This year, 2023, was a good year for our species lists, particularly the invertebrates list.
Continue reading “The year’s finds”The year’s finds
Please don’t do this…
Every winter we get reports of people leaving food, presumably for our wildlife, somewhere in the reserve. Please, don’t do this.
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Winter Facts
Eurasian wrens (Troglodytes troglodytes) share territories during the winter, in particular they will share sheltered winter roosts, sometimes crowding together for warmth in nesting boxes. The record number of wrens seen leaving a nesting box after a cold night is sixty three.
Header image: wren by Cheryl Cronnie
Christmas bird table
Treat your garden birds with a Christmas bird table. Here are some suggestions:
Continue readingXmas fact file
Common name: robin
Scientific name: Erithacus rubecula
Family: Muscicapidae
Habitat: woodland, hedgerows, gardens
Diet: invertebrates, fruit, seeds, bird table scraps
Predators: birds of prey, domestic cats
Origin: native
Pigeon ID
Here’s a video from the British Trust for Ornithology to help us all sort out our native pigeons:
Terminology
At this time of year, writing about the reserve’s inhabitants, we use the words overwinter, hibernation, and diapause a lot. It’s easy to assume that they are interchangeable terms but that is not so: let’s take a closer look.
Continue reading “Terminology”Winter robins
Here are some of the reserve’s robins all fluffed up against the cold.
Coccinella septempunctata
Coccinella septempunctata is the rather grand scientific name of the most common of our native ladybirds, the seven spot.
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Eco-engineer
Ecosystem engineers are creatures that create, significantly alter and maintain (or destroy) a habitat and in doing so change the availability of resources for other species. Our water voles are busy engineering the banks of Lambrok Stream and its tributary. How do they do this?
Continue reading “Eco-engineer”10 facts about foxes
ONE: our native red fox, a common visitor to the reserve, is the largest of the world’s true foxes and one of its most widely distributed. It is found across the entire Northern Hemisphere including most of North America, Europe and Asia, as well as in parts of North Africa.
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Owl and vole
Tawny owls come to the reserve to hunt our plentiful field voles.
Blackbirds and berries
Wood mouse
The wood mouse is Britain’s commonest and most widespread species of rodent. There must be hundreds, if not thousands, in our nature reserve but they are rarely seen. Here are some of their personal details.
Continue reading “Wood mouse”Winter moths
The Winter moth (Operophtera brumata) is one of the few Lepidopterans that can cope with winter’s freezing temperatures in its adult stage. They are endothermic which means that they can produce heat internally by biochemical processes, just as warm-blooded creatures do.
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Beak length in great tits
Apparently, great tits in the UK have longer beaks than Dutch great tits: data analysis has shown a difference of 0.3mm. What’s going on?
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Goldfinch
Goldfinches come to the reserve in flocks during the winter to feed on seeds in our hedges and edges.
Continue readingS41 mammals
The Natural Environment and Rural Communities Act (2006) makes it the duty of all local authorities to conserve biodiversity. Section 41 of the Act refers to a published list of habitats and species (called S41 species) which are considered to be of principal importance for the conservation of the country’s biodiversity.
Continue reading “S41 mammals”
One of the reserve’s most controversial residents: much loved sweetheart of our local wildlife or destructive and costly invasive alien species?
Grey squirrel photographed last week in the reserve by Ian Bushell.
Spider numbers
Spiders are not insects, they are arachnids, a family that includes harvestmen, ticks, mites and scorpions.
Three arachnids: harvestman, tick and scorpion
Continue reading “Spider numbers”Treecreeper
Treecreepers (Certhia familiaris) are shy, quiet, and rarely seen. We know they visit the reserve to feed and we hope they are long term residents that will nest here in the spring.
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Ivy flowers
The reserve’s ivy blooms from the beginning of September right through November; each plant’s flowering season is quite short but a succession of plants flowers all through the autumn and into the winter. The flowers are small, green and yellow, and so insignificant-looking that many people don’t realise that that they are flowers at all.
Read on:Let the leaves lie
There are thousands of species of invertebrates that overwinter in the leaf litter below the reserve’s trees and shrubs. Let’s not be too eager to sweep the autumn leaves from our gardens.
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Southwick Country Park Nature Reserve 