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Seven of us met this beautiful Spring morning.

Daffodils before…

The first jobs were to litterpick and to carry out further work on the hospice woodland – clearing the path through the wood and freeing some of the trees which are being smothered by brambles.

…daffodils after

It seems that when the trees were planted, groups of daffodils were also planted around some of them.  However, over the years they have become concealed by the brambles and so we spent a few minutes bringing them back into the light.

Daffodils at the entrance to the hospice wood

At our last event, we cleared brambles around the daffodils at the entrance to the hospice wood.  These can now be seen in all their glory, though they are still only on the cusp of flowering.  In a week’s time they will look wonderful.

At 11.15 some of us left Steph and Brian to continue with their vocation of liberating the woodland trees from brambles while three of us made our way down to the Buck Stone, pausing en route to cut back holly on the path down to the rugby club.

The Buck Stone before…

By the time we reached the Buck Stone, we only had about quarter of an hour left to work, but fortunately the Buck Stone was surprisingly clear and it looks as if last year’s bracken bashing may have been successful.

…the Buck Stone after

We cut down some branches which were concealing the view of the Buck Stone, and cleared brambles from a clump of snow drops and then spent twenty minutes on the main task – cutting back the shoots from the oak tree at the left hand (eastern) end of the Buck Stone and clearing the abundant brambles around it.

Whilst at the Buck Stone, your correspondent heard his first chiffchaff of the year and saw his first butterfly of the year too – probably a peacock as a peacock butterfly was flitting round his driveway when he got home.

Thank you again to everyone who took part.

A beautiful morning after the constant rain of the last few weeks.  Nine of us met up to litter pick and clear paths. Rob and Tina were also litter picking under their own steam and so there were eleven of us altogether.

Tamsin, Judith and Chris set off to litter pick and did a fantastic morning’s work.

A birch tree had come down across the path near the Stairfoot Lane steps and so Beth and Graham were despatched to start work on clearing it.

Not before, but halfway through!

Your correspondent and Brian set off to join them and en route found a large pond had formed across Crag Lane in the area where we installed a drainage pipe in February 2011.  Poking down the drainage pipe with a stick dislodged a large log – presumably pushed into the pipe by children – and hey presto! we suddenly had a torrent of water flowing

After!

through the pipe and the pond had gone in a matter of minutes.  Your correspondent estimates that at least 500 gallons of water were trapped across the path until the pipe was cleared.  Once the pond had gone, it became clear that a stream was running down the hill and across the path and it continued to flow strongly through the drainage pipe.

Before!

Then it was time to catch up with Graham and Beth at the fallen tree which completely blocked a major path through the woods.

They had made a start on cutting it up and after another half an hour’s work the path was clear.

After!

Having cleared the tree, Graham set off to join the litter pickers.

Brian, Beth and your correspondent set off to join Steph and Jen, last seen clearing holly on the path leading from Crag Lane to the Hospice Woodland.

Steph and Jen had done a great job of clearing the holly.  A further 20 minutes of frenzied pruning and it was time to make our way to the Hospice Woodland.

Clearly, when the Hospice Woodland was planted, someone had planted clumps of daffodils to border the path.  These were smothered by brambles, bracken and fallen leaves, and so 20 minutes were devoted to clearing these and revealing the daffodils to be enjoyed by the passers-by when they bloom in the next ten days or so.

A view showing the widened path in the foreground

Finally, we spent half an hour working on the path running through the Hospice Woodland.  Largely this was clear, though in various places tree branches protruded across the path or brambles and bracken were encroaching.  As we cleared these away it became clear that the undergrowth concealed daffodils which had been planted around the trees.

Time did not permit us to complete all the path improvement work but it is incredible what a dedicated and motivated team of Friends can achieve in two hours work!

Four of us met with Steve Joul to complete the survey of the tit boxes from the Slabbering Baby down to the Seven Arches – a total of nine boxes.  Eight contained tit nests and one seemed to contain the remains of a bumble bee nest.

See the insect cocoons in the hinge area of the box

Each survey your correspondent notices new things.  This year, one of the new “discoveries” was that insect larvae gnaw at the wood, leaving what seem to be teeth marks (though they cannot be teeth marks due to their position), and use the wood to create cocoons.  This phenomenon is shown in the picture: click on the picture for a better view.

Last January we took down the starling box as a squirrel or woodpecker had clearly attacked the entrance hole and made it bigger.  This year we put it back up as David had reinforced the entrance with steel sheets!  The starling box differs from the tit boxes in that it is about twice the depth and the entrance hole on this particular one is on the side rather than the front of the box.  It is also distinguished by sheets of steel around the entrance hole!

A nest in one of the Woodstone boxes put up last January.

It took us about three hours to complete the survey.  Having completed the survey, your correspondent and Steve returned to the picnic area and put up a new box number 12 to replace the original which has disappeared without trace.

The fibrous mass found in a robin nest box

 

Our readers might be interested in the following exchange between your correspondent and Steve Joul in relation to the strange fibrous mass found in one of the robin nest boxes.

 

 

Steve Joul:  I thought you would be interested to see my photos of the wax moth cocoons and a larva that popped out on my desk

Response:  Is the lump of brown stuff in the pictures the stuff that was in our nest box?

Steve Joul:  Yes, I think it is an accumulation of the silken cocoons of the Bee Moth. It could possibly be the Wax Moth or the Lesser Wax Moth I’m not definitely sure but the Bee Moth is most likely to live with Bumble Bees.

It’s clearly meant to be communal (the cocoons are joined together into a mat) and very tough to penetrate (I could not tear it). This was on the underside of the lid of the nestbox.

It was also originally surrounded by a silken web which I believe was produced when the larvae were feeding on the nest to protect them from the bees which might otherwise remove them from the nest. I believe the caterpillars eat everything in the nest including the wax nest, food stores, dead bees etc.

Usually weak or failing colonies without a queen are most susceptible apparently.  The adult moths detect the bees by scent then lay their eggs, about a hundred from what I’ve read.

A quick google reveals that the two Wax Moths are the scourge of bee keeper. I believe it is most commonly the Lesser Wax Moth which lives with Honey Bees but usually not Bumblebees.

There is confusion over the correct identification of the species which are very similar.

I read that the Wax Moth caterpillars can eat the caterpillars of the Lesser Wax Moth.

I’ve also read that the Wax Moth will eat diseased parts of the hive, removing it and stopping the disease from spreading and so has sometimes been useful in commercial beekeeping. This was apparently the case when it was introduced to New Zealand when the incidence of disease was reduced. So, there is sometimes disagreement about whether having Wax Moths living with the bees is a good or a bad thing.

A full day surveying nest boxes from 10 am till 4 pm with Steve Joul.

Five of us surveyed all the nest boxes north of Old Leo’s Rugby club, along Crag Lane to the picnic area and then down the Meanwood Valley trail to the footbridge over the stream by the Slabbering Baby.

Last January we “upgraded” our nest boxes by replacing some with Woodstone nest boxes, adapting some so that we could easily lift them down and clean them at ground level, and improving some by putting a plastic covering over the lid and back of the nest boxes to keep them dry.

We were keen to see how the nest boxes had fared in what has been a remarkably wet Autumn and Winter.

The first thing to say is that some of the wooden nest boxes were very wet and damp.  Disappointingly, nesting material at the bottom of the woodstone nest boxes was surprisingly damp whilst the material at the top was dry.  It seemed that any damp filtered down to the bottom of the nest boxes where it had no way of escape and no aeration.  In contrast, the nesting material in the wooden boxes tended to be dry – presumably because there were plenty of gaps in the bottom of the nest boxes for air to circulate through the boxes.

The plastic covering put on the lid and back of the wooden boxes did seem to be very effective in keeping the boxes dry.

We did not adapt all of the nest boxes last January and so today we took the opportunity to take down damp unadapted boxes and replace them with refurbished boxes so far as the supply of refurbished boxes allowed and one or two we refurbished “on the job”.

By the end of our survey, all nest boxes had been adapted so that they could be lifted down from the trees to be cleaned (originally they were nailed on to the trees).

Nest box number 8 had to be rescued from a tree which had snapped in half – right where the nest box had been placed, and another, number 12, had simply disappeared without trace!

Once more, virtually all of the nest boxes had been used for nesting by tits.  Whereas last year two boxes had been used by nuthatches (which seal up the lids of the boxes with mud and make a nest of wood chippings – see a picture in last years blog), no boxes seem to have been used by nuthatches this year.  I say “seem” because one box contained strips of bark which may have been nesting material.  However, they were unlike the building blocks of the previous nuthatch nests and the nest box lid had not been sealed up with mud.

