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Wivenhoe in Bloom – through the eyes of an eight-year-old

Eleanor's photos, WildEssex, WildWivenhoe

When the muse takes her, Eleanor, now 8, likes nothing more than exploring and capturing the world around her through a cameraphone.

Last weekend was one of those lovely occasions, an hour together in the sun, with no guidance, no restrictions, just free to photograph whatever struck her.

Mostly she gravitates towards flowers, although not exclusively., especially when insects present themselves…

Whereas I would deliberately try and avoid the tangible evidence of human beings in my own photos, Eleanor seemingly relishes those juxtapositions.

And I would of course always seek pristine perfection, but her photos demonstrate so clearly there is beauty in senescence! That certainly makes me look anew!

Then there is the positioning of the subject. OK this might be random, but seeing the sequences of her pictures where she starts with it centred and then increasingly shifts the focus to one side or another makes me think her artistic appreciation is somehow innate. The number of images where the subject bleeds off the edge without compromising the beauty of the whole has to be deliberate?

Likewise throwing focus: indeed she patiently explained to me how she gets the shots where focused background detail is highlighted by a blurry foreground…

…as well as getting so close into the subject, it is driven to abstraction (my words!).

And finally, by being younger, smaller and more supple she manipulates perspectives in ways I could now only dream of!

The apogee of this (so far) for me is in the picture of a small tree from ground level, looking like a foliar firework exploding into the heavens.

I know I am biased but I am a very #ProudPapa!

Midsummer Moths 2026 at Beth Chatto Gardens

Beth Chatto Gardens, Britain's Wildlife, WildEssex, WildWivenhoe

Our June moth event in Beth Chatto Gardens took place as normal just before the equinox. On the face of it the night was perfect: calm, humid and very warm, with temperatures not falling below 20ºC. But such are the uncertainties (and joys!) of moth trapping, reflecting not only weather on the night, but also recent weather extremes (eg the May drought and more recent downpours) as well as seasonal trends, that in fact we were a little disappointed. Or thought we were until we totted up the total and found we had recorded four more species than on the equivalent date in 2025, last year being the record-breaker to date. For a full listing over the years, see here BC MOTHS TOTALS.

71 macromoth species and 33 micros is certainly a good haul, but the slight disappointment was at the number and especially diversity of the big, bright ones, the crowd-pleasers. And again, we cannot really complain at the twenty or so Elephant Hawk-moths, a couple of Small Elephants, six Buff Tips, Swallowtail Moth, Ghost Swift and a lovely Puss Moth, mostly compliant and happy to be passed gently around the early morning crowd. The Ghost Swift even laid eggs as we watched, scattering them freely where it was resting, rather than as with most species attaching them firmly to their substrate.

Among the smaller macromoths were colourful ones such as Brimstone Moth and Rosy Footman…

… whitish ones, like Yellow-tail, Brown-tail, White Satin (playing dead!), Miller and Dwarf Cream Wave…

… distinctively speckled and barred ones: Latticed Heath, Willow Beauty and Peppered Moth …

… and a whole host in every shade of brown: Lackey, Fen Wainscot, Dotted Fanfoot, Clay, Cypress Carpet, Uncertain, Dingy Shears, Bright-line Brown-eye and Minor Shoulder-knot, a litany of names almost as euphonious as the Shipping Forecast!

Some of the brown ones are also distinctive by having shaped wings like Beautiful Hooktip or a characteristic resting posture, like the Festoon, the latter a nationally scarce species of old oak trees in the south-east of the country.

Micromoths seemed to constitute a higher proportion of the catch than in previous years. But not all micros are small and some are rather beautiful, and certainly should not be overlooked, even though they often don’t have widely used English names. Here are some of the more colourful ones: Carcina quercana, Agapeta hamana, Lozotaeniodes formosana and Mint Moth…

… and equally striking monochrome morsels: Bird-cherry Ermine, Ethmia quadrillella, Diamond-back, Platytes alpinella, Zeiraphera isertana and Homoeosoma sinuella.

And always interesting is the bycatch of other insects attracted to the light, including pond-dwellers (in their pre-adult stages) such as the mayfly Cloeon dipterum and the caddisfly Stenophylax permistus …

… a green lacewing Chrysopa carnea and Birch Shieldbug…

… a couple of plant-bugs Stenotus binotatus and Phytocoris dimidiatus.

And when all was counted up at the end, we found in the trap some 35 new insects for the garden list: moths, bugs, caddisflies, a mayfly and best of all a Brown Chafer Serica brunnea, with only about four previously recorded sites in north Essex.

Moth-trapping (and release unharmed) provides a window into the night life of the garden, as well as giving the privileged opportunity for attendees to experience the delight of the early morning calm before floods of garden visitors arrive. So if anyone fancies it, our second event is planned for 18 July, booking via the Beth Chatto website at Marvellous Moth Morning – Beth Chatto’s Plants & Gardens

A Trio of Botanic Gardens: Chelsea, Oxford and Reading

Britain's Wildlife, Travel by Bus, Travel by Rail

June is always a peak month for seeing the delights of a botanic garden, so last week for me it was three in three days, dodging the rain. The chance for some ‘extreme botany’, taking photos of plants from all over the world, including usefully some rare British plants without the need for long treks into the wilds!

First, Chelsea Physic Garden. Only our second visit there, the warm sun was interspersed with a couple of sharp showers, but it was lovely, the blue sky adorned with lenticular clouds:

Lots of interesting plants here, of course, many with a medicinal bent, although not exclusively:

And not just showy flowers: seeds, leaves, stems and fronds were all interesting and photogenic too:

And in the hot, sunny interludes the insects and other invertebrates performed for us, surprisingly abundant given the position of the garden almost surrounded by the metropolis. These included Zebra Jumping-spider, and Mullein and Knot Grass caterpillars, hopefully indicating the garden is managed without recourse to poisons…

… diverse bees, including Colletes daviesanus agg, Osmia leaiana agg, Gwynne’s Mining-bee, Wool Carder-bee and Honeybee….

… Batman Hoverfly and Ferruginous Bee-grabbers (‘Gargoyle Flies’ to us!) mating….

… 10-spot and 2-spot Ladybirds (the latter seems to be resurgent this year)…

…Cinnamon Bug, Hairy Shieldbug and the eggs and nymph of Green Shieldbug…

… and lots of Azure Damselflies busy making more Azure Damselflies.

Perhaps the most interesting finds, none of which are shown from London on the NBN maps were the cloud-winged hoverfly Pipiza lugubris (with recorded sites no closer than Cobham and Grays) and the banded metallic longhorn moth Nemophora fasciella, a scarce East Anglian species that the map shows reaching only as far south and west as Dartford, an apparently significant range extension.

Then it was over to Oxford Botanic Garden, again my second visit.

Here is a treasure trove of botanical riches, with some important conservation collections of endangered endemic plants from places like the Canary Islands and other Atlantic islands gathered in Britain’s oldest botanic garden.

And much more, including in the glasshouses, providing welcome shelter from the repeated torrential and thunder downpours as well as lots of interest.

The gardens are well laid out, with themed sections. Sadly the parasitic plant bed, of particular interest to me, was well past its best. A May visit might be better some time.

But the Mediterranean rock planting was wonderful, bringing back the memories, sights and smells of many past visits, and without the incessant nibbling pressures of goats disfiguring the plants! This included a section on the specialities of Crete, one of my regular haunts in the past and a place where the endemics often have to be really searched for, and then sometimes in inaccessible spots:

Insects were few and far between because of the rain, but included a Painted Lady and a Footballer hoverfly.

Finally was the Harris Garden at Reading University. This was my first visit, but sadly restricted by a much more organised band of heavy rain which washed out the morning plans.

It had passed through when I reached the Harris Garden at Reading University. But…  was it the gloom, or was it that this was clearly one of the lesser British botanic gardens? More a flowery park with some interesting trees, it made little attempt to engage people in the wonderful world of plants. The labelling was sporadic (and not always accurate) and there seemed to be little effort at interpretation. I was disappointed, although the value of any urban greenspace that is not mown within an inch of its life cannot be overstated, and a school party bug hunting in the meadows was noisily joyous.

