Watching Unseen

Most times we see wild animals and birds they see us first.

To see them relaxed, not knowing they are being watched, is a privilege. No hides for me but it happens. Like the coal tits feeding their young this morning. Better still the young fox exploring. Was he old enough to be out on his own?

The hind on the other side of the stream valley was in her sheltered secret place hardly visible.

She remained lying with her head turned back and eyes closed as if listening for another heartbeat.

Natural beauty.

Return of Cr*p 'n Cr*p

CROPPING

CR*PPING

Also known as 'conservation grazing'.

Secret Place

It's rare that council functionaries display enough sensitivity to satisfy all the public. Sensitivity is not a core part of their remit. Things that are precious to some of us don't figure in job specifications. At the moment there is a big outcry in Sheffield about the destruction of roadside trees to facilitate street and footpath maintenance. Trees are also part of our concerns on Blacka, even on a place reserved for nature.

Nothing on Blacka is perfectly idyllic, but often we come close with the compromise easier to forget.

Sometimes it is road noise that intrudes, sometimes it's evidence of intrusive human activity. But all life is compromise and we can live with some things - up to a point.

But our more secret and near tranquil areas must not be given up without a fight. If that fight never raises itself beyond a bitter and lonely complaint  that should tell us something that we may not wish to hear.

One delightful place is just where multiple threats have already begun.  This little known and very small section of the neighbouring land is a wonderful place to spend time in spring. Despite its proximity to the road, audible in this recording, the overwhelming sense is of naturalness.

https://soundcloud.com/pastandpresent/hidden-valley

While taking this short recording I saw the doe below, tongue out as she was drinking at the stream. She had not seen me. A secret and perfect place.

Just a few metres from here a little known informal path is being converted into a bridleway at the behest of the Public Rights of Way unit of the Council. Tranquillity will decline.

There are other threats: SRWT's species agenda with its dislike for 'non-native' species (except cows and sheep) has already put sycamores, beech and horse chestnut at risk of 'ethnic cleansing' measures.

The trees here are sycamore, horse chestnut ........

and lime.
 

None fits the 'native only' plan so can't be guaranteed a future in the new pure-race community of their brave new world. Non native trees may survive in the short term - some of them- but unlikely in the medium/long term plan dedicated to only oak/birch woodland. Yet who could complain that what we have here now is unsuitable?

Very close by is, for Blacka, a rare elm.

Night Visitor

Left behind by an irregular visitor to the Old Wall Food Bank.

He would be more likely to be feeding on some of the customers.

Downy ?

The quest to get certain identification of a downy birch that is not some kind of hybrid continues. So the Woodland Trust's guidance should help. Identification guides are always flawed to a degree and the best bet is a combination of several of them allied to plenty of direct observation.

The key features according to numerous sources include being more upright, having a more brown bark and more horizontal grooves. All things are comparative and how much is 'more'? Another association that's mentioned is the presence of 'Witch's Broom'.

The most notable Witch's Broom on Blacka is this one and this year it's grown even grander.  It's decorative in winter too when covered in snow. The same tree is showing good downy patches on the back of leaves.

But upright? This test it fails. It's almost supine in fact.

Ghetto

The heather was cut using farm machinery. You can see the margins clearly. This was to give cows grass to eat giving the lie to the tale that they were here to manage the land - the truth was that the land was managed for the cows. The explosion of cotton grass is not in any way natural. It follows from the management as surely as a herbaceous border in a park. Pretty as cotton grass can be this just looks false.

Contrast with this area where cotton grass aficionados may  see a more 'natural' colonisation of cotton grass - looking less like a ghetto. Once again the lesson is less management is better.

Oak Variations

High winds in June tear leaves, twigs and sometimes branches from trees. This morning the paths are littered with the evidence.

The leaves here are oak and they prompted a thought. The colouring of the foliage helps to make oak recognisable. But the green colouring is not always the same. It goes through more changes than many other native trees especially during May and June. And different oak trees change at different rates. Two oaks even close by will not necessarily show the same shade of green, to the extent that they may at first be taken as two different species. Each oak seems to have a character of its own, determined to move forward at its own pace, fitting nicely with its position in the national folklore as a symbol of staunch independence.  Blacka is a good place to observe this.

Amongst the mix of trees around Strawberry Lee Woods above, the oak's colouring stands out but it is nowhere near as deep a green as that of the fallen leaves above on the path in the woods.

Here we have a younger tree not fully convinced it's time to commit itself.

Behind and just to the left is another oak in contrasted colours.

Different again are the alien oaks planted in the seventies. Their unmistakeable yellowish colouring stands out from a long way off near Ringinglow, shown up as something that does not quite fit in, which, as an American import, it wouldn't.

Now we know that SRWT is pursuing a policy, however inconsistently, of removing non-native species, I'm surprised there is no suggestion they may be removing these. After all many trees with more claim to being native seem to be under sentence. A hidden agenda?