The Times A Year in Nature Notes. Derwent May

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      Another loud spring announcement that can now be heard in the woods is the ‘cork-cock’ note of the cock pheasants. They make the call with their long tail pressed to the ground and their head held high, and follow it by energetically flapping their wings. The buzzing sound of the flapping wings can also be heard clearly in the silence of the woods, and they too answer each other.

      

8th February

      STONECHATS ARE CONSPICUOUS when they sit on the top of gorse bushes, on the tall, dead stems of hemlock in waste ground, and on fences in farmland. They are about the size of robins, to which they are related. The males are coming into spring plumage, with a shiny black head, a white half-collar and an orange-red breast.

      The females, which look like faded versions of the males, usually sit on a lower perch, beneath their mates. From their spying points, they watch out for insects moving on the ground below them, then drop swiftly down and take them. A few flies are now buzzing about when the sun is warm, and the stonechats will also fly up and catch these in the air. They have a sharp note like small stones being knocked together.

      Many of them are still wintering away from their territory in warmer spots that they have found, but they will soon be returning to heathland and to the gorsy seaside slopes that they favour. After that, some time early in March, the male will begin his sketchy little song. Gorse bushes have been in flower all through the winter, but the yellow pea-like blossom is now multipying on them.

      

9th February

      MOORHENS ARE BEGINNING to build platforms of reeds at the edges of rivers and ponds. Each pair builds several platforms, and one of them may be used later as the basis of a nest, but at present this activity is part of the pair’s courtship ritual. They also walk around each other with their beaks down and their tails turned up, showing off the white patches under the tail that look like a pair of traffic lights.

      At a distance moorhens look dull black but, in fact, they are dark brown above and deep blue beneath, with a red-and-yellow beak and green legs adding further colour.

      Ferns still provide some green in the bare woods. By the side of streams and ditches, there are often large, feathery clumps of male fern (this is the name of the plant, not the sex). Some of the fronds are still growing upright, some have jack-knifed with their top half drooping, some are old and brown and are already half-submerged in the water.

      On wet rocks and walls, and on hedge banks, there are tufts of hart’s-tongue, which has long, leathery leaves like straps, with the brown spores visible in rows on the underside.

      

10th February

      ONE OF THE first hedgerow shrubs to show leaves and flowers is the cherry-plum. Here and there bright green leaves are already appearing along the twigs, and the brilliant white flowers will soon follow. Cherry-plum is often confused with blackthorn because the flowers are similar, but the dense masses of blackthorn flowers come out well before the leaves, and the blackthorn twigs are far more spiny. Also, the blackthorn is unlikely to be in flower for another month yet. Tightly woven blackthorn hedges full of young twigs are like lines of misty purple along the field edges just now.

      Flocks of black-headed gulls are still out in the fields, all standing facing the wind so that their feathers do not get ruffled. In winter they spread all over Britain except onto mountain tops, and many come here from as far away as Poland or Russia. Some of them now have almost the complete chocolate-coloured hood of their summer plumage. They will soon be returning to their noisy nesting colonies, which are found not only among sand dunes and on saltmarshes along the coast but also inland on the reedy edges of lakes and tarns.

      

11th February

      LONG-EARED OWLS are mysterious birds that are found in most parts of Britain but are rarely seen. They normally come out at night, and during the day sit in the depths of bushes and trees. They can sometimes be detected looking out from these roosts with their cat-like faces. They stare at one with orange eyes, and if they are alarmed they raise their long ear-tufts. Even when the bushes are bare, the streaky brown body of these owls blends with the twigs and helps to camouflage them. At this time of the year they are most often found near the sea, where there may be several of them roosting in a single large bush.

      Short-eared owls have relatively unnoticeable ear-tufts. They hunt over marshes and lonely farmland for mice and voles, and are often out and about in daytime. They wheel round in the air, then flap and glide, with wings held in a V shape, just above the grass. They will take a small bird if they can. They sometimes come down to earth and crouch low. In summer they nest chiefly on moorland. There are more of them around in winter, since we often have large numbers of visitors from the continent.

      

12th February

      IN THE MOUNTAINS and along craggy coasts, male ravens are showing off to the females. They nose-dive from high in the sky, and sometimes even roll over in the air and glide on their backs for a moment. They will also soar around in wide circles.

      Although they are much larger than their equally black relatives, the rooks and carrion crows, the size of a distant bird in flight is often hard to judge. However, they can usually be picked out by their massive beaks and longer-looking necks. If they call, there is no mistaking them: they have a deep, vibrant croak that is almost as much like a rumble in the earth as a cry in the sky.

      The large leaves of cuckoo pint, or lords and ladies, are now coming up in many ditches. They are like glossy-green arrowheads, often stained with shapeless black blotches, and frequently growing in clumps. They will be followed before long by the distinctive greenish-white hood curling round a purple, truncheon-like spike.

      Growing about them in the ditches are young, fresh-green nettles (which already sting).

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