats - a consumptive jay.

Regarding the ‘maybe mayfly’, John availed himself of the free insect identification service offered by The Royal Entomological Society and received this very prompt reply from Professor Jim Hardie, their Director of Science:

‘It’s an ichneumonid or parasitoid wasp which parasitises other insects and there are some 2300 species in UK. This one looks like the largest (body length up to 50 mm and 100 mm including the ovipositor) and is called the sabre wasp, Rhyssa persuasoria. This is a female as she has a long ‘tail,’ the ovipositor, with which she drills into logs and lays eggs on larvae of the host insect, often wood wasps, and when the sabre wasp egg hatches the larva feeds on the host.

Harmless to humans.’

Maybe playing some Khachaturian would attract more of these creatures.

15th May

Barbara R - a friend of Clare’s from London days and avid Blog follower - came to visit. She had two requirements from her stay, a visit to Newcastle/Gateshead to see the kittiwakes and a walk around Liddells. Clare was happy to oblige with both. Clare proudly showed off John’s completed wall repair.

You will maybe notice the spare stones on the left. It seems to be a rule of wall repair that there are either too few stones or too many. Maybe it’s a phenomenon that leaves you climbing the walls.

16th May

Clare, maybe drawing on her capacity for stick-to-itness (OED, 24th April: dogged perseverance) continued her efforts to rid the Top Strip path of weeds. During this activity she noticed what maybe a spider, with a pale blue bulbous body. Of course there is no point in asking Keith-w-k-?-a-n about this. There is also a question about the identity of the insects that were flying around the whole time (except when one alighted conveniently for a photograph - maybe an insect hoping for its moment in the Blog).

The first of the Blue Tit eggs have hatched.

19th May

John and Clare continued their prayerful attitude to the path in the Top Strip, weeding another ten metres or so on their hands and knees.

Clare returned home and investigated the spider with what she had thought was a pale blue body, and discovered that it is a Wolf Spider with its egg sac.

22nd May

Keith, maybe seeking to reclaim his reputation, arrived at 7am to help us with this year’s breeding bird survey. The sky was a clear blue and the birds sang generously and offered the annual is-it-a-Blackcap-or-a-Garden-Warbler challenge. If anyone else would like to have a go, try this. The morning’s highlight followed Keith hearing what he thought were maybe robin alarm calls in the Scrub. He wasn’t convinced, and his doubts were validated, as were his ears, when the calls proved to be hungry baby robins which were then fed by the parent. Maybe it is alarming to be hungry. You can see the results of the survey here.

Keith (ok, Keith-w-k-nearly-e-a-n) was also able to identify the large black insects (see 19th May) as non-biting midges. Clare had not known there were such things, having only been acquainted with the biting kind - and far too frequently. Apparently the name chironomidae derives from the Greek for pantomimist. “Oh yes it is!”

Keith was also reassuring about the algae situation which had worsened again in spite of input of barley straw and doses of barley straw extract. He recommended adding oxygenating plants, shoring up the banks where the ponies had puddled them and maybe fencing round most of the perimeter. Keith explained that disturbing the soil through the digging process had released nutrients into the water which then fostered the algae growth. The ponies were adding to that process.

And finally in the restoration of Keith’s reputation, he commented that the colour of the Wolf Spider egg sac is surprising given the spider’s need for camouflage.

23rd & 24th May - two days at the beech

John and Clare were catching up on some gardening (Clare) and sawing (John had blagged some replaced telegraph poles and was reducing them to logs; see photo below) when butterfly-Tim called to say that a very large limb had broken from one of the beeches on Liddells and was blocking the road. John went up straight away and was relieved that local farmer Derek drove up in his Manitou, saw the problem and returned with the Manitou plus forks and levered the branch until it broke off and he could drop it off the road. Clare and Tim arrived and set about clearing up the small stuff (throwing it over the wall into the Scrub) while John sawed up the smaller branches. One trailer load of wood was deposited at the Liddells log shed and a second taken home. Clare and John returned in the evening when Derek and Robbie turned up with two chainsaws that made John’s look like an electric carving knife. Derek had said it would only take ten minutes to saw up the main branch. John and Clare found this hard to believe until they watched Derek and Robbie at work. All sawing was done in 15 minutes, whereupon D&R, maybe thinking they hadn’t helped enough, set about logging the wood. Their double act - one swinging the axe in perfect rhythm, the other turning the wood underneath - was a wonder and very scary to behold. No digits, limbs or heads were lost in the process and John and Clare took another trailer load home to stack. Next morning John and Clare returned to log the remaining wood - another trailer load. So not only are John and Clare hugely grateful for the kindness of friends and neighbours, but they now have a nearly full log shed and very aching bodies.

24th May

Normal people sometimes receive bouquets of flowers. Clare was thrilled to find Sue R’s delivery of a bouquet of Wild Garlic in the porch. Maybe this is indicative of how Liddells has affected Clare. Huge thanks to Sue for the gift.

25th May

Clare planted the Wild Garlic in the Pit Wood. John and Clare enjoyed being at Liddells without any use of the chainsaw whatsoever.

Clare began this year’s Creeping Thistle Watch on the Meadow and bagged 122. Although she has not finished, there is only a small area left to cover. It would seem as though the numbers have more than halved since last year, so maybe pulling them out is proving a sufficient deterrent. Clare is wondering if maybe there is a Zeno-like paradox here: if the number of thistles is reduced proportionately each year, when only one thistle remains, will it be halved, and will that half thistle be similarly reduced resulting in the impossibility of completely removing thistles from the Meadow.

26th May

The trail camera has been directed at one of the nest boxes and capturing the Great Tits feeding the young inside. The first food was brought in at about five in the morning. Such is the activity, the camera has been triggered approximately every six minutes. There were about four hundred stills and videos to go through. The videos also recorded at least ten different bird species singing in the background. The last video captures a blackbird stand-off.

Here are the beneficiaries of all that activity

27th May

John and Clare are always delighted when Liddells can make some kind of contribution to others. Today Rosemary M-S collected Silver Birch leaves to use for dyeing wool. She was most complimentary about our convenient and lush foliage! She is ‘using a calendar which suggests the right plants for each month. So far, [she has] used daffodils, birch bark, and dandelions. Colours ranging from cream, to pink to yellow. Birch gives the best yellow. This time [she has] mordanted the wool. Many plant dyes are fugitive’. Thanks to Rosemary for the sequence of photographs and the imaginative challenge of fugitive dyes - from what might they be escaping….

Clare completed the Creeping Thistle eradication programme for the year - at least until she spots the ones she missed - and added 43 to the bag, making a grand total of 165. That’s a considerable reduction in two years. Plenty of thistles remain on other parts of Liddells for the pollinators. Yellow Rattle is now established on almost all of Meadow and this will help other wild flowers become established. There is already an increase in the Red Clover.

Following the Thistle triumph, Clare attempted to video Whirligig Beetles on the large pond - they do what it says on the tin. This proved to be easier said than done or maybe Clare just caught them recovering from a dizzy spell.

31st May

John and Clare are checking the trail camera regularly, hoping that it will capture a moment of fledging. Maybe there will be footage for next month’s blog post. Maybe the camera batteries will expire at the crucial moment.

A reminder - 30 Days Wild starts at midnight.