Events – Page 3 – Hoopoe

Phenology Series: Winter

Winter is the toughest time of year for wildlife – cold temperatures and short days mean that finding enough food and staying warm become a challenging job. At this time of year, some animals enter a period of hibernation or torpor to preserve energy for when conditions improve, while others rely on stashes of food or body fat, stored away during the more abundant summer and autumn.

Much of our vegetation has entered a period of dormancy; growth has slowed right down and most trees and shrubs will remain bare until the spring. It would be easy to assume that nothing much is happening in the wild, but there are still amazing sights to be seen for the intrepid wildlife watcher who isn’t afraid to venture outside.

This is the fourth and final installment in our seasonal phenology series where you can explore a carefully chosen collection of ID blogs, books, equipment and events, all designed to help you make the most of a winter outside. Check out our spring, summer and autumn blogs for inspiration during the rest of the year.

Identification guides:

What you might see:

• During the colder months, Mountain Hares turn white to blend in with the snow that would historically have blanketed the uplands for much of the winter. For keen wildlife watchers, this makes November to April the best time to see them, as they stand out clearly from a snow-free landscape. Also known as the blue hare, they are present in Scotland and the north of England and Wales, and are most commonly found on heathland where they can be seen bounding across the landscape.

• As wild food sources become scarce throughout the colder months, elusive Red Squirrels may be increasingly tempted by garden peanut feeders, providing us with a perfect chance for a close-up viewing. Where they are present in the wild, bare trees can make winter a great time to spot these delightful mammals.

• Tawny Owls breed very early in the year, meaning that their loud mating calls can be heard from late autumn and through the winter months. Their territorial calls are very easy to recognise and provide a wonderful accompaniment to an early morning winter walk.

• Ducks and other wildfowl flock together in huge numbers during the winter for their nesting season, and are often responsible for a cacophony of sound around lakes and ponds. The appearance of winter plumage in male ducks also makes them a spectacular sight, and it is now that the differences between male and female birds become most apparent.

• At the same time as we say goodbye to many of our summer migrants, we also welcome to our shores a number of species which arrive to spend the winter away from colder regions. Geese, swans and ducks flock here from as far away as Canada, Russia and Iceland. The numbers of some of our resident species, such as Starlings, Chaffinches and Robins, may also be boosted by additional migrants.

Activities:

Upcoming events:

Big Schools Birdwatch – 8th January – 19th February
Big Garden Birdwatch – 26th to 28th January
World Wetlands Day – 2nd February
Global Recycling Day – 18th March
First Day of Spring – 20th March

Essential books and equipment:

The Field Key to Winter Twigs

The Field Key to Winter Twigs offers a striking new approach to the identification of over 400 wild or planted trees, shrubs and woody climbers found in the British Isles. It allows any diligent enthusiast to reliably name a woody plant, normally within three turns of a page.

Guide to Winter Coastal Birds

This laminated fold-out chart features 44 of the bird species you can see along the coastline of the UK in the winter. From long-legged waders to gulls, geese and shore ducks, all birds are shown in the adult winter plumage with separate images for males, females and juveniles.

Guide to the Seasons

This fold-out FSC chart aids the identification of different species of flora and fauna through each season, including winter. From catkins in spring to Redwing in winter, this portable guide is essential for exploring wildlife and nature throughout the year. Especially suitable for younger children.

Wild Winter

John D. Burns sets out to rediscover Scotland’s mountains, remote places and wildlife in the darkest and stormiest months. In Wild Winter, he traverses the country from the mouth of the River Ness to the Isle of Mull, from remote Sutherland to the Caingorns, in search of rutting Red Deer, pupping seals, Minke Whales, beavers, Pine Martens, Mountain Hares and otters.

A Field Guide to Bryophytes

This field guide covers 133 species of moss and liverwort encountered in most UK habitats, using non-specialist terms to help identify them. Twelve flow-charts help identify species by the habitat they occur in. All proceeds from sales of this book go to The Species Recovery Trust.

Winter Birds

In this stunning book, Lars Jonsson celebrates and explores the beauty of the birds that surround him during the Swedish winter months. Inspired by the desolate, wintry landscapes, the dazzling light and the stark contrast of colours he observes against the snow, Jonsson has created an unparalleled collection.

Kite Lynx HD+ Binoculars

Lynx HD+ binoculars have unique, class-leading optical characteristics in an exceptionally lightweight and compact body. They are perfect for surveying as it is easy to locate even fast moving animals and features in large landscapes.

Hawke Optics Nature-Trek Spotting Scope

A high quality yet economical choice for the keen wildlife watcher. Housed in a tough polycarbonate body, fully multi-coated optics help to produce sharp images whilst BAK-4 porro prisms ensure intense colour and contrast.

Petzl Actik Core Headtorch

The Petzl Actik Core is a carefully designed professional headtorch with both white and red light options.

Guardian Seed Feeder

This feeder includes a plastic seed feeder and an exterior cage designed to keep out squirrels and larger birds. The feeder is constructed from plastic with a metal lid and has plastic perching rings, which enable birds to feed in a natural forward facing position.

Great British Beach Clean 2022

2014 beach clean at the Port of Dover. Image by Port of Dover via Flickr.

What is the Great British Beach Clean?

The Great British Beach Clean is organised by the Marine Conservation Society (MSC) and takes place in September every year. During this nine day period, thousands of volunteers gather together on beaches around the UK to collect the litter they find on and above the strandline. This huge event has taken place since 1994 and occurs alongside the International Coastal Cleanup.

This year’s Great British Beach Clean runs from Friday 16th to Sunday 25th September.

What does a beach clean involve?

A beach clean has two purposes: firstly to remove potentially harmful and unsightly waste from our coastline, and secondly to gather data on the types of litter that are polluting our beaches.

During a clean, volunteers are asked to collect and record all of the litter they find on and above the strandline over a 100m stretch of beach. This information is then sent to the Marine Conservation Society, who collate and store it in a database. While collecting, volunteers also look out for other items such as tangled animals, patches of oil, or items that have originated from abroad, as these can be also be recorded.

At the end of the beach clean, bagged up rubbish is weighed and then deposited at a local collection point (with any hard, recyclable plastic kept in separate bags if possible).

Volunteers aren’t restricted to cleaning only 100m of the beach of course, but recording over a specific length of coastline makes the submitted data easier to compare.

Littered tideline at Oxwich Bay. Image by Bo Eide via Flickr.

What happens to the collected data?

The data collected during the Great British Beach Clean is as important as the clean-up itself as, without knowing what items are commonly found on our beaches, it is difficult to know where the most serious problems lie. With almost 30 years’ worth of data to hand, the MSC can now look at trends and patterns over time and make important decisions about where to focus their attentions.

The information submitted each year by volunteers is compiled and stored by the MSC who use it to campaign for better legislation relating to plastic waste, and to direct public awareness campaigns to help change consumer behaviour. To date, the MSC has been instrumental in bringing about the 5p plastic bag charge, which has seen the number of plastic bags washing up on beaches decrease by a huge 61% since 2011. They have also lobbied for wet wipes to be more clearly labelled, as they are not only responsible for massive blockages in sewerage systems, but many also contain plastics which break down into harmful microplastics in the aquatic environment.

They are currently working towards bringing in a Deposit Return System for drinks bottles and cans. The 2021 British Clean found an average of 30 drinks-related items per 100m. By making consumers pay a small deposit at the time of purchase, which is returned to them when they bring their bottle or can back for recycling, it is hoped that the number of such items ending up in the aquatic environment could be significantly reduced. A Deposit Return Scheme is due to be unrolled in Scotland in August 2023, but so far England, Wales and Northern Ireland have yet to make similar plans.

Other campaigns include the ‘Don’t Let Go’ movement, which aims to ban balloon and sky lantern releases, as debris from these items provides a significant source of pollution.

How do I get involved:

To find an organised beach clean near you, simply head over to the MSC website and search their events database. If you can’t find one, then you can always organise your own. All you need to do is register as a volunteer and then the MSC will provide you with all the information you need to get started.

If you don’t live near the coast or aren’t able to attend a beach clean, you can still help by making a one-off donation to the MSC or becoming a member.

Recommended books and equipment:

The Essential Guide to Beachcombing and the Strandline

In this handy guide you will find an in-depth account of the animals and plants that make up this rich and continuously shifting oasis of life in the otherwise harsh and hostile environment of the beach. The more we come to terms with the sensitive nature of the strandline, the more we can do to nurture and protect it.

The Beachcomber’s Guide to Marine Debris

This richly illustrated book serves as the ideal guide to the items that litter the world’s beaches. Forget sea shells and other fauna and flora. Here, you will find what a beachcomber is actually most likely to encounter most these days: glass, plastic, wood, metal, paper, oil and other sources of marine pollution.

FSC Wildlife Pack: Seashores

The Seashores wildlife pack is a presentation pack featuring 5 different fold-out guides – explore the wildlife of our coastline, from birds to seashells. The pack also includes a card-sized magnifier to help you get in ever closer to the details. Includes guides to cetaceans and seals, rocky shores, seashells, seaside flowers and summer coastal birds.

Litter Picker

This 82cm litter picker is constructed from lightweight, robust aluminium with an easy grip handle for comfortable use. With a grooved jaw for extra grip and a rotating head for increased flexibilty of use, it’s an ideal tool for any bioblitz, beach clean, or similar environmental event.

Phenology Series: Autumn

Autumn is a time of great change for the natural world. Hedgerows are bursting with nuts and berries, the landscape is shedding its green lushness in favour of reds and golds, and animals large and small are beginning their preparations for winter – whether that be by storing food, getting ready to hibernate, or migrating south where the weather is warmer and food more plentiful.

Although the days are shorter and the weather cooler (and almost certainly wetter!) autumn is a wonderful time for observing nature. As our focus shifts from the butterflies and flowers of summer to the fungi and garden bird feeder, this season also brings us some of nature’s most incredible spectacles.

This is the third in our seasonal phenology series where you can explore a carefully chosen collection of ID blogs, books, equipment and events, all designed to help you make the most of an autumn outside. Check out our spring and summer blogs and don’t forget to look out for our winter blog in December.

Identification guides:

What you might see:

• During the autumn, most of our summer migrants will begin to head off for warmer climes. Swallows and House Martins will depart on their lengthy migration to Africa, where they will spend the winter before returning to us next spring. At the same time we see the arrival of other species such as Fieldfare, Redwing and several species of ducks and geese. Many will spend the winter in Britain whilst others will stop off briefly to feed on their way elsewhere. Some coastal species, such as Puffins and Gannets leave during the autumn to spend the winter at sea.

• Peaking in late November and early December, Starling murmurations are one of the most spectacular events in the wildlife watcher’s year. These magnificent clouds of birds, swirling and turning in perfect unison, can be made up of more than 100,000 individuals. The best time to see murmurations is in the early evening – this is when the birds take to the skies to find their night-time roosting spots.
•As days shorten and temperatures cool, the natural pigments in tree leaves change, and we are treated to a final burst of colour before the leaves fall and winter sets in. Parks and deciduous woodlands are the perfect place to witness this wonderful palette of red, gold and copper throughout the autumn.

• October is the ideal time to observe the deer rut. Our three largest species of deer (red, fallow and sika) all perform this spectacular behaviour which involves rival stags roaring and locking antlers in battle in order to gain access to females, who are only fertile for around one day each year. Exmoor, Dartmoor and the New Forest are particularly good locations for observing these iconic displays.
• With the cooler weather and increased rainfall, autumn is usually the best time of year for spotting fungi. Following a spell of rain, grassland and woodland can suddenly be carpeted with an array of fascinating species. Giant puffballs and the stunning fly agaric are two easily identifiable and impressive species to spot.

• During the autumn, salmon will migrate from the open ocean back to their home rivers in an effort to reach the higher reaches of clean water where they will breed. As they travel upstream they can jump up to three metres upon encountering waterfalls or other obstacles. Although risky for the fish, as jumping out of the water makes them vulnerable to predation, these spots provide an excellent chance for us to observe the salmon run in action.

Activities:

Upcoming events:

Great British Beach Clean – 16th to 25th September
National Hedgerow Week – October (dates TBC)
World Migratory Bird Day – 8th October
Seed Gathering Season – 22nd October to 22nd November
National Mammal Week – October (dates TBC)
National Tree Week – 26th November to 4th December

Essential books and equipment:

Collins Bird Guide: 3rd Edition

The third edition of the hugely successful Collins Bird Guide is a must for every birdwatcher. In addition to comprehensive descriptions, illustrations and distribution maps, each group of birds includes an introduction that covers the major problems involved in identifying or observing them.

Collins Complete Guide to British Mushrooms & Toadstools

A superb guide that allows anyone to identify mushrooms found in Britain and Ireland. The book is illustrated with beautiful photographs throughout, featuring the species you are most likely to see. Extensive details on size, shape and colour are given and over 1,500 photographs help you identify each species.

What to Look For in Autumn

In the UK, autumn is a season of change and preparation. The air temperature starts to drop, trees change colour and the days get shorter. This book takes a closer look at hedgerow picnics, unexpected houseguests and hibernating hedgehogs as the secrets of autumn begin to appear in the world around us.

Kite Falco Binoculars

High performance, lightweight and compact binoculars. They produce bright images, with all lens surfaces coated in Kite’s MHR coating; a multilayer coating that allows up to 90% light transmission.

Defender Metal Seed Feeder

The Defender Feeder’s metal construction is tough, long lasting and offers excellent protection from squirrel damage. The base and hanger cap are all constructed from corrosion resistant solid metal alloy. The feeding tube is made from UV-stabilised polycarbonate, which will not deteriorate when exposed to sunlight.

NHBS Wooden Bird Nest Box

Our own range of wooden bird nest boxes have been custom designed and manufactured from substantial 2cm thick FSC-certified wood. These simple, breathable wooden bird boxes have a sloping roof and four drainage holes and are ideal for providing crucial nesting spaces for the smaller garden birds.

Browse our full collection for more field guides and equipment highlights.

The Big Butterfly Count: NHBS Staff Results 2022

Speckled Wood (Pararge aegeria) sunning on a hazel leaf – Sabine Lang

Butterfly Conservation opened the Big Butterfly Count between 15^th July and 7^th August this year. This annual initiative sees citizen scientists taking to their gardens, local parks and verges, or heading out into the countryside to spend fifteen minutes counting the butterflies and moths in their chosen patch.

At the time of writing (15^th August) the results on the 2022 Big Butterfly Count page state an accumulation of just shy of 95,000 counts recorded by approximately 63,400 participants. Most counts were submitted from the UK but there was a scattering of submissions from elsewhere in the world. It’s a lower participation count than last year, but there’s still time to submit any counts you took between 15^th July and 7^th August at: https://bigbutterflycount.butterfly-conservation.org/map

The results from the 2021 Big Butterfly Count suggested a continued decline of the overall number of butterflies across the UK and prompted some sobering thoughts on the diminishing appearances of these beautiful, remarkable and vital members of our ecosystem. “76% of butterflies have declined in abundance in distribution since 1976” heads one article on the Butterfly Conservation website, then goes on to state that “We may be the last generation to enjoy butterflies and moths in abundance.”

Some interesting results from the 2021 Big Butterfly Count were increases in the recorded numbers of some species such as Meadow Brown (Maniola jurtina) (33%), Ringlet (Aphantopus hyperantus) (81%) and Six-spot Burnet (Zygaena filipendulae) (42%) and a whopping increase of 213% from 2020 for the Marbled White (Melanargia galathea)!

It’s hard to imagine that 2022 has been more favourable for the UK’s Lepidoptera. A prolonged winter of record-breaking storms that rattled the country was followed by low temperatures through spring that gave way in a burst to record-breaking heat, parching the soil for weeks on end and plunging us into drought and sporadic wildfires by the time the Big Butterfly Count came around.

Town centre meadow of dried grasses in Totnes – Oliver Haines

For one of my counts I took a lunch break trip to a local parkland meadow under a heavy humid sky where the grasses, thistles and cow parsley flowers have been allowed to grow all summer long. Allotments run along one field edge and private gardens with a variety of growing styles along the other. In my allocated 15 minute count a single Large White (Pieris brassicae) slipped past in a hurry, over the wall and away.

A second count along a hedge by the local river bank was a little more fruitful, sporting three Gatekeepers (Pryonia tithonus), one Meadow Brown (Maniola jurtina) and five Ringlets (Aphantopus hyperantus) all skipping along the spent bramble flowers and sunning themselves on the leaves.

Results

Elsewhere within the NHBS team, counts were taken by Hana, Catherine and Sabine who spotted the following species in their chosen locations:

Hana:

1 x Speckled Wood (Pararge aegeria)

1 x Red Admiral (Vanessa atalanta)

1 x Jersey Tiger Moth (Euplagia quadripunctaria)

Catherine:

7 x Large White (Pieris brassicae)

3 x Speckled Wood (Pararge aegeria)

2 x Red Admiral (Vanessa atalanta)

2 x Gatekeeper (Pryonia tithonus)

Red Admiral (Vanessa atalanta) – Catherine Mitson

Sabine:

1 x Holly Blue (Celastrina argiolus)

1 x Comma (Polygonia c-album)

2 x Small White (Pieris rapae)

2 x Small Copper (Lycaena phlaeas)

1 x Red Admiral (Vanessa atalanta)

Comma (Polygonia c-album) – Catherine Mitson

Butterfly Conservation

There’s some interesting reading on the Butterfly Conservation website on their strategy to save and support the UK’s butterfly and moth populations here and a useful guide to ways that you can directly get involved and help out here.

The current top 5 Butterflies recorded in the 2022 Big Butterfly Count are as follows:

Large White (Pieris brassicae)
Gatekeeper (Pryonia tithonus)
Small White (Pieris rapae)
Meadow Brown (Maniola jurtina)
Red Admiral (Vanessa atalanta)

Useful resources

NHBS sells a wide variety of helpful guides to assist in butterfly identification all around the world – some great ones to get you started in the UK include:

Britain’s Butterflies: A Field Guide to the Butterflies of Great Britain and Ireland
Flexibound | 2020
£12.50 ~~£17.99~~

Pocket Guide to the Butterflies of Great Britain and Ireland
Paperback | 2019
£8.99 ~~£11.99~~

Collins Butterfly Guide: The Most Complete Field Guide to the Butterflies of Britain and Europe
Paperback | 2009
£13.99 ~~£18.99~~

Guide to the Butterflies of Britain and Ireland
Unbound | 2019
£3.99

Guide to the Day-Flying Moths of Britain
Unbound | 2006
£3.75

Life Cycles of British & Irish Butterflies
Hardback | 2019
£34.99

Phenology Series: Summer

For those of us living where there are four distinct seasons, summer is the period of long, warmer days where the skies, fields, lakes and mountains are alive with the busy activities of plants and animals at the peak of their growing year. Most of the animals that have hatched or been born earlier this year will be beginning to fend for themselves, while many plant species will be coming to the end of their flowering period and preparing to produce seed in an effort to ensure their survival and proliferation.

The combination of warmer weather and longer daylight hours makes this the perfect time to get out and about and experience the beauty and complexity of the natural world.

This is the second in our seasonal phenology series where you can explore a carefully chosen collection of ID blogs, books, equipment and events, all designed to help you make the most of a summer outside. Check out our spring blog and don’t forget to look out for our autumn blog in September.

Identification guides:

What you might see:

• Hedgerows and verges are still home to lots of flowering plants, although the frothy drifts of cow parsley are now coming to an end. Honeysuckle can be seen blooming from June, providing a night-time food source for moths such as the Elephant Hawkmoth (Deilephila elpenor).

• Bee orchids (Ophrys apifera) will flower briefly in June and July on dry, chalk and limestone grasslands, while sea cliffs will be adorned with the delicate blush of sea thrift (Armeria maritima) from April to October.
• Auks, such as Razorbills (Alca torda), Guillemot (Uria aalge), Puffins (Fratercula arctica) and Fulmar (Fulmarus glacialis), come to their cliff nests in spring to lay their eggs. They can still be seen (and heard!) throughout the summer as they make frequent trips out to sea to catch food for their young. Further inland, summer visitors such as Redstart (Phoenicurus phoenicurus), Wood Warblers (Phylloscopus sibilatrix) and Pied Flycatchers (Ficedula hypoleuca) are wonderful to catch a glimpse of.

• June to August is an important time for ladybirds. During this period, mated females will lay their eggs which then hatch into larvae and form pupae through a series of four stages, or ‘instars’. Adult ladybirds emerge from the pupae in August.
• Wasps, bumblebees, honeybees and butterflies are all active in the summer and will feed as much as possible while the weather is fine. Small Tortoiseshell (Aglais urticae) and Red Admiral (Vanessa atalanta) butterflies can both be frequently seen around nettles where they like to lay their eggs.
• Frogs and toads spend their days keeping cool in damp and shady areas and are often found in overgrown areas of the garden during the summer. This year’s froglets and toadlets will remain in the water until late summer.

• The summer months are a great time to spot bats hunting for insects during the dusk and dawn hours. Female bats give birth to their young in June and within three weeks these juveniles will be learning to fly themselves. By August the youngsters will no longer need their mother’s milk and will be hunting for their own food.

Activities:

Upcoming events

Big Butterfly Count – 15th July to 7th August
British Dragonfly Week – 16th to 24th July
National Marine Week – 23rd July to 7th August
International Bat Night – 27th to 28th August

Essential equipment and books:

Field Guide to the Moths of Great Britain and Ireland

This beautifully illustrated and comprehensive field guide shows moths in their natural resting postures. It also includes paintings of different forms, underwings and other details to help with identification.

Britain’s Reptiles and Amphibians: A Guide to the Reptiles and Amphibians of Great Britain, Ireland and the Channel Islands

This detailed guide to the reptiles and amphibians of Britain, Ireland and the Channel Isles is designed to help anyone identify a lizard, snake, turtle, tortoise, terrapin, frog, toad or newt with confidence.

The Wild Flower Key: How to Identify Wild Flowers, Trees and Shrubs in Britain and Ireland

This essential wild flower guide is packed with identification tips and high-quality illustrations, as well as innovative features designed to assist beginners. The text aims to be as useful as possible for those working in conservation and includes a compilation of the latest research on ancient woodland indicator plants.

NHBS Moth Trap

A lightweight and highly portable trap, tested and approved by Butterfly Conservation. This mains-powered trap runs a single 20W blacklight bulb (included) and comes supplied with a 4.5m power lead with UK plug.

Kite Ursus Binoculars

These affordable binoculars have been designed for everyday use and have a robust housing, great field of view and produce a bright, colour-balanced image.

Magenta Bat 5 Bat Detector

A handheld super-heterodyne bat detector with an illuminated easy-to-read LCD frequency display. This fantastic entry-level detector converts ultrasonic bat calls into a sound that is audible to humans, allowing you to listen to and identify the bats flying around you.

Browse our full collection for more field guides and equipment highlights.

No Mow May 2022

Just days into May the flowers begin. Image – Oli Haines

Throughout May 2022 Plantlife have once again made their impassioned annual plea for garden owners across the UK to resist the urge to mow lawns and tidy up their gardens and to join in with #NoMowMay. It’s a simple enough premise to leave grassy areas alone for a month, and it has huge benefits for biodiversity at this time of year to do so, giving a wide variety of flowering plants a chance to bloom early in appeal to our rich network of vital pollinators.

As in 2021, we here at NHBS have participated this year by letting the grassy areas on our premises flower and the results were quickly quite astounding. Within days there was a carpet of daisies and dandelions, Germander Speedwell and Black and Spotted Medic, and, as the month progressed and we explored further, the picture grew more and more complex. Tangles of Common Vetch, Creeping Buttercup and Common Mouse-ear proliferated, and tall fronds of Beaked Hawk’s Beard, Ribwort Plantain and Prickly Sow-thistle appeared. Hidden deep within a mixed mat of grasses the miniscule flowers of Cut-leaved Crane’s-bill, Thyme-leaved Speedwell and Scarlet Pimpernel flourished and, at the lawn edges, tall stands of Garlic Mustard and Cleavers towered over the last of the seasons Bluebell flowers.

It can still feel strangely radical to let an area of public space, or even a private garden, to grow wild. Perhaps it can feel like going against the flow to sit back and not mow or trim the grass, and to embrace a modicum of wild chaos. Much of our wildlife relies on the flowering plants that we suppress with our tidiness and our control of lawns. Multitudes of beetles, bees, ants, moths and butterflies have evolved alongside plants that, given half a chance, can still thrive in our green spaces. No Mow May offers us a glimpse into this rich relationship, this conversation in time, and it provides a lifeline. One flower that showed up in our lawn here, by way of an example, is the Cuckoo flower or Lady’s Smock, a light and elegant pink flower of grasslands that is almost exclusively selected by the Orange-tip (and Green-veined White) butterfly in spring to lay their eggs on, as it feeds the caterpillars when they hatch. Growing up to 50cm in height its reach is well within the mowing range.

In addition to the No Mow May initiative, Plantlife have also introduced Every Flower Counts, a citizen science survey that asks participants to count, record and report back the flowers found in a single metre squared patch of lawn . This will enable them to gather important data on the impact that leaving areas to grow can have on abundance and biodiversity.

Our premises at the end of May. Images by Oli Haines

As May winds to a close, species are still beginning to emerge in our lawn ready to flower in June: Spear Thistle, Oxeye Daisy, members of the Carrot family and, with a final flourish of the month, a Bee Orchid slowly opens its blooms right by the footway, surprisingly cryptic until you meet it at ground level.

Bee Orchid (Ophrys apifera). Image – Oli Haines

We hope that we can leave our grass uncut for a little longer so we can see who’s still there to flower, and that those of you who have participated in No Mow May may feel inspired to do the same.

Below is a list (in no particular order) of the flowering plants we discovered on our premises during No Mow May this year and a small selection of guides for wildflowers and grasses, plus some suggested reads for those who have inspired to take wild gardening further.

White Clover – Trifolium repens
Red Clover – Trifolium pratense
Common Vetch – Vicia Sativa
Germander Speedwell – Veronica chamaedrys
Common Speedwell – Veronica persica
Thyme-leaved Speedwell – Veronica serpyllifolia
Common Dandelion – Taraxacum officinale
Common Daisy – Bellis Perennis
Meadow Buttercup – Ranunculus acris
Creeping Buttercup – Ranunculus repens
Cuckoo Flower – Cardamine pratensis
Yarrow – Achillea millefolium
Spotted Medick – Medicago Arabica
Black Medick – Medicago lupulina
Bluebell – Hyacinthoides non-scripta
Cut-leaved Crane’s-bill – Geranium dissectum
Common Mouse-ear – Cerastium fontanum
Ribwort Plantain – Plantago lanceolata
Bee Orchid – Ophrys apifera
Herb Robert – Geranium robertianum
Oxeye daisy – Leucanthemum vulgare
Beaked Hawk’s-beard – Crepis vesicaria
Catsear – Hypochaeris radicata
Broad-leaved Dock – Rumex obtusifolius
Sheep’s Sorrel – Rumex acetosella
Southern Marsh/spotted Orchid Hybrid
Creeping Cinquefoil – Potentilla reptans
Primrose – Primula vulgaris
Common Ragwort – Senecio jacobaea
Hemlock – Conium maculatum
Hemlock Water Dropwort – Oenanthe crocata
Cuckoo-pint – Arum alpinum
Scarlet Pimpernel – Anagallis arvensis
Nipplewort – Lapsana communis
Bristly Oxtongue – Helminthotheca echioides
Cleavers – Galium aparine
Ivy-Leaved Toadflax – Cymbalaria muralis
Wood Avens – Geum urbanum
Garlic Mustard – Alliaria petiolata
Red Valarian – Centranthus ruber
Hoary Willowherb – Epilobium parviflorum
Broad-leaved Willowherb – Epilobium montanum
Fringed Willowherb – Epilobium ciliatum
Procumbent Pearlwort – Sagina procumbens
Groundsel – Senecio vulgaris
Cornsalad – Valerianella locusta
Spear Thistle – Cirsium vulgare
Prickly Sow-thistle – Sonchus asper
Common Nettle – Urtica dioica
Lesser Trefoil – Trifolium dubium

Suggested books and equipment

Wild Flower Flowcharts Species: ID the Easy Way
Spiralbound | March 2022
£6.99

A Field Guide to Grasses, Sedges and Rushes
Spiralbound | April 2016
£11.99

The Wild Flower Key: How to identify wild flowers, trees and shrubs in Britain and Ireland
Paperback | March 2006
£24.99

Harrap’s Wild Flowers: A Field Guide to the Wild Flowers of Britain & Ireland
Paperback | November 2018
£19.99

Collins Wild Flower Guide: The Most Complete Guide to the Wild Flowers of Britain and Ireland
Paperback | June 2016
£24.99

Making a Wildflower Meadow: The Definitive Guide to Grassland Gardening
Paperback | February 2015
£16.99

Wildlife Gardening: For Everyone and Everything
Paperback | April 2019
£14.99

Q1 Quadrat
£14.99

Q2 Quadrat
£15.50

Opticron Hand Lens 23mm 10x Magnification
£12.95 ~~£14.95~~

All prices correct at the time of this article’s publication.

The Big Garden Birdwatch: NHBS Staff Results

We have reached the end of the 43rd Big Garden Birdwatch, which took place between Friday 28th and Sunday 30th January. Run by the RSPB, it’s one of the largest citizen science surveys in the UK and encourages the public to record their garden birds and submit their results. Over a million people took part last year, recording over 17 million birds, helping the RSPB gain an accurate understanding of how bird populations are faring.

Great spotted woodpecker on a window feeder by Ian Watson-Loyd

There’s still time to submit your results if you took part over the weekend, the final date to let the RSPB know what you saw is 20th February. But don’t worry if you didn’t get to take part this year; it is an annual event, so make sure to look out for it next year! To take part, all you need to do is spend 1 hour counting the birds that land in your garden, balconies or outdoor spaces. It’s important to count the highest number of each species, rather than the total amount you see over the hour, otherwise, you might end up counting the same individual twice. You can submit your results online on the RSPB website. To help you identify certain species, take a look at our range of field guides, as well as our previous identification guide blog posts here.

Over a million people took part last year, recording over 17 million birds, helping the RSPB gain an accurate understanding of how bird populations are doing. They now have over four decades of data, showing the trends in UK bird populations, which helps them which species are faring ok and which are in decline. Both goldfinches and great tits have benefited from gardens, with goldfinch populations in gardens increasing by 50% over the last decade. However, the Big Garden Birdwatch has also shown that thrushes and greenfinches sightings have decreased, with greenfinch recordings down by 65% and thrushes by 78%. We hope that more people have taken part this year, and, as always, many of our staff got involved. Scroll down to see what we found.

We’d also love to see what you’ve spotted if you took part – let us know in the comments below.

Results

Beth saw the highest quantity of birds this year, at 32 individuals:

Woodpigeons: 4

Blackbirds: 4

Chaffinches: 6

Magpies: 1

Robins: 2

Starlings: 4

Chaffinch (Fringilla coelebs) by hedera.baltica via Flickr

Sparrows: 5

Jackdaws: 2

Blue tits: 3

Blackcaps: 1

Female blackcap (Sylvia atricapilla) by Mick Sway via Flickr

Over the weekend, Catherine was visited by a large flock of starlings, as well as the most blue tits of all our staff results this year. She also managed to spot a reed bunting, an amber listed bird in the UK:

Starlings: 9

Crows: 2

Blackbirds: 1

Magpies: 1

Blue tits: 7

Woodpigeons: 2

Goldfinches: 1

Great tits: 1

Reed bunting: 1

Ian managed to spot the largest number of species this year, including a wren (Troglodytes troglodytes), another amber listed species:

Starlings: 1

Blue tits: 2

Woodpigeons: 4

Blackbirds: 1

Robins: 1

Great tits: 2

Magpies: 2

Dunnocks: 1

Goldfinches: 2

Blackcaps: 1

Wrens: 1

Male house sparrow by Steve Colwell (Channel City Camera Club) via Flickr

Female house sparrow by hedera.baltica via Flickr

I completed my Big Garden Birdwatch in East Sussex:

Great tits: 2

Blue tits: 1

Sparrows: 4

Starling: 1

Woodpigeons: 2

Robins: 1

Blackbirds: 1

Notably, one of the woodpigeons picked up a stick from my garden and flew off with it, a potential sign of nest-building behaviour.

Sabine had the highest number of jackdaws, one of our most recorded species in 2021:

Jackdaws: 6

Woodpigeons: 3

Blue tits: 2

Dunnocks: 3

Robins: 2

Great tits: 1

Magpies: 1

She also managed to capture this beautiful footage of one of her Robin visitors:

Our total

In total, we saw 16 different species and 105 individuals across our 5 gardens. Our most common bird species were starlings (Sturnus vulgaris), blue tits (Cyanistes caeruleus) and woodpigeons (Columba palumbus). Last year, our most common were long-tailed tits (Aegithalos caudatus) and jackdaws (Corvus monedula), and in 2020 it was house sparrows (Passer domesticus), followed by great tits (Parus major). It will be interesting to see how our results compare to the overall results of this year’s Big Garden Birdwatch.

Percentage per species of overall total 2022

The RSPB

For more information on UK garden birds, the Big Garden Birdwatch and how you can help them, please visit www.rspb.org.uk. Here you will find a wealth of information to help you find and identify UK bird species.

The Big Butterfly Count: NHBS Staff Results

We have reached the end of the Big Butterfly Count 2021, which took place between Friday 16th July and Sunday 8th August. It’s the world’s biggest survey of butterflies and is aimed at assessing the health of our environment by recording the number of our most common butterflies and day-flying moths.

But don’t worry if you didn’t get to take part this year; it is an annual event, so make sure to look out for it next year! To take part, all you need to do is spend 15 minutes counting butterflies on a sunny day. You can count from anywhere you like, such as in the garden or park, in the woods or fields or wherever you find yourself outdoors. You can submit your results online on the Big Butterfly Count website. For a list of handy butterfly ID guides as well as some tips on how to distinguish certain species, take a look at our previous blog post here.

This count is extremely important as butterflies are vital to the ecosystem, as pollinators and within the food chain. Populations have decreased significantly since the 1970s, therefore monitoring butterfly numbers is crucial. We hope that more people have taken part this year, and, as always, many of our staff got involved. Scroll down to see what we found.

We’d also love to see what you’ve spotted if you took part – why not let us know in the comments below.

Results

Catherine spotted all of these butterflies during her lunch break:

Small White: 10

Meadow Brown: 5

Gatekeeper: 9

Gemma found:

Large white: 2

Meadow brown: 2

Ringlet: 1

Red admiral: 1

Tonie did the butterfly count by the coast:

Meadow browns: 5

Red admiral: 2

Large white: 2

Small skipper: 2

Marbled white: 1

I managed to complete a butterfly count at the end of a hike on Dartmoor:

Small white: 1

Meadow brown: 4

Gatekeeper: 1

Red admiral: 1

Angeline completed her big butterfly count in Plymouth:

Ringlet: 3

Small skipper: 2

Silver-Washed Fritillary – by A. Rietveld

Oli spotted:

Gatekeeper: 2

Small tortoiseshell: 1

Red admiral: 1

Peacock: 1

Ringlet: 1

Meadow brown: 1

Butterfly Conservation

For more information on UK butterflies and how you can help them, please visit Butterfly Conservation.org. Here you will find a wealth of information to help you find and identify butterflies and moths.

No Mow May 2021

Plantlife’s “No Mow May” campaign asked gardeners around the UK to lock up their lawnmower and let the wild flowers in their lawn bloom. This simple change in mowing has been shown to bring huge benefits, providing a feast of nectar for our hungry pollinators.

At the end of May, Plantlife opened its “Every Flower Counts” survey, a fun and easy way to discover how many bees the UK’s lawns can feed. People from all around the country took part, recording the different flowers which had bloomed on their lawn. These results will then be compiled to produce the National Nectar Score.

