End of year favourites - Shrews

WeaselCam has been on tour a few times this year but has failed to record a weasel away from here.  It has, however, been good at recording other small mammals.  While in Williwood, the home of Denise & Phil, the box was visited by three species of shrew within an hour, providing an opportunity to compare their shape, body size and tail length.  From the top they are common shrew, pygmy shrew and water shrew.

Here's the video.

And here are the three individual species - common shrew,

pygmy shrew,

and water shrew.

SardineCam 2

Two of my cameras have been on tour again, this time to Denise and Phil near Riding Mill in South Northumberland.  As before, one camera was set up with a sardine scent lure and the other was in a camera box.  SardineCam was set in woodland edge for the first week and within woodland the second week.  It recorded 1061 videos in all, most of which were of wood mice.  As last time, the mice were fascinated by the sardine smell.  A domestic cat also came by to sniff but the highlight was a roe doe.

Passers-by taking no interest in the sardines were fox, American grey squirrel, robin, blackbird, song thrush and wood pigeon.

The camera box was set at woodland edge in the first week and recorded 546 videos, almost all of wood mice.  In the second week I put it in a rough grass field, still not far from woodland. This time there were only 163 videos and almost all were of shrews - common shrew, pygmy shrew and, most excitingly of all, a water shrew.  There is a small garden pond nearby but the nearest large pond is 160m away across a railway line.  Here are the three shrews in frame grabs from the video to compare their size, body shape and tail length, common shrew above, pygmy shrew middle and water shrew below.

And here is the video.

It was fascinating to find another water shrew away from water, so soon after the one in my garden.  Here is a montage of more water shrew action, all high speed.

If anything the common shrew is even more frantic.  It was interesting to see it collecting the sunflower seeds I had put in.  Shrews are insectivores but water shrews and common shrews both take sunflower seeds in my garden.

The smallest of the three, the pygmy shrew, seems a bit less hyperactive.

We did get a glimpse of a vole but it was very shy and didn't venture past the entrance pipe.  I can't tell what it is with any confidence but from its size I suspect it is a field vole rather than a bank vole.

So no mustelids, which we were hoping for, and no wood mice in the field, but it was great to see all the shrews.  And it is fascinating that moving the camera 50m from woodland to grass completely changes the clientele.  I am not sure it will be worth persevering with the sardine lure but the camera box seems by far the best way to see small mammals.

Nearly ready for the off

These young swallows are nearly ready for departure.  My friends Denise & Phil have been watching the birds which built a nest in their back porch, the first time they have had a swallow nest.  The four eggs hatched on 23rd June and these photos were taken on 13th July, when the chicks were 20 days old.  Fledging occurs at 20-22 days so I was just in time.

Photographing them was an interesting experience, using flash, manual focus and trying to get the timing right.  The parents were arriving every couple of minutes with food and seemed to put up with me without complaint.  Looking through the photos I noticed that sometimes the parent is side on (as above) and sometimes it has its back towards the camera (as below).  I wonder if one parent habitually lands at the same place on the nest and the other in a slightly different place.  I have noticed in the blue tit camera box in previous years that one parent goes to one side and the other the other.  With swallows I can't tell the parents apart.

It was a great pleasure to watch and to photograph the birds.  Many thanks to Denise & Phil for the opportunity.

Bird of the week - Green woodpecker

This is an elusive bird, often heard yaffling but rarely seen.  Even then it is usually peeping from the far side of a tree trunk or branch.  So it was a rare and wonderful opportunity to watch and photograph this female green woodpecker. Many many thanks to Denise & Phil.

The European green woodpecker (Picus viridis) is our largest woodpecker.  Although it nests in a hole in a tree it spends a lot of time on the ground hunting for ants and has a long sticky tongue for collecting them.

Green woodpecker numbers are increasing

but it is less common here in the north of the country.

In Thomas Bewick's time the green woodpecker was only the second largest British woodpecker (he records the black woodpecker as a resident bird!).  This is the male green woodpecker from his 1797 A History of British Birds.

Bewick gives the bird's other names of Woodspite, High-Hoe, Hew-Hole and Pick-a-Tree.  He writes "... it is called by the common people ... Rain-Fowl, from its being more loud and noisy before rain.  The old Romans called it Pluviae aves for the same reason.".  He also made a watercolour.

You can read more about the green woodpecker here.  Listen to a recording of the yaffle here.  And listen to Kate Humble's BBC Radio 4 Tweet of the Day on green woodpecker here.

Wasp beetle

The wasp beetle, Clytus arietis, is a harmless longhorn beetle that gains protection from looking and sounding like a wasp, another example of Batesian mimicry.  It feeds on flowers and lays its eggs in dead wood.

NEWPOTY 2015

For the first time I submitted photos to the North East Wildlife Photography Competition and three were shortlisted.  I am delighted to say that one of them won a prize.  This photo was runner-up in the Wildlife Portraits category.  It was taken in Denise & Phil's garden at Williwood so many thanks to them.  The prize is a place on a wildlife photography workshop which I hope will provide more photos for the blog.  More news in due course.

Bird of the week - Treecreeper

Its latin name is Certhia familiaris but I don't often see it in the garden - perhaps once a week.  I expect it is here much more often but it is well camouflaged and doesn't stay in one place for long.  Treehopper might be a better name as it flits from tree to tree and hops rather than creeps up the trunk looking for insects and spiders.  In my garden it prefers the oak and ash trees as they have more fissured bark.

Bird of the week - Coal tit

The coal tit, Periparus ater, or Periparus ater britannicus.  Coal tits appear to be monogamous and usually stay paired for life.  However, all is not as it seems.  Older males are particularly prone to cheat on their partners and father chicks by other females.  Maybe the females prefer more mature males (sensible!) as they may have better genes for longer survival.  See here.

Many-headed slime mould - part 2

An update on my previous post on the slime mould.  It is now mostly at the mature spore-producing stage.  The black spore heads cover most of the surface.