Even though spring has definitely arrived, there was ice on
the pond in the morning. High pressure, as is well known, means clear skies at
night and rapidly falling temperatures. But it is still spring. Hooray.
In the shady bank below the hedge the celandines are
starting to come into flower. So are the primroses. The primroses were given to
me about twenty years ago by an elderly friend in the Lake
District who had grown them from seed. She was an energetic wild
flower campaigner, constantly nagging the parish council to see that verges
were cut at the right time – after seed had been set. Her legacy is some
wonderfully rich and diverse verges around Coniston.
Lots of the wild flowers seem to be yellow at the moment.
This is no accident, but relates to what the pollinating insects are looking
for at this season. There was a big bumble bee bumbling around. Presumably it
was a queen, just emerged from hibernation, looking for some nourishment before
finding a place to nest. We get a bumble bee nest most years, and they are one
of my favourite things to watch. They like holes between roots, or at the base
of tussocks of old grass, so a very tidy garden will tend to be inhospitable.
Mine is not very tidy.
Being just back from holiday I had refilled the
bird-feeders, and there was plenty of action there. The special nyjer seed
feeder was crowded with goldfinches. They are now so common in our little patch
of gardens that one might take them for granted – except that they are so very
lovely. It was particularly pleasing to see so many sparrows chirruping and
bustling around, feeding, drinking and having dust baths. I think they like our
garden because there are so many thickets in which to roost.
However, the main action yesterday was round the pond. At
the beginning of the month a heron was eating so many frogs that I erected a
ramshackle system of netting and branches to try and preserve some of the
breeding colony. Sure enough we came back from holiday to find a goodly mass of
spawn. Yesterday a pair of mallard were wandering around, trying to find some
open water. I guess (with no evidence) that they are a pair who have been in
previous years. If so, two years ago they ate every scrap of spawn, and all the
tadpoles. As a result I made a little nursery pond for a few refugee tadpoles.
But this year, as I say, there is anti-heron netting. Even in this miniature
setting the ethical dilemmas of conservation have too be faced.
Meanwhile, however, the heron was back. Male frogs,
exhausted by mating, must make easy prey. I saw it catch three in about five
minutes, two in an unprotected corner of the pond and one in the thick rough on
the verge. It found it tricky to get the frogs adjusted for swallowing, and
kept turning them round, and sluicing them in the water. I think, though it was
hard to see, that one victim had been impaled, not pecked, and was particularly
awkward to get unstuck. In search of a
photo I kept moving closer until eventually it took off, a frog still in its
beak.
No sooner had it cleared the wall than there was a great
screeching and three angry gulls swept down of the roof and mobbed the heron,
shouting what sounded like very bad language. I saw the heron later, sitting on
the neighbour’s wall, still clutching the frog. Later on a pair of crows
started hopping around in the tree tops (we have one big old tree. So do
several neighbours) which could lead to more big-bird squabbles later on. Those
gulls do not like rivals of any sort, especially if they might be egg-eaters.
All this spring-watch excitement takes place within fifteen
minutes walk of Princes Street ,
in the centre of Edinburgh .
I recommend wild-life gardening to anyone. Step 1: No pesticides 2. Step 2:
Don’t be too tidy.
