Here is Michael Walter's latest report:
A feature of the past few weeks has been the passage of siskins, a bird that is increasingly seen in our gardens, but more frequently in spring rather than during its autumn movements. This year flocks of up to thirty have been commonplace, though none seem to have lingered. The siskin breeds mainly in the north and west of Britain, its principal southern outliers being in the New Forest and Thetford Forest. Numbers have increased in recent years, so it is perhaps not surprising that more now appear to be nesting in Kent,with concentrations at Hemsted Forest (between Cranbrook and Rolvenden) and Lyminge Forest (north of Hythe), while several families with newly-fledged young were seen to the north of Canterbury this summer. Each autumnbirds from further north in Britain traditionally move our way, their numbers boosted by influxes from the continent,so the picture locally is getting more blurred, making it impossible to tell whether the recent flocks are of local, British or European origin.
Another, slightly more exotic finch, unlikely ever to be seen in most people’s gardens, is the crossbill. Like the siskin, it is a gregarious bird that frequents coniferous woods and has a very limited breeding distribution in Kent. It has nested in Blean Woods, but the progressive removal of maturing pines in order to return the reserve to a more natural state means that crossbill habitat is steadily being whittled away. However, there are still enough cone-bearing trees to attract occasional flocks, and recently a group of about 24 flew in. Their visits tend to be fleeting, so it doesn’t surprise me not to have seen a feather of them subsequently.
No book on ancient woodland is complete without an account of the wild service tree, which is reckoned to be a good indicator of natural woodland that has developed since the last Ice Age, and therefore, given its very limited powers of dispersal, likely to be growing in a wood that has never been cleared for agriculture. Blean Woods has its share of this iconic tree, though it has to be said that most specimens are decidedly puny, unlike some in Ham Street Woods that rival the oaks in stature.One particular individual has a special meaning for me, as I rescued it from an area of coppice way back in 1985. Having discovered it almost smothered in faster-growing sweet chestnut, I cut a halo of coppice stems around the tree to let inmore light. The tree demonstrated its gratitude by putting on virtually no growth, and now, thirty years later, it is still a fairly miserable thing, with a trunk circumference at breast height of only 18”. However, wild service does have one redeeming feature for, though when growing in the shade of larger oaksits autumn leaves remain a sulky brown, if luxuriating in full sunlight it is one of the few native trees to turn deep crimson in October. This display does rather make up for the tree’s refusal to turn into a prized specimen and, when the sun shone on its fiery foliage this week, I could forgive the tree its weedy appearance. Wild service thrives best on deep clay soils, but this individual is an outlier on exceptionally acidic, nutrient-poor gravel - henceits stunted state. Incidentally, the leaves look remarkably maple-like, but it belongs to the rose family and produces brown berries rather than helicopter seeds. Two more facts may be of interest: the name “service” comes from Latin cervisiam, meaning beer, as in the past its berries were fermented to make an alcoholic drink. The old country name for wild service was Checkers, so the numerous Checkers and Chequers pubs in southern England are probably named after the tree rather than the board game.
A photo of a siskin, taken by Dave Smith, is below: