RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch 2015

Every January since 1979 people across the UK have taken part in the world’s biggest wildlife survey: the RSPB’s Big Garden Birdwatch. Despite the name, you don’t need a garden to take part; many people visit their local park for the survey. Clare and I count the birds in the section of the estate we can see from our balcony, which includes two mature trees and planted bed of around 200 square metres.

Over the six years we’ve lived here we’ve seen fourteen bird species, adding blackcap to the list this winter. Five have graced our balcony: we’ve had single visits from a rook, a magpie, a wren, and a blue tit, and one year we had repeated visits from a pair of pigeons.

Our rather monochrome Big Garden Birdwatch 2015 results include the four usual suspects — feral pigeon, herring gull, magpie, and carrion crow — but this year they are joined by the pied wagtail, which are often seen around the estate but usually go into hiding during the birdwatch:

A Cheats Way To Plant More Bee Friendly Crops In Your Veg Plot

Just let things bolt. And when you see a bee drunk on pollen, all over the globe artichoke you didn't pick you'll see why.

There are other benefits too like edible flowers and self seeding. But that's a really happy bumblebee.

Food Issues: Organic friends

We’re passionate about organic agriculture. We pay for organic food, we volunteer to help grow it and we rant about how more people should have the option of good affordable organic grub. There are many reasons we prefer organic food and think it’s the best way to feed people. This one we’ve been paying close attention to recently. Stephen has been tracking the insects and uninvited plants that have ended up on our balcony. — Clare

When your garden is on a balcony three floors up, you don’t expect to see much wildlife. There’ll be no foxes, badgers, or hedgehogs — to make it here you have to crawl or fly. The sheer range of creatures that have done so has taken us by surprise, and this post details a few of them.

Probably the oddest visitors were two leeches (pictured right), seen a year apart, crawling across the glass of the balcony doors during wet weather. How they made it here is a mystery.

The most surprising visitors, at least in terms of making us jump, are the birds — you just don’t expect to look towards the balcony and see a large bird on it. For a short time we made a concerted effort to attract birds, using feeders that stuck to the balcony glass. Unfortunately the only bird they ever attracted was a magpie — and while I like magpies, I was really hoping for a selection of smaller birds. A carrion crow stopped by once, and for a few months two pigeons (who Clare calls our ‘pigeon pals’) frequently rested in the joists above the balcony.

During the Summer we’re visited by a range of pollinators, and towards the end of this Summer I started trying to identify the species, which included common carder bees (pictured left), European honey bees, common wasps, and the hoverfly Eupeodes luniger. We’ve also had some insect visitors most gardeners wouldn’t welcome, such as the large white butterfly and its caterpillars. Clare’s favourite has been the ladybirds, both for their beauty and their attacks on the aphid population.

Glorious Greenfly

When I first started the balcony garden I was horrified with bugs. Horrified. I squished and squashed, I washed away, I bought a biological control. And none of it worked. I had greenfly, I still get greenfly. I might have even made the problem worse. Now the greenfly come. I let them. I wash them off anything I'm about to eat and occasionally get freaked out by the entire 'born pregnant' thing but I generally let them live. The good thing about nature is that eventually the predator with catch up with the prey. And then I get ladybirds.

Love Hate: the greenfly

Planting a rainforest

In an article titled Where Wild Things Were back in the Summer issue of Natural World, the Wildlife Trusts wrote about ‘shifting baselines’ — the phenomenon whereby we lack ambition in conservation projects because we forget how rich the natural world once was. Since the 1940s the UK has lost 40% of its reedbeds, 46% of ancient woodland, and 96% of its hay meadows. The loss of habitats is reflected in the species that dwell in them: numbers of common toads fell by 50% between 1985 and 2000, and the bullfinch saw declines of 75% in farmland and 47% in woodland between 1968 and 1991.

Similar losses are seen in habitats around the world. The Sumatran rainforest has been decimated over the past fifty years, but now the RSPB, along with their Birdlife International Partners Burung Indonesia, have a plan: they will move from mere conservation to restoration, and will plant a million trees to reconnect the remaining fragments of the Harapan rainforest (see map above). Each £2 donated will pay for one tree — you can donate online on the Harapan One Million Tree Appeal micro-site, and UK taxpayers can use gift aid to increase the value of their donation by 28%. It’s a great feeling to know that 32 trees will be planted in a rainforest on the other side of the world due to my donation.

Ladybird metamorphosis and our first passion flower

After we arrived home from a long walk to the Willows and back (who said you have to drive to out-of-town shopping centres?), Clare excitedly called me onto the balcony. While we were gone our first passion flower had appeared, but this wasn't what had excited Clare — in fact, we didn’t even notice the passion flower immediately, instead focusing on a small insect half a metre from it.


There have been ladybird larvae — strange black and orange creatures covered with tiny spikes — on our balcony for over a month now. On 30th June I spotted a particularly large one in the middle of the largest blackcurrant leaf, and took the photograph below.


Two days later, on 2nd July, Clare noticed its appearance had changed dramatically — it had entered the pupal stage.


We looked at it every day, several times a day, but it was only today, 11th July, that the adult ladybird emerged, eleven days after we had first seen it. It’s in what is known as a ‘teneral’ state — it’s still soft and pale, and without spots (despite the pupa having developed spots).


Four hours later it had become noticeably darker, and spots were starting to become visible. It seems to have twelve spots, but the twelve-spotted ladybird isn’t one of our native species, so we’ll have to wait for its pattern to develop more fully (assuming we can find it again tomorrow).

Buy This Book

A spot of father-daughter bonding before I left the north left me with a copy of No Nettles Required (Amazon link on the pick) for the train home. I'd read it by Bristol and was left entertained, educated and buzzing with energy. Too bad I had two hours on the train left to go.

First of all what makes this book so special. Well have you ever read a gardening book that says you must plant your daffodil bulbs the right way up and you think 'yeah? Sez who?'* Well that's kind of the feeling you can have reading about wildlife gardening. It's mostly based on common knowledge and not evidence based understanding of the way our gardens work.

No Nettles Required however is based on a study. Not the most exhaustive in the world but they readily admit that and they are open and transparent about methods and the why and how it was conducted. Indeed the only reason I'd suggest to avoid this book is if you have ethical concerns about the study which included trapping and preserving mini beasts.

So we start with good scientific foundations and from there offer practical tips that work. In gardens. In a real life study. Sure there aren't great big planting lists, the book explains why you don't need them. And no there aren't any guaranteed tips to get foxes in your yard, the book explains that wildlife isn't just mammals and birds. If you are concerned about real wildlife in real gardens this is a book you need to read.

And now a word for our balcony gardeners...

As a balcony gardener this is especially good news because, short of a hedgehog scaling the building, mammals aren't going to happen. Birds may not happen. Mini beasts though? Yes. We can have our wildlife. And considering our space is so lacking it's reassuring to know that we can do that without setting up a patch of nettles.

*Not only can you plant them any which way you please and they will right themselves with no time lost but they will also move up and down in the soil to get the the required depth. Is this creepy or cool... Who can tell...

Wild Outside

This week's Wild Wednesday is straight from the balcony. I'm feeling rather proud as my hard work from earlier seasons is paying off now. I find each and every flower so exciting. What was a building site a year ago is now home to bees, butterflies, moths, spiders, flies, ladybirds and yes, even aphids. Yay.

Days off

Today's Wild Wednesday consists of pictures from my days off two weeks ago: a chaffinch at Becky Falls, a giant butterfly at Buckfast Butterflies, a bee on a flower in Torquay, and a cuddly hedgehog buried in marbles at The House Of Marbles.

Fishes in the water, fishes in the sea

We’re going to have a ‘let’s talk about’ blog again today.

When I was little my Dad pointed to the side of a can of tuna and said ‘this means it’s dolphin friendly, make sure the fish your Mum buys is dolphin friendly’ Of course my Mum, who doesn’t see the point in unleaded petrol, energy saving light bulbs or votes for women, didn’t care but a lot of people do. Almost every can of tuna I care to look for in a supermarket says dolphin friendly. 

