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Tag Archives: haws

Willsbridge Mill, Bristol

12 Friday Oct 2012

Posted by theresagreen in Local Nature Reserves, Nature, nature of woodlands, nature photography, woodlands

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ash keys, catscliffe woods, dark bush cricket, feather moss, haws, red berries, siston brook, spider's webs, willsbridge mill, woodland walks

I am currently staying in Bristol with my son and family, and as they always do when I am here, they make great efforts to take me out to places they know that both I and the children will enjoy.

Avon Wildlife Trust takes responsibility for 35 reserves within the Avon area, with a good few clustered closely around the city.

On Sunday we drove out to Willsbridge Mill, a Local Nature Reserve, which the website describes as  ” Set in a peaceful valley on the edge of Bristol, Willsbridge Mill is an impressively restored 19th Century Corn Mill and Long Barn, located within a stunning 22 acre nature reserve.” It continues ” This green oasis, which was once a bustling industrial site, now supports an amazing array of wildlife habitats – woodland, ponds, meadows, scrub, quarries and a demonstration wildlife garden, running along the fast – flowing Siston Brook. The reserve is home to kingfishers, dippers, owls, foxes, badgers, and bats.”

Dragonfly plaque

After several days of rain and general dampness, the ground in the wildlife garden was soggy and its plants bedraggled, there were a few pond skaters skimming over the surfaces of the ponds and a robin piping a few phrases of song, but apart from that there was little movement.

One of the trails around the reserve is the Sculpture Trail, which features ” striking environmental sculptures made from local materials”. There is also a sequence of attractive brass leaf-shaped plaques bearing different designs, which today were the only indicators of the wildlife that frequents the reserve in spring and summer.

Leaves are beginning to change colour and fall

The Ash tree – Fraxinus excelsior, bears its large single-winged seeds – also commonly known as keys, in large bunches

We followed the pathway to Hawthorns are laden with good crops of haws, but there were no signs of these particular ones being eaten yet.

Haws – the fruits of the Hawthorn

On the wooded side of the pathway, on a bramble leaf in a patch of sunshine a Dark Bush Cricket sat having a meal.

Dark Bush Cricket – Pholidoptera griseoaptera

The Dark Bush cricket is a common animal across the southern half of England, occurring in gardens, hedgerows and on woodland edges, where they can often be seen in quite large numbers sunbathing on bramble patches. Males are very aggressive, fiercely defending their territories against intruders. Females lay their eggs in late summer in rotting wood or bark crevices; the young crickets emerge 18 months later, so odd-year and even-year dark bush-crickets never meet.

Bramble festooned with gauzy spiders’ webs – a classic feature of damp autumn days

The pathway through Catscliffe Woods

Common Feather- moss-Kindbergia praelonga growing on a tree trunk

The stream that flows through the woodland is Siston Brook; it flows fast here and its energy once powered Willsbridge Mill’s water wheel. The stream rises five miles away at St. Anne’s Well, just south of the village of Siston and is a tributary of the River Avon, joining it at Londonderry Wharf, near Keynsham.

A fallen tree spanning the brook

A tree has fallen on one side of the stream bank arcing gracefully over the water to form a natural bridge. It has continued to grow, pushing out branches that now grow vertically from the original trunk; those that touch the ground have probably put down roots and appear to be growing as independent trees.

Steps lead temptingly to a higher woodland trail

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Red-berry trail

31 Wednesday Aug 2011

Posted by theresagreen in Bryn Euryn Nature Reserve, Nature of Wales, nature of woodlands

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cotoneaster in the wild, cuckoo pint, haws, hawthorn, hawthorn berries, poisonous berries, red berries, wild arum

11th August

I resumed my woodland walk, passing by a Hawthorn tree laden with red berries.

11/8/11-Common Hawthorn -Crataegus monogyna, fully laden with a crop of berries

Crataegus commonly called hawthorn or thornapple, is a large genus of shrubs and trees in the rose family, Rosaceae, native to temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere in Europe, Asia and North America.  They are shrubs or small trees, mostly growing to 5–15 m tall, with small pome fruit and (usually) thorny branches. The thorns are small sharp-tipped branches that arise either from other branches or from the trunk, and are typically 1–3 cm long.  The fruit, sometimes known as a “haw”, is berry-like, but structurally a pome containing from 1 to 5 pyrenes that resemble the “stones” of plums, peaches, etc.

11/8/11-Hawthorn berries, or haws

Hawthorns provide food and shelter for many species of birds and mammals, and the flowers are important for many nectar-feeding insects. Hawthorns are also used as food plants by the larvae of a large number of Lepidoptera species and haws are important for wildlife in winter, particularly thrushes and waxwings.

I have noted several cotoneaster shrubs growing throughout this site, which I have assumed to have arrived there via bird droppings as the shrub is not generally a native of Britain, but is widely planted in gardens.

11/8/11-Berries of Cotoneaster horizontalis

* * There is an indiginous native cotoneaster that is found growing only on the Great Orme: Cotoneaster cambricus (Wild Cotoneaster;  Welsh: Creigafal y Gogarth “rock apple of Gogath”) is a species of Cotoneaster endemic to the Great Orme peninsula in north Wales. It is the only species of Cotoneaster native to the British Isles. It has never been found naturally at any other location.

______________________________________________________

I very recently came upon the following on the ‘Plantlife’ website on the very subject of ‘escapee cotoneasters’:

Cotoneaster species

Non-native invasive plants.

Cotoneasters provide an important reminder that even with the best intentions of gardeners, the wind, birds and other animals can help plants to ‘escape over the garden wall’.

Plantlife is particularly concerned about four types of cotoneaster:

  • Hollyberry cotoneaster (C. bullatus)
  • Wall cotoneaster (C. horizontalis)
  • Small-leaved cotoneasters (C. microphyllus agg.)
  • Himalayan cotoneaster (C. simonsii).

What’s the problem?

These popular garden and landscaping shrubs are also popular with birds who enjoy the berries and spread the seed. This can spread cotoneasters in the wild, where they can be difficult to eradicate.

What are we doing about it?

Find out more about Plantlife’s invasive plant programme by clicking here

_____________________________________________________

Another probable garden escape is Hypericum – St. John’s Wort, also growing in various spots throughout the site and also now bearing red berries.

11/8/11-berries of St John's Wort-Hypericum

A native plant, the Arum lily or as I know it, Cuckoo Pint or Lords and Ladies, is also bearing bright scarlet berries now. I found them in a few places, mostly tucked almost out of sight beneath other shrubbery.

11/8/11-The poisonous berries of the Wild arum

Arum maculatum is a common woodland plant species of the Araceae family. It is widespread across temperate northern Europe and is known by an abundance of common names including Wild arum, Lords and Ladies, Devils and Angels,Cows and Bulls, Cuckoo-Pint, Adam and Eve, Bobbins, Naked Boys, Starch-Root and Wake Robin.

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