Here at NHBS we were delighted to take part in No Mow May, with a number of our staff members saying “no” to the mow in order to help our bees, butterflies, and wildlife!

You can find out how we got on below:

Outside the NHBS building

The grass outside the NHBS building was left unmown during May, allowing lots of daises, dandelions and speedwell to bloom. This created a beneficial space for a variety of insects and pollinators.

Nigel

Nigel turned his lawn into a wild haven, allowing an abundance of dandelions and forget-me-nots to blossom.

Nigel also contacted the local council, persuading them to set aside an unmown patch of grass at a local cemetery – an area usually mown twice a month from March to November. The photo below shows the contrast between the the unmown area and the area which continues to be mown and strimmed. As shown below, leaving an unmown patch has allowed a number of daises and dandelions to sprout up.

Oli

Oli’s garden remains wild year-round, attracting a variety of plants and wildlife. Most recently, his garden saw the arrival of this rather impressive-looking slow worm!

Natt

Natt’s lawn was left unmown during May, with the long grass helping to provide habitat for a variety of different insects.

Elle

Elle’s garden saw the blooming of these stunning buttercups, ideal for pollinators and other wildlife.

Marie

Marie’s lawn was also left to grow during May, allowing lots of lovely daises to sprout up.

Angeline

Angeline’s dog Freya enjoyed exploring a field of buttercups which had been left untouched during May.

Have you taken part in No Mow May and are keen to learn more about some of your local flora? You can find our ‘Guide to UK Wild Flower Identification’ here.

6th International Berlin Bat Conference – Interview with Christian Voigt

The 6th International Berlin Bat Meeting is due to be held online from 22nd–24th March 2021 and will consist of a series of live lectures delivered via video link. To make it possible for people to attend from around the world, the lectures will also be available to watch on demand. At NHBS, we’ve always loved being involved with the Berlin Bat Meeting and hope that soon we can attend again in person!

In the build up to this exciting event, organiser Dr. Christian Voigt kindly took the time to answer some questions about this year’s meeting. Dr Voigt is Head of the Department of Evolutionary Ecology at Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research, Lecturer at the Freie Universität Berlin and Member of the Berlin-Brandenburg Centre for Stable Isotope Ecology.

The theme of this year’s International Berlin Bat Meeting is ‘The Human Perspective on Bats’. Can you tell us why you decided to choose this particular theme?

We decided on this topic because we became aware of the necessity to address bat conservation from a more holistic approach. Conservationists often have the saying ‘wildlife management is the management of humans’ and this is very much true. We need to better understand the emotions and attitudes of humans towards wildlife in general and bats in particular, in order to protect wildlife and bats respectively. Ultimately, this will make conservation more efficient. The Covid-19 pandemic told us that we were right because many aspects of bat conservation have turned more difficult when some people changed their attitude towards bats. It is important to remember that bat conservation does not only mean dealing with the protection of bat populations but also with their ecosystem function. In many cases, bats are very helpful for humans, e.g. by consuming large numbers of pest insects or because they pollinate flowers or disperse seeds. Becoming aware of these ecosystem services might change people’s minds about why they should care for bats. Lastly, zoonotic diseases such as Covid-19 emerge because the way we treat wildlife is wrong. Poaching, wet markets, our whole interaction with wildlife has to be reconsidered and we will be talking about this during the International Berlin Bat Meeting. The topic of the upcoming IBBM `’The human perspective on bats’ is more relevant and timely than ever.

What do you think are the key conservation challenges currently faced by bats?

The major challenge is now to re-establish a good reputation for bats. Bats are key players in ecosystems, they are important indicator species, and many species are rare or even threatened. We need to care for them.

How do you hope that this meeting will contribute to the work required to address these challenges?

Our hope is that we come up with ideas about how to approach bat conservation and human-bat interactions from a different angle. This conference will bring together people from various geographic backgrounds and from a variety of disciplines. It is this exchange of ideas and perspective that make the IBBM quite unique among bat conferences.

Meetings such as these provide an unrivalled chance for attendees to share ideas and network. Do you know of any key projects or collaborations that have arisen from previous International Berlin Bat Meetings?

The networking that happens during these meetings is huge. The very first IBBM on bat migration brought this topic to the attention of many people and lots of papers have been published since then. Specifically, our meeting on bat diseases, right when white-nose syndrome hit North American bats, stimulated a lot of excellent research on both continents. I remember that we sat together during the IBBM and discussed what should be done and what to expect.

Organising an online meeting must be very different in comparison to organising an ‘in person’ event. How have you found the process? And have you noticed that there are benefits to this format, as well as challenges?

Organizing an online meeting is overall not difficult, it was the postponing of the conference, not knowing when to reschedule it and not knowing how people would respond to an online instead of a presence conference that caused us sleepless nights. Now that we have already organized a few online events, the task seems doable. Overall, the benefits are that people from many more places on our globe can participate in this event without having to pay the travel costs. The challenge for these kinds of conferences is to maintain a format in which people feel encouraged to discuss and to interact. This can be better achieved when you meet in person, e.g. during coffee breaks. It is my hope that we have a very lively discussion and a very stimulating event.

For more information and to register for the 6th International Berlin Bat Meeting, visit the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research website.