30 Days Wild | Day 5 - stroll in the sunshine

For day 5 of 30 Days Wild I went for a stroll in the early evening sunshine as a reward for having spent the afternoon having a bit of a clearout ahead of moving house. We live in Bournville, Birmingham (currently!) where we are spoilt with numerous lovely parks. Today I walked across Rowheath playing field and did a loop around an area of rough grassland, before heading back across to Rowheath Park where I checked out some more rough grassland before finishing off with a quick look at the pond.

Over both areas of grassland there were a lot of speedy orange flutterers; without my binoculars it was hard to tell what they were but I think probably Large Skipper. I also saw a Holly Blue at the edge of Rowheath playing field and Common Blue and Green-veined White in Rowheath Park. I spotted a couple of Stock Doves and some Swifts during my walk, as well as one solitary Greylag Goose among the Canadas by the pond, unusual around here.

Here are a few photos!

Rough grassland on Rowheath playing field.

Rough grassland in Rowheath Park.

Nice area in Rowheath Park.

Common Vetch (Vicia sativa) in Rowheath Park.

Yellow-rattle (Rhinanthus minor) in Rowheath Park.

Meadow Buttercup (Ranunculus acris) in Rowheath Park.

Solitary Greylag in Rowheath Park.

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....

30 Days Wild | Day 20 - stroll around Stock's Wood

On Day 20 of 30 Days Wild, I went for a short walk around the perimeter of Stock's Wood in Bournville.

Here is some info about Stock's Wood!

It's not open to the public, as if it was some of the old trees would have to be removed as they would pose a health and safety risk. It's better this way as it means this small scrap of woodland remains undisturbed for nature. You can still walk all the way round the edge too and peer in!

We had been to the garden centre in Bournville earlier the same day (I needed to buy a bowsaw to attack a rather out-of-control Buddleia in our back garden) which is right next to Stock's Wood, and from the car park I'd heard what sounded a lot like a Pied Flycatcher (!?!?). It's certainly nice habitat for Pied Flycatchers - lots of mature oaks and other deciduous trees - but it is only a tiny fragment, surrounded by suburbs (which are admittedly also quite leafy). The bird only sang a couple of times, I waited for a bit but didn't hear anything more, so went into the garden centre to complete my purchase. I went for a proper walk around the woods later on to see if I could see/hear it again but no joy. I did see a Song Thrush though, and heard Nuthatch, Blackcap and Chiffchaff among others. I might get up early tomorrow morning for some more investigations.... for now here are some photos of Stock's Wood!

Path round the edge of Stock's Wood.

Stock's Wood.

Path round the edge of Stock's Wood.

Stock's Wood.

30 Days Wild | Day 3 - something blue...

As of today I am on annual leave from work, for some intensive revision time leading up to my exam! So for day 3 of 30 Days Wild, I was looking for something close to home. One of the suggestions in the 30 Days Wild booklet is to find and photograph something blue and it just so happens that I recently found some lovely blue things in our garden. We only moved to this house last July, and due to a combination of wanting to see what appears, and having no free time for gardening (well mainly the latter), the garden has pretty much been left to its own devices. So I had a nice surprise when I found these flowers there the other day:

I think they are Perennial Cornflower (Centaurea montana), which although not a native UK species is very attractive to insects as a nectar source, and to humans as an aesthetically pleasing bloom! They appear in quite a few gardens around my neighbourhood. I don't know if the ones in my garden were deliberately planted or self-seeded there. As the third photo shows, they fade to more of a purple colour as the flowers age. I took the photos with my field lens + smartphone camera combo.

But what is particularly special about blue things in nature anyway? If you think about it, there aren't actually that many blue flowers compared with flowers of other colours, nor blue animals. It turns out that plants and most animals cannot synthesise blue pigments, so the small number that are blue achieve it via various types of jiggery-pokery. Here's a short article about blue in plants, and one on blue in animals!

30 Days Wild | Day 1 - commute birding

It's day 1 of 30 Days Wild! As I'll be revising for my forthcoming oceanography exam (a week tomorrow, EEK) during the first days of June, my random acts of wildness during this time will be mainly small things that I can fit easily around my usual day-to-day activities. So this morning I counted all the bird species I saw and/or heard on my commute to work.

I live in the pleasant and chocolatey south Birmingham suburb of Bournville, and commute on foot to my workplace at the University of Birmingham. The walk is about 2 miles so takes 40 minutes, I always enjoy it as it's a good way to get exercise and the route is very nice - I go through the back streets of Bournville, along a bit of main road through Selly Oak, then onto the canal all the rest of the way to the University. I normally see and hear a fair few birds, but much as I love birds, I also love listening to music and podcasts while commuting, so I don't usually give the birds my full attention! However today I did, and here's everything I saw/heard:

Robin
Mallard
Chiffchaff
Blue Tit
Great Tit
Goldfinch
Starling
Chaffinch
Magpie
House Sparrow
Blackbird
Woodpigeon
Dunnock
Wren
Carrion Crow
Goldcrest
Nuthatch
Long-tailed Tit
Blackcap
Greenfinch
Moorhen
Canada Goose
Feral Pigeon
Pied Wagtail
Lesser Black-backed Gull

25 species, not too shabby for a 40-minute walk through suburban Birmingham. South Birmingham is known for its leafy environs, and while this is a pretty good representation of what I see around my neighbourhood, there are a fair few nice species missing that I have seen on my commutes during the course of the nearly a year that we've lived in Bournville - such as Song and Mistle Thrush, House Martin, Swift, Jay, Swallow, Green and Great-spotted Woodpecker, Coal Tit, Collared Dove, Black-headed Gull, Grey Wagtail, Redwing, Buzzard, Kestrel, Sparrowhawk, Peregrine......

Here is my commute in pictures! As you can see there are plenty of mature trees and lovely gardens, it gets a bit more urban in Selly Oak before you hit the canal. I think making a conscious effort to focus on looking and listening out for birds made my commute slightly more relaxing than usual, although it's not as though it's usually a stressful journey anyway! And I wasn't even that much more late for work than I normally am.....

Bournville.

Bournville.

Bournville.

Bournville.

Nooooo! Hope they find him.

Bournville.

Bournville.

Bournville.

Selly Oak.

Selly Oak.

Entrance to the canal - this always makes me smile.

The canal.

The canal.

She's been sitting on that nest for weeks now, may be too much disturbance for her to successfully hatch eggs - that's the A38 going over the bridge right next to the nest!

The canal.

The canal.

The canal.

This grassy bank between the canal and railway is great for wildflowers and butterflies in summer.

Looking towards the University of Birmingham.

The canal.

The bridge at University railway station, where I head up to the campus.