Late Summer Notes: A lament for summer's imminent passing!

30th August. One of the hottest days of the summer in London. Very hot sun which will go down early of course but when in the sky today had a lot of intensity. Not entirely unusual for this time of year of course. It's often fine and warm but the days seem to shorten very quickly even when the heat remains.  The exact opposite of the beginnning of summer when the days seem to lighten more and more quickly even though it's often rather nippy. The inexorable sense that summer is on it's way out is almost more intense with the summer determined to hold on and keep things hot. The older I get the more I lament the imminent disapearance of summer - perhaps the birds feel the same, they're very quiet today. Hardly seen anything, a dunnock or two and a blue tit, a few goldfinches twittering  and coming for dinner to their feeder - but if ever there was a case for living and enjoying the moment it's days like these where seeing is believing and believing is seeing. Summer is still here in this moment.  In this moment, it's beautiful, it's hot, it's still. And yet, I sense something. Maybe it's just me? What is it about human nature that makes us compare, judge and not just be. Of course conditioning plays a huge part but maybe circadian rhythms affect us more than we think and are not just for the animals.  Obviously our biological barometer noting the fading light, can't help but know that summer is on the way out. But it's our human side that gets emotional about it, I suspect the birds are not dwelling on it.

Goldfinches and Tits....

As a teenager I think I perhaps had a slight obsession with goldfinches. I don't remember seeing any in Glasgow, at the time they were more of a countryside inhabitant, in any case, my desire to see one remained unfulfilled and this obsession lead to an amusing prank, well amusing for me and Colin Dunlop anyway. We would interrupt our dreary Latin class by pretending there was a herd of goldfinches outside the classroom window. I would move to the side of the class that looked onto the garden, the teacher Grahame Dire Esquire as we called him, didn't have much control. I would leave it for a minute or two and shout excitedly to Colin, "Colin it's a herd of goldfinches" and he would dash across the class feigning excitement at the prospect, knocking chairs and tables out of his way. There never was a herd of goldfinches and there never will be, actually to be literal for a second. The collective term is a 'charm' of goldfinches. Collective terms rarely seem logical, more random. A flock of g

eese, a pod of dolphins,  a committee of vultures but charm works. Goldfinches are infinitely charming and having them in the garden daily as I do now thanks to a feeder that specifically attracts them is a treat. Worth waiting 25 years I’d say.
Now Tits, you say, they were less exotic, blue tits, in particular, also very charming were far more visible and always the first to arrive. The garden is dominated at the moment by the goldfinches and their brood and by lots of tits - the robin has gone into relative hiding and can be heard singing wistfully, an ominous sign that autumn is coming- blue, great, coal and another perhaps less well known and equally charming, the long-tailed Tit. They come and go, but the other night we had five at the suet feeder which was rather nice. The suet feeder has had a variety of visitors and is very popular, even the giant woodpigeon tries to have a go but risks falling off the branch (that'll learn it) but it's always nice to have a slightly less common guest. The Woodpecker last week, the long tailed tits this week. I wonder what the next surprise will be?

Nature Notes: The Twitcher

Nature Notes: The Twitcher: The garden is buzzing this morning though not so much with bees as birds. At least 4 blue tits, 4 goldfinches, a great tit or two, dunnock...

The Twitcher

The garden is buzzing this morning though not so much with bees as birds. At least 4 blue tits, 4 goldfinches, a great tit or two, dunnocks, robins, the woodpigeon feeding off the scraps that reign down on it's head from the seed feeder, blackbirds, the garden warbler persisting with the brambles though they're clearly tastless, the odd rogue magpie which looks like the Kargan from highlander due to it's lack of head plumage but most exctingly of all, the guy in the picture, a spotted woodpecker. Just appeared out the blue. Nature is truly extraordinary. How did it know there was food, there are no woodpeckers round here, it's not really woodpecker country. Once upon a time, on seeing this I would have texted this to my birder friend, Daniel Kirpatrick, as he was my only birder friend. Bird fanciers are a bit like acoholics in the sense that they're  don't necessarily want to people to know, it's a bit embarassing, but there's worse things to do than love the birds. Anyway, if the woodpecker comes back, great, as he 's a colourful addition to the garden, if he doesn't I might just consider it to be a passing visit from dat giant coircus strongman in the sky, Dan Koirkpatrick!

Mid-Summer notes...

Little nature journal...inspired by my childhood reading of Gilbert White's famous journal.
Mid- July 

Quite warm, will be hot later, shade keeps things cool at this time. First hot weather this year, more or less. Lots of bumblebees, liking all things purple and pink, sage flower, dahlias,  another purple one whose name escapes me…
Goldfinches, Tits, great, blue and the odd coal... lots of swifts, occasionally three or four of them come screaming down like jet fighters from Star Wars
No summer visitors in this garden this summer, -apart from a Blackcap back in the spring which came to the bird feeder until a female appeared then never saw either again, maybe Muswell Hill just not trendy enough or perhaps not enough native trees and shrubs for our picky summer birds

July 22^nd
Muggy and close last few days, though sun threatening to break through. Garden very quiet and still. Hear the odd goldfinch, there’s a wren floating about and the robin of course always at the seed feeder. Bumble bees numerous, honey bees less so, seem to see more when the sun is out….

Song thrush singing in Highgate wood this morning, extraordinary.

August 15^th
How times flies.
Been some decent weather since last post though no more hot weather usually pleasantly warm, last week was a little autumnal morning and evening though essentially very dry this last month or so…

Birds bit more active, the usual, still no summer visitors- except a warbler, a few times, probably a garden warbler due to its silver silhouette- apart from the the swifts up above though not so much recently. Lots of  bumble bees still, few honey bees, dragonfly couple of times emperor size though maybe a hawker-not being an expert is annoying at times-lots of wasps indicating their work is done or they're looking for food for their grubs…small common wasp, also see a wall mason wasp fairly regularly small and striking.

Beautiful day today, warm sun, clear blue skies, less wind than recently. Robin, goldfinches, dunnock, blackbirds, the woodpigeon which gets good pickings from underneath the seed dispensers so favoured the robin and dunnocks in particular...tits at feeders and long tailed tits (not actually tits in fact-but very endearing) came to feeder briefly. 

Remarked that haven’t seen chaffinches or greenfinches in the seven months since we moved here. Presumably due to the lack of native and mature trees.