Spotted, August 2021

by Jenny Seale | Nov 20, 2024 | Article, Spotted

SPOTTED!

Wildlife in (and around) Hailsham

by Tim Fox

Some months back, I wrote about a buddleja in our garden that was not only self-service nutrition for bees and butterflies via nectar, but also to aphids via sap. This year, eagle-eyed Ann spotted something else helping itself to a cutting of the plant. The first clue that some-thing was feasting were the holes in the leaves. Suspecting slugs or snails (there have been quite a few after the wet month of June) the culprit was, much to my surprise, a caterpillar. Brightly coloured white, yellow and black and with a funky face mask, four caterpillars of cucullia verbasci (better known as the mullein moth) were merrily munching away, oblivious to what fate lay ahead of them. One option was to change their dimensions by making them much wider and significantly less tall, but this option wasn’t favoured by 100% of the household, so plan B was enacted: transfer them to the larger buddleja where their feasting would cause less damage. Over the course of the next two weeks, I played spot the caterpillars, which were usually located by their barrel-shaped poop. Eventually, having grown to well over an inch in length, the caterpillars disappeared one-by-one. I’d like to think they went to find a safe place to pupate, but I’m not ruling out one or two of them having been turned into snacks for the second brood of hungry blackbird chicks in our clematis. The adult blackbirds have been quite adept at catching moths as well, so those caterpillars that do successfully pupate into the moth best find a very safe place to hide up during the day.

Big Butterfly count is now well underway and runs until August 8th. Mullein moth is not one of the three species of moth to watch out for but, along with seventeen species of butterfly, keep an eye open for moths species Silver Y (mottled brown moth with small letter “y” on its wings), Six-Spot Burnet (black with red spots on its wings) and the drop-dead gorgeous Jersey Tiger (black wings with white stripes and red/orange hindwings). More details at butterfly-conservation.org

Photo credits: Tim Fox

Tim can be found most Saturday mornings gracing the airwaves with Pat Bradley on 95.9 Hailsham FM, discussing local happenings between 8 and 10am.

Spotted, September 2021

by admin | Sep 1, 2021 | Article, Spotted

SPOTTED!

Wildlife in (and around) Hailsham

by Tim Fox

I took the plunge this year in attending one of the many outdoor keep fit sessions held around the Hailsham area. For me, still stuck working from home 100% of my working time, not only is it a chance to get out of the house for some fresh air, along with face-to-face socialising (at suitable distance) and getting some of my 150 minutes weekly exercise, it was also an opportunity to go birding somewhere new. I saw my first and last swifts of the year at Tuesday evening sessions at Western Road recreation ground and, over the course of three months clocked up another 21 species, including greenfinch.

Greenfinch (scientific name chloris chloris, derived not from the mythological nymph Chloris but instead from Greek Khloris meaning, amongst other things, green) used to be a common site on our birdfeeders but, as with chaffinch, their population dropped significantly from 2006 onwards due an outbreak of the parasite trichomonosis gallinae, the infected birds suffering with swelling in the neck; eventually they die of starvation as they cannot swallow food.
About the same size as a house sparrow, but with less variable plumage, the male is a bright olive green, the females and young closer to brown, with all of them showing yellow bands in the wing. The beak is conical and heavy looking, which is great for cracking open seed shells, including sunflower.

In Spring, there is usually one tweeting and trilling away in the top of the trees of Cortlandt (stop number 11 on the Hailsham Heritage Trail), and sometimes I am lucky enough to hear one fly over home but, one Tuesday evening recently, whilst flat on my back doing bicycle crunches at Western Road, I was treated to a family flyover with one adult being chased by three hungry offspring all demanding to be fed. I’m sure Andrea (the instructor) didn’t notice me miss a few peddles as I enjoyed the avian spectacle.

Pic: Credit Wikimedia Commons

Tim can be found most Saturday mornings gracing the airwaves with Pat Bradley on 95.9 Hailsham FM, discussing local happenings between 8 and 10am.