While its website suggests it is a valuable teaching and research resource for the University, I felt it was rather limited, especially in comparison with Oxford, and others like Cambridge I know well. Perhaps this is the result of the closure of the Plant Science department, followed by transfer to the responsibility of the Estates Department. I just hope that this apparent dumbing down has not also been reflected in the internationally significant herbarium of preserved specimens.

So, what flowers there were were dripping with recent raindrops, attractive maybe but of little use as an identification resource.

And the only other wildlife a solitary Cucumber Spider waiting in vain for dinner!

Three botanic gardens in three days, not all successful but overall very enjoyable, each a cheap or free day out (for Chelsea, remember to check for ‘2 for 1 by train’ offers) and, for me, the chance to immerse myself fully in plants and what they attract, always a joy, whatever the weather!

The Wild Side of Essex: the Heath Fritillaries of Hockley Woods

Britain's Wildlife, WildEssex

As has now become traditional, early June sees me heading to Hockley Woods atop the hills to the rear of Southend, leading Naturetrek day trips in search of Heath Fritillaries at one of their premier British sites. But nothing is guaranteed, and things can go wrong. The preceding two days had torrential rain, 30mm or more, so would they have survived? Indeed, would they even have emerged yet given our odd weather this spring, of drought followed by downpour.

The day dawned grey and breezy, but mild and with a promise of afternoon sun. When we started the walk it was still cloudy and I felt there were fewer insects about than usual, probably due to the rain. But as always we had plenty of things to look at that were not butterflies. The ancient woodland habitat is impressive, at 130ha the largest contiguous series of ancient semi-natural woods in the east of England.

The trees in the woodland picked out the geological preferences of each species, with multi-layered influences overlain from historic land use, management and other interventions. Many of the canopy trees are oaks, not the usual oak of the east but the normally western Sessile Oak, or its hybrid with Pedunculate Oak. A number of them seem to have died recently, while others show signs of bleeding lesions that could signal the beginning of the end: this might be expected as result the stresses these trees must be under as a result of climate change, and is not a bad thing – the woods are overstocked meaning that insufficient light penetrates to the ground floor to produce the maximum biodiversity the habitat can. If we don’t have Wild Boar (yet!) to cause natural disturbance and break up the gloom, then maybe disease will do it for us?

Hornbeam is one of the dominant understory trees, typical of London Clay, but as in much of Essex supplanted in places by Sweet Chestnut, brought here by the Normans, and preferred in the Middle Ages when woodlands had to work for a living. There was also Ash (much showing signs of Ash Dieback infection), Elder (indicative of aerial nutrient enrichment) and Wild Cherry, picking out the springline between clay and gravel…

… and less frequently Hazel, Sallow, Aspen, Wild Service, Crab Apple and others.

Almost all were well munched by caterpillars  – this is a good year to be a baby Blue Tit! – the only exceptions being the non-natives, Sweet Chestnut and invading from gardens at the wood edge, Cherry Laurel and Mock-orange.

Other birds included singing Wrens, Blackcaps and Stock Doves, and calling Great Spotted Woodpeckers and Nuthatches.

But very soon the sun was glimpsed and then appeared more purposefully around lunchtime. And so the insects emerged, including (phew!) Heath Fritillaries in the first patch of their larval foodplant, Common Cow-wheat. The rest of the walk brought us maybe a hundred in all, all pristine, presumably overnight emergers. I guess the following couple of warm days will have seen the peak for the year.

Other butterflies slowly mounted into a respectable list, including Comma, Holly Blue and Red Admiral, with Meadow Brown, Essex Skipper and a single Silver-washed Fritillary marking the advent of high summer.

Other insects were also out in abundance in the sunlight, thanks to the trees sheltering the wide rides from the chilling breeze. Brambles were the main forage source, visited by hoverflies of all sorts: Batman, Marmalade, Footballer, Tapered Drone-fly, Superb Dayglower, Syrphus sp., Pipiza noctiluca, the Essex RDB species Volucella inflata and more Large Pied Hoverflies than I have ever seen in one place before.

Amongst the other flies were the parasite-fly Tachina rufa, the Semaphore Fly Poecilobothrus noibilitatus and the robber-fly Dioctria linearis, here enjoying lunch seemingly in one of its scattered Essex strongholds.

A diverse array of micromoths included the tortricids Celypha lacunana and C. cespitana, Common Bagworm and the larval webs of Spindle Ermine:

In a nod to the advancing summer there were nymph Dark and Speckled Bush-crickets sitting on many a leaf:

Bumblebees were very active, predominantly Buff-tailed and Common Carders with a few Red-tailed and Early Bumblebees for good measure, while Wood Ants were everywhere, wandering, carrying prey and seeds, nesting and milking aphids:

Black Bean Aphids were very apparent, in common with many places this spring, also a bonanza for ladybirds hopefully to come, while other bugs included nymphal Green Shieldbugs and adult Dock Bugs:

And in a final flourish of insects, the beetles: Seven-spot and Harlequin Ladybirds, Willow Flea Beetles glistening like jewels, Figwort Weevils on almost every Common Figwort flower and a very scarce saproxylic click-beetle in Essex Ampedus balteatus.

Insects and other invertebrates do not of course to be actually seen to be identified if their life leaves distinctive structure or patterns. Thus we found the mysterious dangling leaf rolls of the Hazel Leaf-roller Weevil and leaf-mines of the Holly Leaf-miner Fly…

… along with a number of distinctive galls including the pouch galls of the mite Eriophyes torminalis on Wild Service leaves, the swollen stem galls of the gall-midge Lasioptera rubi, known from very few other Essex localities, and the new British arrival the Asian Chestnut Gall-wasp galls that I first recorded at this site last year, but are now appearing throughout.

In the shadier sections of wood, fungi and mosses put on more of a show from Turkey-tail to Polytrichum formosum:

And other flowering plants included two species of Hypericum, Slender St. John’s-Wort and Tall Tutsan, Field Rose, Common Figwort and the lovely grass Wood Melick:

All in all, it was a wonderfully diverse day with delights and highlights from all taxonomic groups, a veritable cornucopia of biodiversity. As one of the group said as fritillaries flittered in the sun around her like wood-sprites, it feels like a ‘little bit of Heaven’. Thanks to Rochford District Council for making it happen – it would take only a few years’ neglect, for example when a new administration with different priorities assumes power, for the woods to become overgrown and the whole wildlife spectacle come tumbling down.

A Spring Heatwave in Tunbridge Wells & Hastings

Britain's Wildlife, Travel by Bus, Travel by Rail

Half term, and as often try to do, it was away with Eleanor for a few nights. Little did we realise just how hot it was going to be, a fierce late spring heatwave that certainly restricted some of our planned activities (except ice-cream eating!). We last visited Tunbridge Wells a couple of years ago, and at the time thought she might like it there, especially the Wealden Sandstone outcrops for climbing.

The town itself was a challenge, at least for we lowlives, with hills in every direction, quite an obstacle in the heat. But the tree-lined  streets were model of sanity that all towns should aspire to be like in the global greenhouse…

Straight away it was into Calverley Park, for the first ice-cream and lunch, followed by an hour in the play park. Chance for us to sit in the shade, to keep Eleanor hydrated and take in the gardens, with plants wild and cultivated. Too warm for many insects though apart from a single Closterotomus trivialis bug and a few bumblebees.

‘Mount Ephraim’ may be a bit of hyperbole, but believe me it felt like a full-blown mountain as we slogged up there to find our hotel, a bit of a disappointment this time after an outstanding stay previously. Perhaps a lesson there: don’t look back!

But at least perched on the heights there was a modicum of breeze, and of course panoramic views over the town:

The Common is a lovely area of greenspace, trees full of Long-tailed Tit family parties, calling Nuthatches and singing Blackbirds and Song Thrushes, with Swifts screaming overhead, all set among grassland coming into peak pollen season! And of course the rocks….

It was Wellington Rocks we were headed for, and they provided plenty of opportunity for ‘hard play’ (no safety nets here!) on both afternoons of our stay.

Geologically, the rocks are gently spectacular, water-worn, showing strata of pebbles indicating different depositional environments around 100 million years ago when what is now the High Weald was a warm river delta.

In the cracks and crevasses where moisture can gather, especially on north-facing walls, there were ferns, mosses and liverworts, despite the pounding they have had from the activities of generations of youngsters:

On our second morning, we took the bus out to Eridge Rocks, a lovely nature reserve, the only downside being the complete lack of any provision for pedestrians to cross the very busy road safely on alighting at the bus stop. Seems car is king in East Sussex, as sadly in so many places.

But on reaching the reserve, the modern world is forgotten. Dense woodland around a ravine of those Wealden rocks make for a magical place, abounding in half-imagined wood sprites and goblins:

 

Some faces, eroded by wind into honeycomb structures, were like we have seen before only in the cliffs of West Bay (Dorset) and north-eastern Menorca…

l

And where the cliffs turn to face north, a rich covering of lower plants and lichens, albeit looking less spectacular than on our previous visits probably because of the near-absence of rainfall for the two months preceding.

Then on our final morning, the temperature ameliorating a little, it was out by train to Hastings. Being a sunny Saturday in half term, the crowds were out in force, but it provided the requisite ice creams and funicular to the heights, among begging gulls and screaming Swifts, and views over the town and a by-now-hazy Channel.

Rock-A-Nore beach, as far east at you can get along the prom, provides excellent views of the spectacular cliffs, the rocks looking similar to those on the High Weald but actually about 40 million years older…

Nesting Fulmars kept up their guttural bickering despite the heat of midday, and along the lower cliff slopes, Hottentot Fig, Buck’s-horn Plantain and Tree Mallow provided the botanical interest.

All that was left then was the chance of a wonderful, and reasonably priced, smoked fish platter at Webbe’s fish restaurant, while Jude’s holiday was topped off in fine fashion at the sight of one of Hastings’ notorious residents, the ‘naked cyclist’ speeding home. Must have been getting a bit hot!

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And finally, as is now traditional, the blog ends with a chance to display some of Eleanor’s phone photos, ones that I would have been proud to take. Flowers, wild and cultivated, always seem to stir her creative juices…

… together with those flowers attracting insect visitors …

… and not forgetting the plants that can look interesting after flowering.

And just a final couple: a perfect set-piece of found objects in nature…

… and a flower-head she promptly titled, without prompting, ‘Little Lands’. A fascinating insight into the eyes and mind of an eight-year-old! #ProudPapa, as always!

The Wild Side of Beth Chatto Gardens: late-May delights

Beth Chatto Gardens, Britain's Wildlife, WildEssex, WildWivenhoe

The photo above, a myriad of fairies photobombing a Monet masterpiece, encapsulates the joy of late May in the gardens. Everything is getting on with what they need to do, feeding or breeding or dispersing, furiously because they know the retreat of the sun is only a month away.

The 26th saw peak damselflies mating (mostly Azure, Large Red and Blue-tailed) alongside the first emerging Common Blue Damselflies and Banded Demoiselles AND the mass emergence of dragonflies (mostly Four-spotted Chasers, with a few Broad-bodied and Scarce Chasers, Common Darters, Emperors and a Southern Hawker. Fittingly, and thrillingly, this coincided with my Bug Safaris, a privilege to share it with kids (of all ages!). This was the week our ponds disgorged, a couple of weeks after many garden ponds whose water volume is much lower, so the water warms more quickly, speeding up development.

And the rate of change is just so fast. On a daily basis. A day later, damsels had peaked, dragons were still coming, but the garden was inundated with Painted Ladies, most very fresh-looking so perhaps offspring of the influx a month ago. And the trees and bushes were full of tweeting baby Blue and Great Tits, and Blackcaps: a squeakscape where a day before there was a songscape.

Apart from the Painted Ladies, butterfly action had scaled back from early May: the ‘June gap’ arrived early. But to tide us over were Orange Tips on the Dame’s Violet and onions and Green Hairstreaks on the Thyme, along with a good emergence of Common Blues.

It was a warm two weeks, at times extremely hot, sunny and dry: record-breaking, albeit not-in-a-good way. But generally the insect life seemed to enjoy it: some other highlights included Mint Moth, Cinnabar, Yellow-tail caterpillar and the larval shrouds of Spindle Ermine…

… Thick-thighed Beetle, a soldier beetle Cantharis livida, Adonis’ Ladybird and Two-spotted Malachite Beetles, including this pair in a prolonged bout of ‘kissing’, the male feeding her pheromone-laced food to try and woo her…

… Hairy Shieldbugs and Orange-tailed Mining-bee …

… and a good selection of flies including the lovely hoverfly Xanthogramma pedissequum, and a couple of parasite-flies Tachina fera and Tachina lurida.

I enjoyed myself too, taking time out to grow the garden wildlife list. Every visit produced something new, in some cases rare or absent (probably underrecorded!) in Essex but equally some very widespread that we just haven’t noted here before. Two new mite galls are a case in point: the Lime Nail Gall is found on almost every Lime tree, whereas the Silver Maple Bladder Gall is a recent arrival in this country and still spreading:

There were new flies to the list: the parasite-flies Phasia barbifrons and Blepharipa pratensis, and the robberfly Choerades marginata…

… new beetles: the thistle weevil Rhinocyllus conicus and Mallow Flea-beetle Podagrica fuscicornis…

… and new wasps: the parasitic Ichneumon xanthorius, a digger wasp Cerceris quadricincta (a strongly south-eastern species, rare in the UK) and a beautiful ruby-tailed wasp Chrysis ignita agg.

The list is growing every month, and but we hope to have a working draft available in the autumn!

And so we are fast into summer. Maybe time to relax a little as things settle in. Or maybe not: all it takes is a few days of deep south winds, and as we have seen repeatedly the Beth Chatto Gardens rarely fail to produce surprises!

By bus to Brentwood….

Britain's Wildlife, Travel by Bus, Travel by Rail, WildEssex

It was our tenth wedding anniversary, a perfect excuse for an extra short break. And where better than Brentwood, travelling by bus, staying in the Premier Inn: we know how to celebrate!

This was our first attempt at longer-distance (free) bus pass travel. Wivenhoe to Brentwood involved changes in Colchester and Chelmsford, and took the best part of a morning. But time is one thing we do have, and the bus took us through places we have never or rarely seen before, some like Kelvedon and Ingatestone that would repay a closer look at some time.

The increasingly wooded nature as we approached Brentwood brought life to its original name ‘Burnt Wood’, the town created within a clearing of the great wood of Essex. It was also surprisingly hilly, being towards the southwestern splay of the Essex Alps we know so well from home.

So first into the town, for a welcome drink in the Dairyman. The High Street felt pretty vibrant, but the main interest lay in the religious buildings and the surrounding greenspace. Our first stop, the Catholic cathedral of St Mary and St Helen was a lovely surprise, the larger part of it little more than thirty years old, with a sparse, calming atmosphere.

The oldest part of the cathedral is a Gothic Revival church from the mid-19th century, designed by Gilbert Blount, who started his career working for Brunel on the Rotherhithe Tunnel before moving into churches, inspired by Pugin.

This church became the diocesan centre from its creation in 1917, then the modern ‘Neoclassical with a twist of Wren’ extension by Quinlan Terry (responsible for many monumental buildings in Britain and abroad in similar style) was completed in 1991.

The internal décor is almost austere, with only subtle ornamentation, including the terracotta roundels marking the Stations of the Cross, designed by Raphael Maklouf, he of the Queen’s head (coins not the pub!). And then tucked away in a corner, the organ that we later learned had come from St Mary on the Walls, now familiar to us as Colchester Arts Centre.

Then just round the corner, another church, St Thomas of Canterbury. Outside it is a stylish mix of flints and limestone blocks…

… but nothing prepared us for the visual assault inside. As we went in we were greeted by a lay preacher who said ‘welcome to the most Catholic church in Brentwood, and it is Anglican!’ This church has all the visual detail one would associate with a ‘traditional’ Catholic church, with Stations of the Cross on the walls, priests called Father and the like. All very confusing to a mere atheist, highlighting for me the folly of sectarianism. Indeed, it seems the church comes under the banner of Anglo-Catholicism, rooted in the 19th-century Oxford Movement that emphasizes the church’s Catholic heritage, sacramental theology, and liturgical traditions…

Although dating only from 1881, there has been a church nearby dedicated to St Thomas since the 13th century, the ruins of an early incarnation still to be found just off the High Street.

Seeking some fresh county air (albeit with the aural hallmark of the nearby M25) we headed into the nearest greenspace, St Faiths Country Park, a nice mix of grass and woodland, with tantalising views over to central London. Giant Horsetail is always good to see, typical of springlines on the slopes, and Common Carder-bees were busy on the clovers despite the chilly wind.

Other bits and pieces included the micromoth Cochylis atricapitana and the gall of the gall-midge Iteomyia capreae, on Sallow.

Sadly the cemetery next door was as sterile as they come, one disappointment alongside the litter strewn all through the Country Park. Jude did her bit to clear it up, but why should she have to? What is wrong with having pride in the green heart of a town? All a bit incongruous really, especially as we found local people on the street almost universally to be smiley and friendly…

And so we headed to the hotel. Very functional, as Premier Inns are, and extremely well priced, it had nine floors, and although we were only on floor four we had a panoramic view of the London landscape by day….

… and by night, the horizon lit up like a distant firework display.

And nearby, a very good Indian restaurant, The Raj, made for a great evening.  Overnight, the rain came. Very heavy at times, we managed to adjust our morning plans, and left the hotel to catch a bus to Warley just as the rain stopped.

I have blogged about Warley Place before, once the home of the eminent plantswoman Miss Ellen Willmott, now an Essex Wildlife Trust reserve, amid the mouldering ruins of her horticultural vision.

My previous visit a year ago was alone, but I just knew that Jude would feel at home in this place where nature and history merge so seamlessly. She bounded around like a child entering a Secret Garden! It really is very special, a nature reserve that doesn’t try to erase past human influences, a reserve that celebrates its non-naturalness, and a place of renewal and hope that nature will outlast us all.

The breeze had turned southerly, the air heavy with humidity from the night’s rain, but the warmth had brought few people out. We had the reserve to ourselves, always a privilege, aside from a young family who were thrilled with the roosting Pale Tussocks Jude found in one of the hides, and just one other lone figure. Who turned out to be Jenny, a former colleague and friend and holiday client of mine, who lives in Newcastle and who I last saw at least 20 years ago….  it’s a small world!

In the intermittent sun patches, a tattered Painted Lady bearing the scars of her spring wanderings appeared, together with diaphanous throngs of dancing Gold-barred Longhorn moths.

And back among the sawflies, as I seem to have been all month, the ferns were being visited by the Common Fern Sawfly Aneugmenus padi. Although reportedly not as rare as the other fern sawfly I found (possibly new to Essex) at Beth Chatto’s a few days ago, looking at the NBN map seems to suggest that today’s treasure may not previously have been found in the county. Of course, probably due to the lack of people looking rather than genuine absence!

A few other insects included a dramatic Wasp Beetle, a few Hawthorn Leaf-beetles and a larval micromoth, probably Archips xylosteana…

… along with a couple of woodlice species and a few fungi among the enveloping mosses…

… and several interesting plants, at least some of which may date back to the times of the garden’s former illustrious owner: Coral Spurge, Coralroot Bittercress and Yellow Figwort, together with Yews, a Ginkgo tree and many blooming Rhododendrons.

Even before Miss Willmott’s time, the estate had horticultural connections, being owned by John Evelyn, the 17th century gardener and diarist. Although he may never have lived there, he could have planted or influenced the planting of the oldest garden inhabitants, the magnificent row of Sweet Chestnuts, at least the oldest of which may be his contemporary. The history is all around in Warley Place!

And so into the Thatcher’s Arms for an excellent celebratory lunch, the only downside being the incessant roar of traffic outside, although at least to head home we didn’t have to take our lives in our hands and cross the crazy road on a blind bend to reach the bus stop…

It was back in Brentwood that we experienced our only travel hiccup when the Chelmsford bus failed to arrived, and then promptly disappeared off the board, without explanation. So we took the alternative (paying) option of train (we were right next to station) and got home couple of hours earlier than planned, ahead of the rain: mildly annoying, as we wanted to prove to ourselves we could do this trip all by bus, but a blessing in disguise really!

The Wild Side of Beth Chatto Gardens: all change on the insect front!

Beth Chatto Gardens, Britain's Wildlife, WildEssex, WildWivenhoe

Insect populations are ever-changing and those changes an endless source of fascination. In the first two weeks of May I have been to the gardens leading walks on two days and a further visit to try and reconfirm something I had seen on the previous occasion. And in that time the suite of insects has changed hugely, spring being ushered in by the advent of summer, even given the sometimes indifferent weather.

But there have been other changes too. We have seen several new arrivals to the garden, including sawflies, flies and beetles. Sawflies are actually wasps, ones that lack the wasp waist between thorax and abdomen, and have caterpillars rather like those of moths, rather than the grubs associated with most wasps. This seems to have been a Sawfly Spring, as I’ve seen more this year than ever before. There have been the regulars, Solomon’s Seal and Iris Sawflies all over their respective foodplants, and in a month or two the plants will be bearing the signs of larval chomping. Another species Selandria serva feeds on grasses, sedges and rushes, and has also been prominent around the garden – we have found it in the garden only a couple of times prior to this month. The National Biodiversity Network maps show only a couple of spots for this in Essex, but this is perhaps more down to the fact the sawflies are not a widely recorded group: spots on maps may represent more the distribution of competent observers rather than the beastie itself. All the comment below must bear that caveat!

A couple of new garden records are of Macrophya species. M. albicincta is an Elder-feeder but doesn’t seem to have been recorded from Essex. And M. teutona seems even scarcer: it was first found in the UK last year near to Bury St Edmunds and the map shows just one other location close to the first. So ours might just be the third British record…and we would be a great place for it as its larvae feed on spurges.

And more sawflies apparently new to Essex! Resting on a Foxglove leaf was the distinctive larva of Periclista pubescens, an oak-feeder and so had probably dropped from the tree above. And then were the lovely little black-headed sprites flittering around the bases of our ferns, Ostrich Fern especially. Evanescent creatures that almost disappeared as they were observed, they were Stromboceros delicatulus, the larvae of which feed on ferns and so not surprisingly recorded mostly in the damper corners of our nation.

But new insects for the garden were not all sawflies. The cloudy-winged non-biting midge Psectrotanypus varius and soldier beetle Rhagonycha lignosa are both only sparsely scattered in Essex, most localities being in the west of the county.

But for me the most exciting newbie was another beetle, a spotty chafer Oxythyrea funesta that is an old friend from my travels in Mediterranean regions. It has cropped up sporadically in the UK, probably mostly from accidental imports with plants, but over the last decade seems to have become pretty well established, especially in London and round Portsmouth. There are probably a couple of other Essex records, at least one of which in a garden centre is likely to be an accidental import. No such likelihood with ours though, given that all our stock is home-grown.

It was wonderful to watch it (or just possibly two of them) chomping the poppy and Galactites stamens in the hottest part of the garden, against the south wall of Beth’s house. The image of one sitting in Galactites will linger long in my memory, an instant transportation to one of the places I love most, Menorca. And if I am not travelling to such places so much any more, conscious of our granddaughter’s future in an already overheated world, I can console myself with the thought that I don’t need to: the Mediterranean fauna is coming to me! That impression was solidified yesterday when the soil below the chafer started to crawl with little orange morsels, first instar nymphs of the Firebug. Another constant companion in southern Europe, these have become established in Britain only within the past decade, including many places in northeast Essex. But hitherto, until the staff started seeing the adults a month ago, not in Beth Chatto Gardens: well, they are here now – and breeding!

What of other sightings? Well, the butterflies seem to have hit their ‘June gap’ early. Most overwinterers and spring specialists have gone, but the summer emergers are starting, with both Common Blue and Brown Argus. And one of my groups was entranced by half-a-dozen Green Hairstreaks nectaring on a bed of Thyme, and resting much less obtrusively on surrounding vegetation.

There was been a reasonably large emergence of Green Longhorn moths, dancing around when the weather was warm and still enough. And there seem to be Brown-tail Moths everywhere, thankfully not it seems in rampaging, defoliating hordes, but in some cases experimenting with food choice, such as Large Lord’s-and-Ladies.

As summer approached so we are expecting the songs of grasshoppers and bush-crickets to fill our quit moment. And here they come, a first instar Speckled Bush-cricket is out of the starting blocks…

It is this time too when the ponds start to disgorge their delights around the gardens. No dragonflies yet (our ponds are large and take longer to warm up than garden ponds), but Alderflies are everywhere, along with three species of damselfly: Azure, Large Red and Blue-tailed (in two colour forms).

 

Bees have done well, with Red-tailed and Early Bumblebees more numerous than in recent years, and lots of foraging Red Mason-bees taking advantage of our floral offerings.

And other lovely things to see included flies, the Narcissus Bulb Fly, the cranefly Ptychoptera contaminata and a couple of parasite-flies, Thelaira nigripes and Tachina fera.

Beetles included lots of click-beetles, mostly Athous haemorrhoidalis, the shining-green weevil Polydrusus formosus and a whole herd of stag-beetle larvae the garden team found (and saved!) under a rotten tree trunk slice. Most probably these are Lesser, not the rarer Greater Stags, but we can hope!

And finally a few bugs have been out and about, here Rhabdomiris striatellus, Harpocera thoracica and Hairy Shield-bug.

So a month of many delights, and the good news is there is another half of it to go! If you fancy looking at insects in Essex, there is really nowhere more exciting than Beth Chatto Gardens. You might even fancy joining one of my walks or moth events as advertised on Courses & Workshops – Beth Chatto’s Plants & Gardens? And if you turn up and it’s too cold or wet for insects, there are always the fantastic flowers…

… including my absolute favourite, the gorgeous Bogbean. How can you resist?

Poking around the Suffolk-Norfolk borderlands: Beccles, Southwold, Bungay and Diss

Britain's Wildlife, Travel by Bus, Travel by Rail

Our early May short break by public transport (May is too good a month to miss, so we generally have more than one that month!) was an opportunity to visit hitherto little-known parts of East Anglia, and to use our bus-passes to the full…we are getting rather evangelical about them!

So we headed to Norwich by train, but it was then by bus all the way until our return a couple of days later from Diss. Two nights in Beccles gave us a great opportunity to explore, the usual mix of wildlife, wild spaces, architecture and historical townscapes, although sadly not quite in the way we anticipated. Our hotel, Swan House, on booking.com claimed to have its rooms in the disused church tower, a good part of our reason for selecting it, but we arrived to find the tower actually across the road. Yes, we could see it, but not quite the same, and a complaint is in progress!

But whatever the shortcomings, Beccles as a town didn’t fail to impress. As we approached by bus, the view of the hulk of St Michael’s Church looming over the town atop the only high ground in the vicinity was already impressive, indicative of the wool and trade wealth of the town in former times. Up close it was just as impressive, notwithstanding its lack of an integral high point…

And the aforementioned tower, detached as a campanile because of the structural risks of building such a structure on the edge of the former cliff-line above what used to be the port, and impressive by night as well as by day.

  

Inside, the awe subsides. Much of it was rather plain, and even the stone heads seem unimpressed. Could this be a result of the great fire of 1586 which destroyed the interior of the church as it was, along with a sizeable part of the town?

From the churchyard the views were lovely, over the Broads National Park, the River Waveney in the foreground, its reed-fringed margins crackling with the songs of Reed Warblers.

The feel of the town was somewhat akin to both Kings Lynn, wearing proudly its trading influences with the Low Countries, and Rye, with its commanding position in an otherwise flat landscape.

And as with both those towns, Beccles was full of historic buildings. The list of 149 of them seemed remarkable, although not out of keeping with the other towns we visited as we subsequently discovered, and includes churches, shops, houses and many others, some timbered, others with decorative brick- and flint-work.

 

The delightful little museum of local interest is in one such building, Leman House, built around 1570 and restored a couple of centuries later, adding brick and flint facades to the timber frame. For much of its history it served as a free school, the layout of which is partly retained inside.

The rear garden, overlooking the river, contains some wonderful wooden seats, richly clothed in lichens and with many Virgin Bagworms, silken bags clothed with bits of grit and algae from their surroundings which contain either larvae or wingless females: there are no males, so these odd moths spend all their life inside their bags.

Even the modern Tesco store celebrates the history of the town, well known in the past for its printing industry. Established by William Clowes in 1803, the printing works merged with Caxton Press in 1873, and became a major employer, specialising in printing directories and reference books. ‘Caxton’ is of course a significant name in British printing history, William Caxton having introduced the first printing press to England in 1476, going on to publish many significant works, including Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales. But the Beccles Caxton Press seems to be unrelated to the original, a fortuitous (or opportunistic?) branding perhaps?

We searched hedges and greenspace for insects in the lovely sunshine of our first afternoon, finding a nymph Toad Bug and lots of Pinalitus cervinus, a variable mirid bug, mostly on Ivy leaves…

… along with basking flies such as the hoverfly Epistrophe eligans, a Helina sp. and and anthomyiid in a buttercup flower (demonstrating well how bees are not the only pollinators in town!), together with Red Mason Bees, Holly Blues and Painted Ladies, part of the recent influx to our shores.

All around the town there were gulls, Herring and Lesser Black-backed, waiting opportunistically on the rooftops, but largely dissuaded from breeding by the widespread deployment of anti-bird spikes. So the Nationwide deserve a big pat on the back for accommodating a nesting Woodpigeon with grace!

All in all, Beccles was a lovely surprise to us. That is apart from the disappointment of our room not being in the bell tower, and the Waveney House Hotel losing our food and drink trade when we turned up, and nobody came to serve us after ten minutes’ wait. The Hotel’s loss was Wetherspoon’s gain, and saved us a pretty packet…

Next day the weather changed, dawning grey, damp and cool with a biting easterly wind. Not perhaps the best of days to head by bus on a white-knuckle double-decker ride, careering along tiny roads to Southwold on the coast, especially with dire forecasts of rain. But remarkably we survived and the serious clouds skirted us, producing no more than a couple of drops all day.

A walk to Gun Hill gave us views of the cold seascape, the decorative beach huts and over the dunes south to Sizewell, as well as a very welcome hot coffee at the kiosk café.

 

The cliffline along the prom was covered in flowers, including Sand Sedge, Buck’s-horn Plantain and Wild Clary, in places supplemented with showy maritime garden escapes including cultivars of Thrift and Seaside Daisy.

The pier looks historic but, after the slings and arrows (wind, waves and wars) of the 20th century, was substantially rebuilt between 1999 and 2001. It still has the traditional arcades and ice creams one would expect, and yes, even with the cool wind, we indulged ourselves in the first ice cream of the summer!

The pier also provided coastal views, including back to the town, marine-life-themed furniture and a tribute to George Orwell, whose family home was in the town for 9 years of his all-too-short life.

The two most prominent features of the town’s skyline are the lighthouse and church. Set back from the coast, the lighthouse still functions, an essential marker for avoiding the shifting shoals offshore.

 

Presumably the church tower also serves as a prominent seamark by day. Dedicated to St Edmund, the church is clearly proud of the refuge for nature provided by its churchyard, branded an ‘Eco-church’.

Not overmown, there were a few insects around, including a Small Copper feeding on Mouse-eared Hawkweed flowers, and fresh green Beech leaves in sheltered nooks supported lots of life, here Gooden’s Nomad-bee, a Hawthorn Shieldbug and flittering flocks of Green Longhorn moths, trying hard not to get blown away.

The gravestones and churchyard walls too kept us happily occupied looking at Grimmia pulvinata, mating Fever-flies, hunting Zebra Jumping-spiders…

… and a kaleidoscope of lichens, including sulphur Psilolechia lucida, black Melanalixia fulignosa and pale grey Phlyctis argena.

If Beccles’ church disappointed internally, the opposite was true of Southwold’s: ornate woodwork everywhere, including the beautiful main door, some charming decorative paintwork…

   

..plus stained glass depicting among many other things the martyrdom of St Edmund, killed by invading Vikings in 869. And then there is the array of saints, their faces erased by iconoclastic fervour, Medieval cancel culture.

Once again, all around the town there was historical and architectural interest, indeed with only five fewer listed buildings than Beccles,

.. including, of course, hostelries. The Swan looked good, but it’s ‘fancy high teas’ vibe wasn’t to our taste, so we had lunch in the Crown. Good choice! What a lunch: for Jude, lovely fish and chips (as traditional as the ice cream) and for me the best (and reasonably priced) fish platter I have had in years.

It is impossible to avoid Adnams in Southwold, so to round off our walk, we had to sample their produce, this time in the Lord Nelson. Given that, by now, grey had given way to blue, we headed into the sheltered garden. There to accompany Southwold’s best, a Turtle Bug Podops inunctus sharing our table, rather a strange choice of habitat for what is normally a ground-hugging insect. And of course gulls, their raucous cries and beady eyes, laced with the sight and sound of tinkling Goldfinches from the rooftops. A lovely end to the day.

Our final day, and the weather changed again. Sun pretty much all the way, although yesterday’s cold easterly airflow persisted. We decided to round off our Beccles experience with breakfast at Twyfords Café, recommended to us by a passing local the day previously. Not our best decision: the porridge was cold, with mushy frozen strawberries, the breakfast bap hard to get through and served with a salad full of peppers (whoever heard of such a thing at 9am?), and all highly overpriced. We live and learn.

So back on the bus we headed to Bungay, the neighbouring town up the Waveney valley. Here we were treated once again to a feast of historical interest and listed buildings, this time 190 of them, although some in the town centre were in a sad state of disrepair.

One semi-derelict hulk drew us to it, having all the appearance of a former workhouse, although we have not been able to find any reference to such online. The old brickwork did however have a couple of ferns, Maidenhair Spleenwort and Wall Rue, not a common feature in the dry heart of East Anglia, and Danish Scurvy-grass formed a band at the base of the wall, looking very different to the squat, salt-sprayed plants on our major road-verges.

 

Situated on high ground within a large meander of the river, almost every road heads downhill. With plenty of trees on the slopes and low-lying pastoral marshes it would be idyllic, if not for the curse of the infernal combustion engine. Cars everywhere, and few provisions for pedestrians to cross the roads; at least the vast majority of political signs (it was election day) were for the Green Party, so perhaps there is potential for change…

Three churches form a flock in the middle of town, and in each of those, the green message seems to be getting through: no holy mowers eradicating every scrap of life from God’s (three) Acres! Some of the invertebrates taking advantage were a soldier-beetle Cantharis rustica, harvestman Phalangium opilio and spider Philodromus sp.

Of the churches, the most externally ornate was St Edmunds, most visually pleasing was Holy Trinity, with its distinctive flint, brick and stone round tower…

… while largest and most interesting was St Mary’s, with the priory ruins tucked behind. When the church was struck by lightning in 1577, there appeared a ‘black Hell Hound’ which has led to Bungay becoming associated with the legend of Black Shuck, tales of whom haunt the whole coastline of East Anglia.

Bigod Castle, a tumbledown Norman edifice, forms the other centrepiece of the town, although currently under repair it is both closed to the public and clad in scaffolding, making it rather difficult to photograph attractively.

The greenspace around the twin towers is partly enclosed by what is left of the castle wall, and it was here in warming sunlight that we saw the most insects of our entire trip, including Tree Bumblebee, Painted Lady, Snout Hoverfly and Brown-tail Moth caterpillars, the latter apparently feeding upon Plane leaves.

But what was most remarkable was the sheer number of aquatic insects, here on the highest, driest part of town. Banded Demoiselles and Large Red Damselflies are, like many of their group, prone to wandering to feed but much more surprising were the shimmering clouds of Ephemera vulgata mayflies bouncing up and down over the mown grass. These don’t feed as adults, and given they live in that stage for only a day or so, it all seems very risky to move so far from the waters in which they breed.

All that was left to do was sip a welcome pint in The Fleece; their menu looked very enticing, but we ran out of time, before it was back onto the bus, this time to our rail interchange at Diss. Just a couple of hours to see our fourth town, and that was quite probably enough, notwithstanding it apparently being John Betjeman’s favourite Norfolk town…

We started at Diss Mere, a natural glacial ice-melt lake. Some 3ha in extent, and reportedly 6m deep, with a further 20m of mud below that (pretty much ‘bottomless’ as per its reputation through history), it is a significant landscape feature although at least on our visit supporting only a few motley Mallards and gulls.

Part flanked by the old part of Diss, the remainder is an extensive recreational park, unimaginatively close-mown. And given the number of kids in the playback, and that we needed the loo, we felt that the firmly closed toilet block, with no information on where there might be facilities, was a big fail by Diss Town Council.

So after al fresco relief, we walked the Heritage Triangle, a town centre regeneration initiative based around its historic commercial heart, and many of the town’s 157 listed buildings.

We could see the potential, but for busy through roads, incomplete pedestrianisation and the proliferation of vape shops and the like… it all just felt a bit unloved. But there remains an undercurrent of history, with St Mary’s Church perched impressively above the Market Place, once again rather simple inside, although the 18th century Decalogue Board on the west wall was impressive.

A hint of urban green was provided by the churchyard and other wayside corners, including another Philodromus spider inhibiting the Yews, again the unfamiliar statuesque variety of Danish Scurvy-grass, and what may be the rarely recorded parasitic wasp Otoblastus luteomarginatus. ‘Rarely recorded’ rather than ‘rare’ because there are few people recording them so the grand total of 13 records in the UK on the National Biodiversity Network map is very likely an under-representation.

In fact a couple of hours was more than enough time for our needs to explore Diss, and the final half hour was relaxing, looking over the Mere from the garden of the Waterfront Inn, with one final stop on our trek to the station being at the town sign, featuring the 1213 (alleged) murder of Matilda, daughter of the Lord of the Manor and reputedly the inspiration for the character Maid Marian, by a messenger from King John bearing a bad egg. And all because the big bad king’s advances to her were spurned.

And so ended our three-day break that felt more like a week. We certainly walked the miles, taking in the sights of each place, and everywhere finding wildlife to accompany the history, food and drink. And every bus was on time – we love our bus-passes even more, and they are sure to feature more in our trips from now on!

The Colne Valley, from Chappel to Chalkney Wood, and back…

Britain's Wildlife, Bug & Botany Walks, WildEssex

The mid-reaches of the River Colne, around Chappel, constitute a lovely, quintessentially Essex, mixed agricultural landscape, with extensive pasturelands in the valley bottom, either side of the clear, flowing river; arable on the high ground, parcelled up between hedgerows; and woodland, much of it ancient, on the valley slopes, embracing the spring-lines. An ideal place for long walks, not expecting to see anything rare, just Spring in all her glory, so last week I did that twice, first a full day with Naturetrek and two days later, a half day with #WildEssex.

The first walk started rainy, the first rain for a month, but soon gave way to sunshine, although a stiff northeast breeze kept the temperature down. Two days later, wall to wall deep blue skies, and lighter winds from a warmer, more southerly direction. The blue backcloth was ideal to appreciate the rainbow of greens, each tree providing its own interpretation before high summer dust dulls the difference.

Starting from Chappel, wheezing Greenfinches, twittering Swallows and willows heavily infested with Mistletoe kicked the walks off, along with a fascinating cluster of historic buildings reflecting the diversity of bricks made in the local brickworks. The churchyard wall in particular features the old bricks, and supports a wealth of mosses and lichens, crevice plants like Ivy-leaved Toadflax, and ones such as Red Valerian and Greater Celandine using the wall as a storage heater to mimic their Mediterranean mountain homes.

Heading upriver, the Colne flows between shaded banks, clad in Nettles, pinpricked white with Garlic Mustard: too early for the fluttering sprites, the Banded Demoiselles of summer, the waters were already providing flying life, in the form of Alderflies and mayflies.

The open pastureland of the valley bottom is not especially diverse botanically, although there was Meadow Foxtail in the drier areas, Lesser Pond-sedge and Cuckooflower where damper, and a triumvirate of buttercups – Meadow, Bulbous and Creeping.

Hedgerows of Hawthorn in full fragrant bloom and Blackthorn, most well over but some bizarrely still in tight bud, provided shelter for patrolling Orange Tips and Green-veined Whites, and the last, tatty overwintering Commas alongside the first, scintillating blue Holly Blues, while Whitethroats, both Common and Lesser, sang from within, and Ash leaves and Field Maple flowers introduced their vivid yellow-green colour to the surroundings.

Buzzards, maybe three pairs, soared and displayed overhead, joined by a lone Red Kite, as a Mistle Thrush proclaimed territory atop the largest Oak.

Cowpats! And happily, cowpats with insect holes, suggesting these cattle have not been treated with ivermectins which kill the rich diversity of dung. And sure enough two days later, a lot warmer, and the Yellow Dung-flies were out in force, feeding and frolicking.

Back into more sheltered areas. Evergreen Alkanet amongst the Stinging Nettles provided boundless opportunities for Dark-edged Beeflies and ladybirds, mostly 7-spot but with Cream-spot and 14-spot as well. Several St Mark’s Flies rested alongside the first Red-headed Cardinal Beetles of the year, all under the watchful gaze of basking Nursery-web Spiders.

A sunny wall and wooden fence, providing security for an isolated mansion off the beaten track, was teeming with Zebra Jumping-spiders, one of whom had caught a meal in the form of a Pond Olive mayfly (not that I realised it until I looked at my photos back at home!). And in another bit of post-hoc reassessment, a harvestman on that fence would appear to be Platybunus pinetorum. First found in Britain as recently as 2010 and known mostly from more northern areas, this will be (if confirmed) the first record from Essex, and quite possibly East Anglia.

Close to the river, there were three species of damselfly: several Large Reds, always the first to emerge in the spring, with single female Azure and Blue-tailed, the latter so fresh it was practically colourless, a so-called teneral specimen.

The final upstream section took us past fields of magnificent Longhorn cattle to one of the many former mills on the river, where Grey and Pied Wagtails fed, House Martins chirruped and swooped, a Kingfisher was heard, and a Little Egret bore witness to the inexorable march of climate collapse…

Thence into Chalkney Wood, a place I have been coming to for forty years. An inspiration! A Renaissance wood! A phoenix rising from the ashes of destructive early 20th century forestry policy: when I first knew it, Chalkney’s ancient woodland roots were buried under serried ranks of non-native conifer trees. Fortunately we recognised that those who attempted to destroy the old trees a generation previously had not been very efficient; green shoots of hope remained. And when in 1987 the plight of ancient woods was highlighted by the ‘hurricane’ that swept through our lands in October, it didn’t take too much of a push to guide the Forestry Commission down the path towards a sustainable future.

The conifers were removed ahead of their intended lifespan, light flooded back, life responded accordingly, and now thirty years later it is almost impossible to differentiate that part of the wood from the smaller portion that Essex County Council had presciently been able to rescue from the jaws of doom years before…

Over vast swathes of the wood, Bluebells were only just past their best, a colour scheme interrupted only on some damper patches where white Wild Garlic dominated. And both smelled as good as they looked.

 

Other flowers included cushions of Greater Stitchwort and Ground Ivy, especially around the wood edge, and Bugle and Wood Speedwell lining the rides:

The dominant coppice trees are Hornbeam and Small-leaved Lime, the latter particularly beautiful as its pink-flushed buds open, and Hollies (of both sexes) flowered on the woodbanks. Blackcaps and Chiffchaffs sang everywhere, with a lovely Garden Warbler both days around the lunch stop.

The sunny rides were also the place to find insects, including Speckled Wood, Orange Footman moth, Birch Shieldbug, the hoverfly Pipiza noctiluca, and two ‘longhorns’, Green Longhorn Moth and the beetle Rhagium mordax, rather scattered in Essex, being restricted to ancient woodland habitats.

The return journey was along the hill tops (yes, Essex does have hills!) giving wonderful views over the unspoilt valley. Long may it remain that way. Dandelions as always attracted insects, here a Gooden’s Nomad-bee, and sheltered nettlebeds harboured Hairy Shield-bugs and a Cinnamon Bug. And stunted hedgerow Oaks showed the large, spongy oak-apple galls of the wasp Biorhiza pallida.

The eroded path gave a window into local geology, flint-rich chalky boulder clay deposited by the last outpost of the Anglian Glaciation, before at least the Naturetrek group plunged through a waist-high Rape field. It was surprising just how many insects there were in the monoculture, from Small Whites to Honeybees and several others. We can only hope the Rape was not bearing a lethal dose of neonicotinoid pesticides…

And finally everyone got to pay homage to Chappel Viaduct, up close and personal, at its very best in slanting sunlight, a graphic masterpiece of Victorian architecture, as sound now as when it was built 160 years ago. Worth the effort of visiting in itself, especially for those travelling by train and seeing views both of and from. All rounded off for some with a welcome drink at The Swan: the wild side of Essex at its best!

The Wild Side of Beth Chatto Gardens: Spring in full flight

Beth Chatto Gardens, Britain's Wildlife, WildEssex, WildWivenhoe

April saw me heading to the gardens on three occasions in mid-month, twice to lead walks (two for the National Garden Scheme and the first two of my summer monthly WildSide walks) and one just me and my camera, a moment of peace in a mad world.

Five walks on three days in just a little over a week might seem like overkill, but this time of year it really isn’t. In the full flight of spring, nature can change perceptibly every few days. And this year was no exception, especially as the lack of rain for about five weeks and rising temperatures completely changed track from the past wet winter, and pushed us into incipient drought. These mood swings of nature, actually more like handbrake turns on a sixpence, are what we must expect and live with in the climatically weirded future. And so must our garden plants and wildlife. Some will not be able to, so my advice as always is get out there now and appreciate just what riches we have!

The speed of change was almost frightening. Take that wonderful yellow peony Paeonia mlokosewitschii (aka Molly the Witch), in tight bud on my first visit, full flower six days later and three days futher on, starting to fade. A plant of highly transient glory, but a favourite of the garden bees!

Many other flowers of course, a plethora of potential food sources for insects and a delight to photograph:

And not to be outdone, the unfurling fern fronds and red maple foliage added their own highlights to the masterpiece of spring:

Butterflies have yet to emerge in real force, especially since the overwinterers have started to fade. But the whites are putting on a strong show, with Small, Green-veined and Orange Tip by the first visit, Large White joining them by the final date, along with the first Green Hairstreak and Speckled Wood.

The first visit also coincided with the first emergence of the year of Large Red Damselflies, always the earliest of its group to appear, along with other aquatic insects like Alder-flies, and remarkable numbers of adult Iris Sawflies, on and around the emergent iris leaves and whose larvae will be responsible for nibbled edges to leaves this summer.

Back on dry land, there were plenty of the usual bumblebees, including rather more Red-tailed than we have come to expect in recent years:

Hairy-footed Flower-bees were still patrolling the borders of comfrey and lungwort, not only for food but also for each other, with many interactions between amorous males and seemingly uninterested females noted! Other solitary bees included Yellow-legged and Chocolate Mining-bees, one of the furrow-bees, and Flavous Nomad-bee. The several species of nomad-bee seem to be in remarkable numbers this spring compared with previous years…

Two others from the same insect group, Hymenoptera, were queen Common Wasps, feeding and rasping wood to build their nests with, and the currant galls of the spring generation of the Spangle Gall Wasp on Oak catkins:

Moving to flies, some of the most numerous were the Bibio species. first B. lanigerus and B. anglicus, with the first true St Mark’s Fly B. marci on the first visit. 14th April is early for this species, named because it emerges on or around St Mark’s Day, 25th April. During the second visit, they were very numerous, and by the third, almost gone – perhaps down the throats of birds, as they are favourites of Swallows.

Hoverflies increased greatly through the month, and included many flower-flies Syrphus sp., together with Batman and Footballer Hoverflies , and lots of Epistrophe eligans.

Other easily recognised flies were Yellow Dung-flies, the dance-fly Empis tessellata and the parasite-fly Tachina fera…

… along with many other less distinctive, but still important , parts of our garden’s biodiversity.

Ladybirds are still more abundant than I have ever seen before at this time of year, the offspring no doubt of those that arrived en masse last July. And while most are 7-spots, a selection of other species such as 14-spot Ladybird is starting to emerge.

