This edition marks my last contribution to the Downsman reporting on events in the woodland. My working and personal commitments no longer allow me time for so much voluntary work and no doubt many of you are also fed up with the same old boring drivel! However I have enjoyed the last three years of articles, even though Geraldine Vincent nearly always has to remind me that copy was due yesterday! Writing 500 hundred words in half an hour or so is my new-found skill.
The Dormouse monitoring season is over once again and I am afraid that the news is not very good. Numbers are significantly down for the third year running and more importantly there are half the numbers of nests being built. Young families were quite hard to find and none in October, the peak month. The warm spell through the autumn has clearly been of help, as the smallest dormouse weighed over 15 grams, which is around 4 grams over the winter survival weight. Some were nearly twice that. As usual, some boxes were occupied by wood mice and the dreaded yellow-necked (they bite hard!) while one nest found last Sunday had been sat upon and squashed by a bird. Perhaps breeding was starting extra early in view of the warmth.
The survival of dormice in the wood will have to be addressed if this decline continues, before the population is so small that it cannot recover.
Birds also seem to be in very short supply. The damage to the breeding tits, outlined in a previous Downsman has contributed to the problem, but there are many fewer birds than normal. This seems to be because of sudden climate change, or possibly a lack of food, due to either the wrong weather at the wrong time or the wood being too dark and cold. Butterflies have been almost absent from the wood this year, except for a few isolated weeks in high summer. The very warm spell did not seem to make up for the cold Spring we had again this year. Changing weather patterns are clearly affecting the environment in all sorts of ways but we shall only be able to watch and see, being powerless to halt these variations, only react to them. The worry is that we will simply not react in enough time to reverse the damage. It only takes enough caring people to make sure that something is done. People power can make the difference!
I would like to thank all those from the village who have volunteered to help over the years; particularly Tim and Chris Reynolds for the invaluable help with dormouse surveys. Thank you also to the reader for not complaining about this particular TOG. Any queries, problems or damaged birds should be referred to the Warden at Arne, near Wareham, on 01929 553360.
I hope you all continue to enjoy a wonderful piece of ancient woodland.
The date is 8/11/01, and as I write, rays of sunshine stream in the sitting-room window, bouncing off the polished surface of the round table, which my grandmother gave me many moons ago after inheriting it from her grandmother long before that. There is no fire in the woodburner, nor is the central heating on, yet the room is cosily warm as I sit here writing and drinking a morning coffee. Outside though, it is somewhat different. A fairly blustery wind is blowing and according to the television news it has snowed as far south as London. Despite this, relatively few leaves have fallen from the trees immediately around us. Even the bigger heavier ones, such as those of the horsechestnut, sycamore and ash are staying put, although the elders have shed theirs. There is an excuse for this, as they are the first to show in spring.
Please excuse the delay, but I've been outside to confirm that what I am writing is correct. During my preamble in the garden, I confirmed my observations while also noticing that the chickens had made use of a stack of firewood, not burning it of course, simply sheltering from the wind, while sunning themselves. Also sunning themselves on the buddleia were two Red Admirals (butterflies not Russian Officers). It is now just after mid-day and the sun is still streaming in the window, and to justify the mention of its species, a Red Admiral has just tried to break a pane by flying full pelt into it. Its colours showing brilliantly, obviously in tip-top condition still. Perhaps there should be a calendar on an outside wall, as well as one in the kitchen, so that the wildlife knows what month it is, after all there does seem to be a lot of confusion nowadays. We may appreciate an increase in global temperatures, but the remaining species of our world appear to find it very difficult. The warm, wet summer and autumn have certainly paid dividends where plant growth has been concerned.
The corn harvest was reasonable, vegetable crops have been excellent, potatoes seem to have escaped the blight, despite the warm, humid conditions, apples and pears have given bumper yields (what a stupid time for the supermarkets to push foreign ones) and hedgerow plants have an abundance of fruit.
Blackberries (sorry, there was a delay there, I'd lost the ‘k’ again, I'm sure it moves around on this machine, it can't be me.), elderberries and rosehips have been so abundant that I have made wine from them. A word of warning though, the first two, no problem, but rosehips are a different proposition altogether. It is very easy to tread blackberries and elderberries but rosehips, they are something else, they do hurt the feet, particularly if a few thorns have found their way into the basket. To be serious, all berry bearing plants seem to have done well, including hawthorn, spindle (beautiful, pink four-lobed fruits), wayfaring trees, guelder rose, holly, cottoneaster, pyracantha, etc., etc.. Others, such as buddleia, the currants and lilac are either producing new shoots or buds that look as if they will burst at any moment, while roses almost universally, appear to be producing flower buds, although some don't actually open. Of the wild flowers, it is not at all difficult to find buttercups, daisies, herb Robert and white deadnettle in flower, while even soft weeds like fumitory and chickweed are flourishing.
14/11/01 Even after a considerable ground frost, Red Admirals are still visiting the buddleia, the latter incidentally still flowering and the surrounding trees have done little to divest themselves of their leaves, and it is these facts that bring me back to the title, "Woodcutts in Winter"…
The cleverer ones amongst you will be saying 'Whatever is he on about?’ as winter does not start until the winter equinox, whatever that is, According to the first definition in my dictionary of winter, it is the three months of December, January and February, then followed by spring, summer and autumn, all of three months duration. It then goes on to say that it is also the part of the year that isn't summer, i.e. the colder part. This makes life so much simpler, and since we have already done away with rush hour here in Woodcutts, it would seem sensible to rid ourselves of autumn and spring. As you will know, in the U.S.A autumn is known as the 'fall', presumably because it is the time that leaves fall from the trees; since this does not seem to be occurring now, it is only logical that autumn be abolished.
Since autumn goes, it is only sensible to disregard spring and go straight into summer, without having to sit around waiting for the world to wake up again, after all wakes can be such dismal affairs. Only recently have I been made aware of the origin of the wake, having lived in Ireland for several years I attended quite a few, had I known then what I now know, I would have not been so keen to take part. It all started many years ago, when drinking vessels were often made of metal, sometimes with a high lead content. Lead would be dissolved into the drink, imbibed, and the drinker would go into a deathlike coma. Because it was not clear if the person was dead or not, the body was put on the bed and family and friends sat around, to see if he would 'wake' up. If he did, all was well, if he didn't, hard luck, there was a funeral. Presumably if he awoke he would be offered a drink, while everyone sat around 'chewing the fat' or jawing, as country folk of the past tended to do.
Chewing the fat of course is an expression, describing the luxury of sitting in company and sharing in the lumps of fat bacon, produced from the pig reared in the sty down the garden. This would have been a major constituent of the countryman's diet, if he could afford meat at all. The pig would have been slaughtered in the garden, weighing anything up to twenty score, (a score being twenty pounds weight), in new money this would amount to approximately 180kgs. Today a porker is killed when it weighs in the region of 55kgs. so you can imagine how fat the original animal would have been. With it hanging from a hook in the kitchen ceiling, the host would have boastfully cut off lumps for the consumption by his guests, who would have chewed the fat between the odd word of conversation or jawing, i.e. opening his mouth to speak. I'm sorry but I must move on as I have just realised that I am well past slaughter weight.
What has all this to do with Woodcutts I hear you asking? The answer is of course come and see for yourself, especially if you like fat bacon, otherwise the answer is nothing, but I hope you enjoy reading this as much as I have enjoyed writing it.
May God bless us all.