bird box activity

We have Great tits with six eggs in one box and Blue tits with I think six eggs (difficult to see) in the other.

Walk along the Wear

I had a walk from Bradley Burn back to Wolsingham today.  The season is definitely progressing. 

Orange Tip butterflies are on the wing. Bluebell, Red Campion and Angelica are in flower. 

I saw some hazelnuts on a log where an animal had been feeding, some fresh otter spraint on a boulder in the river and a Morel fungus under some dead wood.

Willow Warblers, Chiffchaff, Blackcap and Wren were all singing in the bushes and Dipper, Grey Wagtail, Heron and Mallard were active on the river.

Babies

We have just seen a baby dunnock being fed in the garden.

Nest box actvity

We have two nestboxes active at the moment. The one on my astro shed has the beginnings of a nest and the one on our boundary fence has a nest with two eggs. 

Mistletoe

When visiting Highclere House (Downton Abbey) last weekend we were interested to see large clumps of mistletoe on several of the trees. That area of the country is a very good area for seeing mistletoe apparently.

Hawthorn in the south

We are in Berkshire for a couple of days. The Hawthorn is already in blossom here!

Baal wood

We had a walk through Baal Wood in Wolsingham today to the Bishop's Oak. We found roe deer prints, heard a roe buck barking and saw two does and two immature deer.

Bluebells are starting to appear near the oak and lots of wood sorrel along the paths. There were several large clumps of primrose. The gorse is in flower and blackthorn and bird cherry are in blossom in the hedges. The new lambs are growing bolder and going around in gangs. 

River walk

Walking back from Bradley Burn to Wolsingham we saw bluebell, forget me not, ivy fruits, primrose and wild strawberry. 

We also spotted a solitary heron.

First swallow

Just seen my first swallow of 2017 at Bradley Burn

Thornley Walk

We tried out a new route today from Bradley Burn round by Thornley Village.

We had some lovely views of Weardale looking west and also saw lots of Violets and Celandines growing.

The route took us through a steep sided wood with the Thornley Beck running through it.

Plucking post and Blackthorn blossom

We walked around our local river walk through Wolsingham on Monday evening and saw a spot in the fork of a tree where a sparrow hawk had been plucking a kill (probably a pigeon).

Nearer the river we saw the first of the Blackthorn blossom for this year.

My nature garden 7 years on

I was looking back through the blog and found a picture of my pond and nature garden when it was built in 2010. It's come on a bit since then!

Spring on river bank

We walked back to Wolsingham today from Bradley Burn. 

We saw lots of spring flowers including violet, celandine, primrose, butterbur, and wood anemone. The blackthorn was in blossom and sycamore buds were bursting.

We also heard our first chiffchaff and wood warblers of the year.