#30dayswild - Week 5

Day 27


Day 28

Wild bouncing!

Day 29

Day 30

Final day - took chance for breakfast outside in the sunshine

Awesome clouds

 and some chalking!

In the afternoon we visited Tandle Hills park

#30dayswild - week 3

Day 13

Making flower perfume

Day 14

Collecting elder flowers

More insects spotted

Day 15

Elderflower cordial brewing

Nettle cordial bottled - amazing colour!

Day 16

Shadow pictures

Lots of dragonflies

Exploring with friends

Day 17

Picnic with friends

Ladybird house made at science festival

Day 18

Cleaned and filled our bird feeders and set up the trap camera to watch them!

Day 19

 No pictures but spent time in the garden, playing and watering the plants

Jan focus - birds

Nature Counts

Todays walk was near Ashton, starting at Park Bridge heritage centre.

We found lots of interesting flowers and bugs!

First we looked at the daisy flower under a hand lens and learned that it is a composite flower made up of many tiny flowers - you can just see some of the yellow ones are opened while others aren't

You can't see the sculpture of a kestrel very well on this photo, but what was interesting was the noise coming from a hole near the top of this tree stump. A little patience revealed a greater spotted woodpecker visiting to feed its youngster in the hole. No reprieve from the noise though - this was one hungry baby!

Flowers spotted - who likes butter! Meadow buttercups are tall and have deeply lobed leaves wheras the creeping buttercup is much lower growing and has 3 segments to the leaf.

Can't remember what this one was called!

 Jack by the hedge

Red Campion - 5 lobed petals, leaves in pairs on the stem

Bistort

On the Bistort we found these very bright froghoppers

Other bugs found

 May fly - had 2 incredibly long tails!

Unidentified fly

Luke found a great dandelion trumpet and the boys learned to play the grass pipes!

Busy Friday

Bird song walk

I was up early on Friday to attend this bird song ID event run by the greater Manchester local record centre.
I'd never been to this area before but found my way and spotted the group with all the binoculars out! The ranger from the Salford area told us about how they were regenerating the canal area and then we set off for our meander. I've been wanting to learn to recognise birds by their song for ages but find it difficult to stop and listen quietly when I have all the children with me so it was a lovely treat to have a few hours out for myself with like minded nature lovers.

Steve, the group leader was the same man we had met on our mammal trapping adventure. Birds are his area of expertise and we heard and saw a good range of birds on our short ramble. The most exciting was a pair of willow tits which we would probably not have seen if he hadn't recognised their call and we stopped to try and spot.

Willow tits have been declining and are on the RSPB's red list so it was lovely to see a pair of them here. Jill, the ranger, told us they were hoping to do some work on making suitable habitats for willow tits to nest in. Their nests are positioned less than a metre above the ground in rotten stumps and it is thought the loss of this type of habitat is the reason for their decline in numbers.

Here is a link to the map and birds we saw present.

Three interesting facts I learned:

• It is only the male bird that sings - to attract a mate and to defend its territory
• Magpies build nests with a roof over them
• Kestrels have ultra violet vision that enables them to see urine trails of their prey (mice and voles)

I have to say I'm not sure I am much more confident at identifying birds by their song but I had a very enjoyable morning!

Food Festival

I returned home for about 11.30 and we set off to the great british food festival at Stonyhurst college near Clitheroe.

It was turning into a lovely sunny day but Amy was a little chilly without her cardigan!

We had a little wander but decided it was picnic time first. In the main marquee there were plenty of goodies to try - the favourite being fudge and chutney.

Outside there was snail racing and vegetable throwing!

 

Inside the hall were some craft stalls. Its a very impressive building.

We finished off the afternoon with an ice cream, some balancing along the wall and daisy chain making.

A lovely day out and we came home with some fudge too ;)