Bugs included the first Harpocera thoracica of the year, with plenty of Hairy and Green Shield-bugs, and also a lovely find of a mating pair of Gorse Shield-bugs, a rather uncommon creature in the garden.

On the reservoir, Dabchicks were singing and a pair of Tufted Ducks has seemingly settled in. All around the garden, birds are in song, residents like Greenfinch, Robin, Goldcrest and Song Thrush, alongsideside the summer visitors, especially Chiffchaff and Blackcap.

On the first two visits a Cetti’s Warbler was singing on the edge of the garden, only the third record for the site, but on the third visit its apparent territory had been filled by a singing Whitethroat, again not common in the garden. And overhead plenty of action too, from feeding Swallows to displaying Buzzards, flyover Egyptian Geese and Red Kites, along with Mediterranean Gulls and a Lesser Black-backed Gull, both rarely appearing in our sights.

Another fantastic month in the Beth Chatto Gardens, the incidental nature reserve!

Back to my Yorkshire roots: Bridlington & York

Britain's Wildlife, Eleanor's photos, Travel by Bus, Travel by Rail

For some time now, Eleanor has been asking if ‘we can go to see where Papa grew up’, so for our April short break it was off to Yorkshire. The hottest day of April for many years was our travel day: the trains were busy but blue skies made for some lovely sights, from King’s Cross to Ally Pally to Peterborough Cathedral to the Humber Bridge…

After changing trains in Hull, I really started to notice the differences from my youth. It is more than a decade since I have visited the area, and more like half a century since I resided here for more than a day or two, so to see Red Kites and Buzzards as we crossed the plains of Holderness was to me remarkable. And the number of Roe Deer grazing the open fields … never were they the stuff of my childhood. But as for Brid itself, it was reassuringly familiar. Horrifyingly familiar. Such is the bittersweet recollection of times past!

All the sights were still there: the harbour, the boats, the promenade, the churches, the guesthouses and the crowds…

… all flanked by the waves that still roll in relentlessly under the watchful gaze of Flamborough Head, with Herring Gulls everywhere stealing sandwiches, and Turnstones trotting along the harbour wall.

And lifting spirits with their wild cries, Kittiwakes. They started to breed on harbour-front houses as I grew up, but there are now many fewer than when I left for university. Seems they are not treated with the same respect as we found in Lowestoft last year.

My memory of the Floral Pavilion, a winter garden feature of the sea front, is its smell, of chrysanthemum from the blooms and lavender from the soap of the ancient incumbents (perhaps a bit of hyperbole there!). Anyway, this visit it proved to be just what we all needed: a safe soft-play area for Eleanor, and an adjacent bar and restaurant to keep us happy as she spent five hours hurtling around!

And the food there was really quite good, in contrast to several of the establishments we tried during our two-night stay. The Wetherspoons Prior John had sticky tables (what’s new!), but its surroundings are a sensitive re-use of a former Methodist Chapel.

But as for the Premier Inn restaurant, there were no saving graces. Breakfast was appalling, inedible, sporadic in appearance, the plates and cutlery, tables and chairs and carpets were all disgustingly filthy. That is my memory of Bridlington: a grey place with grey food…

On our full day in Brid, we hunted for my past: my childhood house, Grandma’s flat, my schools, even the land train I worked as a conductor on in summer. And not a blue plaque in sight! Every morning I awoke to a very particular sight, the reassuring familiarity of the Priory church, and that is still pretty much unchanged.

A magnificent building, this is only a small part of the vast pre-Dissolution Augustinian priory that was founded in 1113, its riches acquired on the back of a lucrative wool trade. And while the inside of the church was never a regular part of my youth, my older self – able to appreciate the architecture and art of such places in a secular way – was duly impressed.

From the outside, the church doesn’t have the forbidding blackness of my mind’s eye – presumably its stonework has been cleaned. The church has always evolved with the times, with a particularly marked restoration and remodelling by George Gilbert Scott in the mid-19th century. He built up the two towers deliberately asymmetrically to reflect contrasting architectural styles on the body of the church, the older tower in Early English style and the other in a more ornate perpendicular style.

The interior space is lofty…

… and full of fine details, including a lovely sculpture of St John of Bridlington and stone flooring filled with marine fossils:

There was also an interesting set of tapestries, dating from 1994-5, depicting the history of the Priory:

And one of the celebrated features of the church woodwork is the carved mouse figures courtesy of Robert ‘Mousey’ Thompson (1876-1955) and his descendants, furniture-makers based in nearby Kilburn, complete with child-friendly ‘hunt the mice’ guide!

Outside the church the Bayle Gate, again a constant part of my history, not least because I was entranced by the pinned, locally-caught Death’s-head Hawkmoth the museum had in its collection fifty years ago. But I had no idea that this, the former principal entrance to the Priory, is itself Grade I listed in its own right.

We had been hoping to head out by bus to Flamborough Head, but in the event the wind was too Siberian to make that a joyful prospect. So it didn’t really matter that the bus simply didn’t turn up, despite that the app was saying/lying it was ‘due’ and then had ‘departed’. This simply epitomises the Brid that needs to get itself into the 21st century: this day and age there is no reason why online resources are based on timetables rather than real life.

It was a mixed experience for me. I am not sure I ever want to return to a left-behind town with dead-end attitudes and the stench of Reform at every turn. Of course the birds of Flamborough and Bempton could be a reason to return, but I suspect the only thing that would draw us back for sure would be an organ recital in the Priory. The acoustics must be simply wonderful, and the organ is regarded as one of the finest in any British parish church, with its 32ft Contra Tuba pipe, the largest pedal reed in Europe apparently.

So on another sunny morning I was happy to wave goodbye to my past, albeit intrigued to find several Common Mourning-bees in the lee of a garden hedge, sheltered from the cold breeze. Now right at the northern extent of its British distribution, this again is something the younger me would not have been able to see in the area.

Our train took us over the rolling chalk landscape of the Yorkshire Wolds, and with a change at Seamer, through the Vale of Pickering, and pastures with tumbling displaying Lapwings. Then, passing by Kirkham Abbey and Skipwith Common, we pulled into York.

My first stint at university was at York and, freed from the parochial shackles of home, safe to say my memories of there are more positive. And we certainly found plenty to interest us all for a couple of days, including  formal attractions like the Jorvik centre, bringing life to the local Vikings.

The historic walls were an excellent introduction, a near-continuous elevated encirclement of the centre, the longest and most complete medieval town walls in England, interrupted only by the River Ouse, running for 3.4 km, built mainly in the 13th century on earlier Roman/Viking earthworks.

Views of history, of Wall-rue in the crevices, and close-up, tree canopy views of Sycamore bursting out:

And as the sun started to set, the Minster bells drew us ever closer. But not inside…who needs to see the interior (at great expense) when the sunset is flickering its flames over the limestone masterpiece?

Then there were the bustling streets like the Shambles, and historic buildings at every turn, including Clifford’s Tower.

 

One particular church, All Saints, Pavement caught our attention the following day, shelter from a shower and another mouse-hunt! When it was built it was on the only paved area of the city, hence its name. Grade I listed, it has a distinctive octagonal 15th-century lantern tower. In the medieval period, a lantern was hung from the tower to act as a beacon for travellers in the forest to the north. The church, first mentioned in the Domesday Book, is the burial place of 34 Lord Mayors. And on the door, a 12th-century knocker depicting the Mouth of Hell.

And on both days, when the sun came out, the highlight of York for us was the the Yorkshire Museum Gardens. We were hoping for Tansy Beetles but there were none showing here in their British stronghold. A nearby mural had to suffice!

But Eleanor got her ice-cream (both times!) and we all got to see the sights, including the Hospitium and the ruins of St Mary’s Abbey.

The gardens had plenty of interesting flowers and, at least out of the cold wind, a few Tapered Drone-flies and Orange-tailed Mining-bees, as well as Woodpigeons demolishing the Norway Maple flowers.

And the highlight of our holiday: the gardens were good for Eleanor too. Sometimes the Muse takes her, and she is happy for hours with a phone and some flowers. To finish this blog then, a selection of her photos from the Yorkshire Museum garden, photos I would be proud of. No names – just enjoy the world as seen through the eyes of an inquisitive eight-year-old! #ProudPapa.