Autumn 9

Redwings galore!

Monday 2nd November, 2015

It is Monday morning and I am behind schedule yet again.  It always seems as though the days are an hour shorter after the time change.  The extra hour of sunlight in the morning seems to pass unnoticed while the darker afternoons cut an hour off my gardening time.

This week’s excitement started on Tuesday evening when I noticed some frenzied bird activity in the big holly tree down by the road.  The tree is too far from the house to identify visiting birds with the naked eye so I took a photo using maximum zoom.  I thought they were probably  blackbirds starting to eat the holly berries.  The light was dim but just good enough to to get some slightly blurry images.  At first I thought that I had photographed a thrush but it didn’t look quite right.  Then I realised that it was a redwing!  I had only seen one once before during the twenty-five years we have lived here so I wasted a lot of time watching the tree for the next few days.  When the light was better I got a few slightly better photos.

When I got bored waiting for photographable redwings, I amused myself by taking an occasional photo of the autumn colours in lower Brookdale.

The redwing is a member of the thrush family and is slightly smaller than a song thrush.  They breed mainly in northern Europe (although a few breed in the north of Scotland) and migrate at this time of year.  Some remain in Britain for the winter while others travel further south.  Ours have been with us for nearly a week now.

I have tried to count them and have seen about eight flying out of the tree when they are disturbed - but one or more may have been blackbirds.  One of my photos shows two and a half redwings so I have photographic evidence of at least three.

Now the trees are losing their leaves I get a better view of some of our garden birds which shun the feeders and prefer to hunt for their own food.  A tiny goldcrest has been seen foraging in the trees behind the house for a few days now and on Thursday, while I was looking for the goldcrest, I saw a treecreeper on one of the hawthorns.

To return to my current obsession, the redwings appear to be holly berry gourmets.  I did see one redwing eating berries on the hawthorns behind the house but the holly berries are definitely their food of choice.  They appear to think the berries on some of the trees are tastier than others.  After they had spent nearly a week stripping the bumper crop from the tree by the road, a few switched to a tree at the edge of the plantation in our neighbours’ garden.  For some reason they are avoiding this  larger nearby tree in our garden which is laden with berries.

Last year the beech trees produced a huge amount of seed and I spent hours picking up the hard pods but this year they are resting and there are practically no pods.  It is the turn of the hollies to produce a prolific crop which is lucky for the flock of redwings.

Sunday was a lovely day, weather-wise.  Better than we could hope for at the beginning of November.  It started with a cool morning - and when I say “cool” I am talking about the temperature and not using the word in the sense of the younger generation’s ubiquitous expression of approval.  I went out to photograph the bright blue sky and saw that the moon was still visible above Skyhill.  I was standing under the tree by the bird feeder taking photographs and could hear the little birds fluttering around impatiently overhead.  Then something landed on my woolly hat - and it wasn’t a drop of rain.  I went in to wipe off the little dropping and had a cup to tea.  When I returned to take more photos, the moon was just about to disappear behind the hill.

When we drove out to the tip on the northern plain we could see that the moon was still high above the horizon.  We have shorter hours of sunlight - and moonlight - in the glen because it takes some time for the sun and moon to appear from behind North Barrule in the east and we lose sight of them behind Skyhill quite early.  The glen is shaded by the hill in the afternoon while most of the Island is still bathed in sunlight.  But I think we are on the better side of the glen.  We benefit from the morning sun earlier than the houses across the river.  The sun lights up the top of Skyhill first and then the sunlight gradually creeps down the plantation until it reaches our back garden.

In the afternoons we have a lovely view of the last rays of sunshine illuminating the trees in Brookdale plantation across the river.

We also see the best of the sunrises, and very occasionally, when there must be a spectacular sunset hidden behind Skyhill, there are some pastel pretty evening clouds.

We haven’t seen the little female siskin with the damaged leg for a few days now.  She was a regular visitor to the niger feeder for a few weeks.  She may have recovered the use of her leg or moved south but I am not optimistic about her fate.  It is a tough life out there for little birds.  This able-bodied female siskin was puffed up, presumably to ward off the chill in the air.

I checked the rain gauge on Sunday morning.  We had 110mm (4.33 inches) of rain during October. Not an insignificant amount unless you compare it with October last year when 297mm (over 11 inches) of rain fell in the glen.

Earlier this week, I received an email from a friend in Tasmania with some photos.  One photo was of the mossy base of a very old tree with some intriguing holes among the gnarled roots.  I thought “I wonder whether that is where the little people live” and when I scrolled down to her comment I found that she had exactly the same thought. I replied saying “We have some mysterious holes in the bank below the holly trees at the top of the garden - possible excavated by wood mice and then abandoned.  I sometimes wonder whether some of our bumblebees live there.  Apparently they do set up home in old mouse holes.  The dogs used to dig holes in the bank - probably trying to get at the mice - which made a mess.  But the mice live in peace now apart from the danger of being caught by trespassing cats.”  I went up to check on the holes but the ivy is thicker now that there is no dog damage and I only found one under the roots of an old holly.  I think it is currently inhabited because there is some loose earth outside the entrance, evidence of recent excavation.

While I was up at the top of the garden I found some autumn colour on a little seedling rowan.  

We have a much larger rowan, also a seedling, nearer the house but it never puts on a display like this.  The only other rowan is a very old one on the bank above which is weighed down with wild honeysuckle and looks as though it may eventually collapse.  I cut back some of the heavier branches to reduce the weight so it may last a few more years.

Further along the bank I saw this fungus - probably a common earthball.

And from the top of the bank I got a good view of Barry’s oak tree.  

The property on our southern side has had two owners since Barry left but I still think of it as his garden.  He retired to the Island after working for many years in the middle east and created the garden.  It is full of interesting trees and plants but is too big to be easily maintained.   Barry told me about the oak tree many years ago but I cannot remember the details.  I vaguely recall that he planted an acorn which he picked up somewhere - and that he thought the tree was a hybrid.  The leaves are much larger than those on the “real” oaks up in the plantation.  The larger ones can be up to six inches long - and most of them blow into our garden!  So I have mixed feelings about that oak.

I had to remove a few oak leaves from this mahonia flower before taking the next photo.

And my last photo is of a couple of fuchsia flowers - all dressed up and nowhere to go.