That doesn’t make the tuna fish friendly though. As a vegetarian my concern is that it’s not very friendly for the tuna but beyond that the inhabitants of the seas are hardly doing a song or dance. Here are a handful of the problems:

•  Tuna stocks are declining or depleted in some areas.
  
• Fishing tuna can result in a bycatch (like fishy collateral damage) of fish, turtles, marine mammals and birds.
• Especially when Fish Aggregation Devices are used to attract tuna to a particular location. They don’t just attract tuna.
• Some species of tuna are becoming endangered due to fishing like the Northern Bluefin (picture courtesy of Wikimedia)

 
Luckily this is one of those areas where you can make a difference. As a vegetarian my perfect solution would be to stop eating fish but if you aren’t going to go that far (let’s be optimistic and say yet) you can still cut down on your tuna intake. A tuna sandwich is going to be a bit shit without it but pasta bake won’t suffer. Should you still desire to buy a can check out this list that Greenpeace has come up with: Tuna retailers league table. 

Wild Wednesday: Insects

This week's Wild Wednesday's theme is insects.




Bee, butterfly, more bees, cricket.

Fun at the farm

Courtesy of my friend Louise, two lovely stories about how our government is embracing GM crops. Joy. We're both wondering if this is a result of the Bush visit.

First up Brown pushes the EU to allow GM animal feed. Because the UK has such good a record when it comes to animal feed.

"Gordon Brown is calling on the European Union to relax its rules on importing genetically modified animal feed in a further sign of the Government's willingness to embrace the controversial technology. Mr Brown believes GM crops are vital to the attempt to cut spiralling food prices." From The Independent

And people should be eating the stuff too.

"Ministers have told The Independent that rocketing food prices and food shortages in the world's poorest countries mean the time is right to relax Britain's policy on use of GM crops." Also courtesy of The Independent

Now I have no fear of GM crops on the basis that they will turn me green and my grandchildren will have seven eyes. I admit that there is no scientific basis for thinking that. But that doesn't mean GM crops are a good idea.

They contaminate the environment. GM crops are made to grow and grow and grow. Through cross pollination and invasive growing habits they squeeze out local wild life. Plants are not able to grow and crops are covered with pesticides leaving the numerous wild flowers, insects, birds and mammals with... nothing. The increased pesticide use on GM crops leads to more pesticide resistant crops which don't stop growing on the farm. They take over the surrounding countryside altering the local ecosystem.

All this would created the interesting situation where wildlife would only be seen in cities and ornamental wildflower gardens. Both of which I heartily encourage but I'd like to have some countryside left too.

But will they save the world? Will we be able to feed more people with GM crops? Not according to Friends of The Earth (PDF)

"Despite more than a decade of hype and failed promises, the biotechnology industry has not introduced a single GM crop with increased yield, enhanced nutrition, drought-tolerance or salt-tolerance. Disease-tolerant GM crops are practically nonexistent. In fact, biotech companies have made a commercial success of GM crops with just two traits – herbicide tolerance and insect resistance –which offer no advantages to consumers or the environment."

In fact conventionally grown crops have better chances of increasing yield.

So what about farmers? Well I wouldn't like to say as I'm not one but from the outside it doesn't look good. With uniform seeds coming from a large agricultural firm prices are going up (that Friends of The Earth PDF again) These being the GM crops that will bring prices down. And with those wonderful patents of seeds companies can now go after farmers who save seeds. Making sure they get their wallets out every year. Home growers too. Monsanto is rather aggressive about it.

But what does it matter to me? I'm a vegetarian, does it matter what animals are fed? Yes, yes it bloody well does. From a vegetable lovers standpoint an acceptance of GM animal feed marks a growing acceptance of GM crops. Once GM crops are grown here well then we are in a pickle. The ecosystem will be altered and our food... well considering the contamination from GM crops in non-GM food that already goes on consumer choice will be rather dead.