30 Days Wild | Day 28 - suburban wanderings

On Day 28 of 30 Days Wild, I waited until the weather got good in the late afternoon, then set out for a walk around my neighbourhood. Although we've lived in Bournville (south Birmingham) for a year now, I haven't had as much of a chance as I would have liked to get to know the area - it's a very pleasant place to walk around and I feel lucky to live here.

To start my walk, I walked across Rowheath playing fields where I saw House Martins swooping and feeding over the grass.

Rowheath playing fields.

At the other side of the fields was a part I hadn't seen before, an area of rougher grassland, not mown like the rest of the fields. I was intrigued by this area, although it had obviously been left to grow there wasn't much in the way of amenity grassland species - there were quite a few grasses and loads of clover, but it was sparsely vegetated. Basically it looked like it was crying out for someone to go and chuck a load of grassland wildflower seed over it to increase the species diversity a bit!

Rough grassland at Rowheath playing fields.

Rough grassland at Rowheath playing fields.

From there I headed along the little path to Woodlands Park, which has plenty of fine old mature trees, then across the road to a couple more fields. I don't really like Grey Squirrels normally but there was a young one foraging around under some trees next to the fields and it was pretty cute!

Woodlands Park.

Woodlands Park.

Juvenile Grey Squirrel.

I skirted around the edge of the fields along the slightly sketchy path following a small stream, and was rewarded with a family of Nuthatches feeding in the trees, and a cute juvenile Blue Tit!

Good for Nuthatches.

Emerging at the end of this path I was in the furthermost of two fields, this one another unmowed field with a path around the edge. I'd visited here once before but in the middle of winter, so was excited to see what I'd find in summer. It was pretty good for Birmingham suburbs!

I don't know what these fields are called or if they even have a name, so can't really caption them adequately!

Field.

Large Skipper (Ochlodes sylvanus) butterfly.

Lovely masses of this growing in the grass, I think it is Lesser Stitchwort (Stellaria graminea).

Small Tortoiseshell (Aglais urticae) butterfly.

As well as the above, I also saw a Blackcap singing his head off, and coming back out of the fields, I saw a Sparrowhawk fly into one of the trees around the field edges. I walked back a quicker way along roads, but still saw a Swift darting around up high. As usual when I go out for walks on my own, this had ended up being longer than planned but that was fine by me! It's got me thinking about other walks to do over summer in the neighbourhood, I might try Kings Norton Nature Reserve next....