On the 12 January we surveyed the robin boxes and found one box contained a very strange fibrous construction covered in cobwebs, while the bottom of the box was full of leaves.  Steve inspected this box today and the best explanation seems to be that bumblebees built a nest in the nest box, and that a species of wax moth then laid eggs in the nest and destroyed it.  Images of the damage that wax moths can cause to honey bee hives seem very congruent with this explanation – as do the presence of a number of dead bumblebees in the bottom of the nest box.

One of the other nest boxes seems to have been used by bumblebees – which is something which we have not seen in previous years surveys.

Steve brought with him some callipers for measuring any eggs which we found in the nest boxes.

Finally, one other feature which your correspondent had not noticed in previous years, is that the inside of many of the nest boxes had marks like teeth marks gouged in the wood.  It seems that this is the result of moth larvae chewing into the wood.

Today was a really interesting day and we were blessed with very mild and pleasant weather throughout the day.

This morning an enthusiastic team of litter pickers met up to spend an hour or so picking up the litter which had accumulated over the Christmas break.

One public spirited individual had kindly dumped nine empty chemical drums in the woods – marked as toxic to aquatic life.  We arranged for Steve Joul to collect these so that they could be disposed of properly.

There was a huge amount of litter and between us we picked up about ten bags of rubbish plus assorted objects which were too large to go in bags.  Clearly, there had been many parties in the woods over the last few weeks because there were bottles and cans everywhere.  A satisfying morning’s work improving the woods for humans and wildlife – but why do our fellow humans make it necessary?

Four of us met in Old Leo’s car park to join Steve Joul in surveying and cleaning the FOAW nest boxes.

Unfortunately, Steve’s new land rover had a flat battery which meant he could not bring the necessary ladders.  Undeterred, we decided to clean the robin boxes which are all at low level – two or three feet from the ground – and concealed in the middle of holly bushes.

Midway round we were joined by David.

Robin nest boxes are different from tit boxes in that robin boxes have an open front while tit boxes have a round hole for the entrance.

We have put up five robin boxes and, for the first time ever, we were able to find all five of them!  One particular nest has eluded us ever since we put it up and we found it entirely by chance this year when picking up a piece of litter:  there, five feet away in the middle of a holly bush was the elusive box.  The fault was that of your correspondent whose map making skills clearly need to be improved.  However, the map has now been updated to show the correct position of the nest box.

The results were as follows (the boxes having numbers which follow no particular order):

Box 6: nest and two unhatched eggs  ——    Box 9: nest

Box 15:  not used  —— Box 19:  strange contents – see below

Box 31: not used, but something had chewed the lip of the entrance.

The nests were tit nests rather than robin nests.

The contents of box 19 were very unusual:  a kind of fibrous mass was attached to the inside of the lid and the inside of the box, covered in cobwebs, and lots of leaves and dead bees in the bottom of the box.  It was so unusual that we decided not to clean that box but leave it for Steve to have a look at when we surveyed the rest of the boxes later in the month.

At the end of the morning, David joined your correspondent to help refurbish a couple more nest boxes.

Happy New Year!

Four of us met for an hour or two to work off the Christmas excesses and refurbish half a dozen nest boxes which have been mouldering in a garage for the last year.

We cleaned them out and fitted each of them with a plastic covering for the roof and back so that they were all as good as new, if not better.

Any similarities to fictional characters like those in The Last of the Summer Wine are entirely coincidental.

I know that I have been calling them Christmas Garlands – ‘cos Steve Joul thought that sounds more upbeat – but I now accept that you are right and they are properly called Christmas Wreaths.

Last week a team of us did the preparatory work for today’s event and today a team of elves, fairies, imps, pixies and dryads (posh word for tree nymphs) met at Old Leo’s Rugby Club to express their artistic selves and create Christmas Wreaths for themselves and for the people who had requested that we make them one.

We had a production line of people creating the leylandii bases, and decorating them with baubles, pine cones, ribbons and artificial poinsettia.

A very happy enjoyable morning – and early afternoon because we didn’t finish till nearly 2 pm.  However, the team was kept energised with Christmas music, mince pies and refreshments, and then easy listening music (sorry Louden).

A big thank you to everyone who took part and to Old Leo’s for letting us use their bar.  Your support is much appreciated.

We have had many messages of appreciation from the people who ordered a wreath.

It’s that time of year again, and a crack team met up this morning to prepare for next week’s Christmas Garland event.

We completed about 20 bases and through creative discussions and tensions managed to design a template for next week.

The team were rewarded with mince pies and non-alcoholic punch made by Barbara.