Autumn is coming! There's dew on the grass in the mornings, the berries are ripening on trees and shrubs, and leaves are starting to drop. That lovely, distinctive, earthy, "wet leaves warming in autumn sunshine" smell is up too. I've been breathing it in deeply as I've walked around the Discovery trail this week, making the most of it.
I've really enjoyed admiring all the lush berries this week. Hawthorn seems to be having a very productive year with their bright red jewel-like berries shining on branches in big bunches. Guelder rose and dog rose also seem to be having a bumper year. When thrushes like fieldfare and redwing start to arrive from Scandinavia, they're certainly going to find a feast at Fairburn!
Hawthorn berries, rosehips and elderberries all on the Discovery Trail.
It wasn't just berries that I spotted on dog rose this week. My eye was drawn to a particularly bare looking stem on the Discovery Trail, and as I looked along the completely nibbled stem, there they were! A little cluster of larvae, happily munching away on the leaves. A bit of leafing through books and Googling, and they were identified as large rose sawfly larvae... aren't they beautiful!?
Pickup hide has been a good one for waders this week with black tailed godwit, redshank and snipe regularly seen. Spoonbill flash has seen ruff, golden plover, dunlin this week too and then three grey plover at Village Bay on Saturday morning. We even had the first corncrake seen on the reserve since 1964, on Sunday!!!!
Black tailed godwit thanks to Gordon Langsbury (rspb-images.com)
As you explore the trails in the coming weeks, take a closer look at dead wood if you spot some. There's plenty of fascinating fungi popping up, and will continue to in the next few months. As its notoriously difficult to identify different species, I embrace this and just admire from afar, the huge diversity of shapes, colours and textures that fungi produce. This one was spotted on a log that was brought in on the floods, near Pickup hide: