Lily's Blog

Denis and I took the dogs for a walk ‘down by the riverside’, the river in question being the Shannon. There’s a great riverside walk which can be accessed through the UL campus. Here’s some photographs from the evening.

We met a number of pairs of swans along the river. Interestingly swans form pairs that last for many years, and can last for life. However genetic techniques are starting to show that ‘divorces’ are more common than previously thought among swans!

Another pair

And another

The importance of not having a stiff neck.

The dogs curious at first, bravely approached the swans but after lots of hissing … reconsidered, and retreated well back.

Other wildlife

There are some lovely fisherman’s huts along the riverside, in various states of repair. Here are some of the nicer examples.

Bridges along the way, old and not so old

Night began to fall

Plassey house, known as the ‘White House’ because because it’s … white and/or contains the offices of the President of the University. Originally the estate was owned by Robert Clive who renamed it Plassey after his victory in India. He later became Lord Clive of Plassey.

The house is three stories high, the third floor being cleverly hidden in the roof level.

Plassey House was the only building on the campus when Denis was part of the first intake of students to UL, (then NIHE) in 1972. That first year five courses were on offer; two in engineering, two in business and one in European studies.

Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery hand in hand,
For the world’s more full of weeping than you can understand.

W.B. Yeats

When does spring actually begin?

According to the calendar, it’s the first of February. In the US it’s the 21st March, the spring equinox. According to nature it’s beginning to happen around now.

Lambs are appearing

Photo owned by rs-foto (cc)

The hedgerows are beginning to green up

Snowdrops are plentiful

Tulip bulbs are bursting forth

Even some early daffodils have appeared

I think we can say spring has sprung … or at least is certainly springing.

I worked in Sligo for a number of years, leaving when I got married. I go back regularly as I still have a group of great friends there. We have all stayed in close contact over the years. Yesterday was my first chance to get back in a while. The day consisted of up early and a lovely drive through the country, which really looks great in the sunshine. This was followed by two hours over coffee with the girls, followed immediately by lunch with another friend and chat, four of us going for a long walk at Strandhill beach and chat, followed by dinner, more chat and stay over. Who says we can’t talk!

A very enjoyable day and great to catch up with everyone.

Last night over dinner, a friend said he was going out in the morning with another person doing a bird survey, leaving at 5.40am. Though it was quite late at this stage, I asked could I join them and so his wife and I decided to get up for the dawn chorus. I have been out a few times with him bird watching in Ireland and we spent a great week with them in France a number of years ago, going for long walks each morning with my friend pointing out all sorts of birds to us. I have learned what little bird knowledge I have, mostly from him.

I woke at 5.30, made myself coffee and was (appropriately) ‘bright as a lark’, by the time they got up! (I need coffee to wake up!)

We drove out the country on yet another beautiful morning. It had the feeling of ‘good to be alive’ about it.

The survey was part of the Countryside Bird Survey. Quoting the Birdwatch Ireland’s website
‘The Countryside Bird Survey (CBS) is a national project that monitors population trends of Ireland’s common and widespread breeding birds. It has been running since 1998. The main aim of the CBS is to keep tabs on changes in breeding bird populations from year to year and over long term periods.’

Basically the survey involves listing the birds found in a 1km square. A few hundred such squares are randomly selected across the country and competent bird watchers volunteer to do the survey on a semi-permanent basis. The survey involves two visits per year, one between early April and mid-May and the second between mid-May and the end of June. The area which he had to cover was interesting as it was quite varied, grassland, some of which was boggy and included a small lake.

More information on the CBS can be found here

I kept a list as they identified each bird. Fair dues to them, they had a spare set of binoculars for me as ours were at home. I got to see most though some were unseen as they recognised them purely by sound. This is the list:

Sedge Warbler
Snipe
Blue Tit
Willow Warbler
Stonechat
Pheasant
Hooded Crow
Wren
Chaffinch
Grey Tit
Swallow
Blackbird
Jackdaw
House Sparrow
Pied Wagtail
Meadow Pippet
Robin
Mallard
Swan
Tufted Duck
Little Grebe
Moorhen
Wood Pidgeon
Reed Bunting
Magpie
Whitethroat
Dunnock
Cormorant
Blackbird
Starling

30 in all. (I may have missed an odd one on my list.) It’s amazing how many birds they identified. Had I been on my own, a) I wouldn’t have spotted as many in the first place and b) would only have been able to name a fraction of them. We never need stop learning!

One thing they commented on was that a virus has hit and almost wiped out the Green Finch population which previously was a common bird.

I saw a lot of new wild flowers as this was a new habitat for wild flowers for me. I started listing and photographing some but quickly decided to stop as would miss birds. I did see Wild Iris, Ragged Robin and the Common Spotted Orchid. A thought struck me – wild flowers are easier to identify than birds. Wild flowers don’t ‘fly away’ and can be easily photographed!

We also saw frogs and hares (and donkeys and cows and calves).

We were back for breakfast at 9am. All in all a very enjoyable morning bird watching.

I left the dogs at home and continued my quest for wild flowers which can be seen on the 30 minute walk around our house. I wouldn’t describe it as surburbia, but it isn’t the heart of the country either. Wild flowers still abound though. I’m continuing the numbering from where I left off in Part 1.

14 Red Campion. (It has a hairy sticky stem, so says the book and yes it does)

15 Fern

16 Wild Rose

17 Ragwort

18 Thistle

19 This one looks like a purple clover but is a taller plant. Its leaves are very different to Clover. I think it is Knapweed.

20 The green plant on the left side in the following photo matches Goosegrass in the book. The book says ‘Scrambling plant of hedges. The prickly stems stick to clothes …’ In the middle is a dandelion clock which we used to blow as children.

I have numbered the following but don’t have names. If anyone knows, please leave a comment.

21 Willowherb (thanks Helen)

22 Stitchwort (Helen)

23 Dock (Helen)

24 Hart’s-tongue Fern (thanks Will and Helen)

25

26 I know there are buttercups here, but the single one?

Earlier in the year I saw Gorse, Bluebells and Honeysuckle in bloom. That brings the number to 29, though I wish I could name them all. I left out some, if the flowers weren’t clear enough.

Tom Doorley over at Megabites commented
The only worrying note has been the quietness of the bees. They are very few and far between this year. A world without bees is not possible, which is a chilling thought. Okay, I’ll spell it out. We need bees to pollinate all sorts of crops that are essential for human survival.

One very noticeable thing over the past few days has been the number of big tractors on the road, for silage cutting. In the good weather last week, they were out as late as 11pm. I hope for all the farmers’ sakes, the weather lasts long enough to get the silage finished.

I frequently take our two dogs for a walk, all three of us need the exercise. Having taken photographs of wild flowers in the field next door, I decided to repeat the exercise on our walk.

First up though let me clarify one point, who takes who for a walk? The following photo of our three shadows answers this question.

Well maybe, this makes it clearer who is in charge here

Barack and Charlie are in no doubt!

The following photos were quickly taken of wild flowers growing by the side of the road. (The dogs were confused as to what I was up to!) I was amazed as to how many wild flowers are out there, just a few steps from home. Please correct me if I get the naming of any of them wrong. I’m learning here!

And apologies for quality of some photographs, I’m only using the camera on my phone for the job.

1 Poppy

2 Rape. This is the wild flower that’s responsible for those beautiful yellow fields, you sometimes see, travelling across the country. When the sun is shining, I think these yellow fields look spectacular. The book says ‘Common on waysides, on bare ground, and in fields. Also grown as a winter feed for cattle … ‘

3 Dandelion

4 More nettles!

5 Daisies

6 Groundsel

7 Purple Clover (not in the book!)

8 White Clover

9 Buttercup

10 Bird’s Foot Trefoil

11 Tufted Vetch

12 Commom Speedwell

13 ‘Devil’s Porridge’

I went back out again to-night and found lots more. Same half hour walk. I have a plan.

Tomorrow night I will leave the dogs at home sleeping. It’s hard trying to photograph and identify wild flowers while two dogs, insist on licking me me all over when I stop, and at the same time I’m trying to keep them from getting run-over by passing cars.

The stress of it all!

Tomorrow night I’ll also bring a pen, great when the memory is dodgy!

I’m beginning to feel like Grannymar. I’m collecting wild flowers. She collects toyboys. We all have our collections!

A post by Tom Doorley got me thinking as I gaze out at the field beside our house. This field has been sold as a site on which a house will be built shortly. This afternoon I will take out my camera and see how many wild flowers I can see and try to name in that field.

One end of the field is a mass of buttercups but not the other. The only real difference between the two ends is that the ‘buttercup’ end is much wetter. Sure as ‘eggs are eggs’, when I look up wikipedia
Ranunculus is a large genus of about 400 species of plants …. It includes the buttercups, … The name Ranunculus is Latin for “little frog … This probably refers to many species being found near water, like frogs.

Isn’t the expanse of yellow just so cheerful!

I am armed with Usborne Spotter’s Guides ‘Country Walks’, 1985 edition, bought for young Collisons, cost 2.50 sterling!, all 64 pages. Pages 23 to 39 deal with wild flowers. I have other books of wild flowers but this is the most useful. The flowers are laid out by colour for children. Very useful for non-children also!

Because this was a grazed field up to recently, grass is still predominant. Years ago, when I was in secondary school and college, I had a summer job in Lyons Estate, which then was a research station for UCD Dept of Agriculture. It was a great summer job because a lot of time was spent in the outdoors. I was working as an assistant in the grassland section. My memory of that time is the variety of grasses. Timothy and Cocksfoot are ones I can recall.

Nettles, haven’t we all been stung by these many times?

Thistle though not in bloom

We referred to this as ‘Devil’s Porridge’. ‘The book’ calls it Cow Parsley.

Common Speedwell

When I had finished this, I went for a walk with the dogs. The one amazing difference was the variety of wild flowers I saw within ten minutes of home in the hedgerows, lots of different wild flowers, much more than in the field. I’ll do a post on these next.

The lack of diversity in the field next door is explained by Tom Doorley in his piece,
I mentioned, a while back, that we have let our fields struggle on without the aid of artificial fertilisers for several years. And that the resulting drop in fertility, keeping the grasses in check, has allowed a lot of wild flowers to flourish. I know that this is a luxury which few farmers can afford but I would like to think that, in every few square miles of the Irish countryside, we can let a couple of acres go fallow and allow the endemic flora to flourish.

So it seems that the field next door just needs to be given more time!

Later in the piece he comments,
This year, what has struck me most, is the buttercup crop. There are fields around here … which are veritable carpets of yellow. I just hope that it means a good summer.
I sincerely hope he is right and that that is what all those buttercups mean!

More weather like this weekend, yippee!