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Macro: As autumn beckons, ivy brings the bees 🐝

Daniel Greenwood3 Comments

East Dulwich, London, September 2023

On the corner of the street, a mass of ivy was spilling over a wall. It was an explosion of leaves and flowers, sound and smell. The flowers were alive with insects: hoverflies, honeybees, bumblebees, and that ivy specialist, the ivy bee. 

I hadn’t seen many ivy bees before, and wasn’t aware they were now so far into the centre of London. They nectared in a frantic fashion, with at least two having been captured by a massive garden spider that scarpered when it realised how close I was to its web.

At this time of year very few plants are flowering, and none like the ivy can. Even so, ivy in London has an awful reputation. People hate it, calling it a parasite and tree killer.

Some years ago a man gave me his opinion by leaning in and whispering that he had seen it sucking the sap from a tree, like it was some dark truth kept hidden from the world.

In reality it’s not a tree killer and it’s not a parasite. But like so many things in society now, people will believe what they want, regardless of the facts.

In a wood near to this jungle of ivy, mature growths of it have been found hacked and severed by visitors acting on their instincts without reason (or permission).

I remember a local tree surgeon unloading on me one morning when I was in the woods about to start a working day, telling me how terrible ivy was at that location. I was taken aback by the man’s strength of feeling and let him say his piece. When he had finished I asked if I could go and start my day’s work.

“You didn’t like that, did you?” he said.

Is it any wonder tree surgeons don’t like ivy? I’m sure many appreciate its place in the ecosystem, a habitat for bats, birds, insects and autumnal nectar for pollinators. But to a tree surgeon it makes your work so much harder, what is already one of the most dangerous and brutal jobs available in the UK. I suppose I had just expected someone who works with trees all day to have a little more imagination and ecological flexibility.

I’ve made the faux-pas while leading guided walks of talking about the value of ivy nectar to honeybees and been informed that it’s not so good for them. One very polite beekeeper corrected me and said that the nectar can crystallise too quickly in the hive and leave the bees to starve. For wild pollinators there is no such problem, of course. The beekeeper said the issue was mostly where the only nectar source was ivy.

Should ivy be cut off trees in some cases? Of course. But is it often framed for crimes it didn’t commit? Yes, all the time.

I remember driving with my parents through Ireland back in 2008, when I knew very little about trees. Ivy was everywhere and I worried it was going to harm the trees. I later learned that the story is different.

Ivy often grows on trees that are in decline, meaning more light comes through the canopy, encouraging the growth upwards. Then when the tree does die, there stands the ivy, ‘throttling’, ‘suffocating’, ‘killing’, as some hyperbolise. In high winds ivy can act like a sail, and trees do come down.

In my experience it is often life-giving.

People come to nature looking for absolutes, but just end up finding more questions and often being humbled. The trick is to embrace the ambiguity, your own lack of knowledge and mastery of any given subject.

Personally, I was thankful for that final flush of insect buzz on an unseasonably warm September morning. Who do I thank for that? That’ll be the ivy.

Thanks for reading.

Why do people hate ivy?

Unlocking Landscapes podcast: walking to Lough Conn with Seán Lysaght

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In September 2022 I had the privilege of walking through the woods of Enniscoe House in Co. Mayo, Ireland, to the shore of Lough Conn with Seán Lysaght. Seán is a poet and author who has taught me a great deal (through his books and poems) about the nature, landscape and heritage of County Mayo.

We cover a lot of ground and experience all the weathers, with Seán reading one of his poems at the close of the episode. It ends in dramatic fashion, with the rain sweeping in off Lough Conn and making further recording impossible.

This is fundamentally a conversation about woods and trees. We encounter a lot of different species which spur conversations about all kinds of things. We also discuss invasive species, bogs, Irish attitudes to nature conservation, and fit in a bit of wildflower identification on the shores of Lough Conn.

You can listen here:

You can see more of Seán’s work here and see the outline of the episode below. I hope you enjoy!

Recorded on 7th September 2022 at Enniscoe House and Lough Conn

  • Woodpeckers arriving in Ireland
  • Identify wych elm’s bristly leaves
  • Elm trees in Mayo
  • 2022 a good year for beech mast
  • How vital ivy can be in woodlands
  • Ivy is not a parasite
  • Beech trees in Ireland, a planted tree of demesnes
  • ‘The Big House’ landscape and differences with England
  • Definitions of rainforest
  • Tutsan and hypericums
  • Personal memories of chiffchaff in Kerry, other warblers
  • Moving from eradication to control with rhododendron
  • Coniferous plantations in Mayo
  • The appearance of ‘bog scrub’
  • Wild Nephin – Seán’s 2020 book about National Park formerly known as Ballycroy
  • New Leaf – Seán’s latest poetry book
  • Wild Nephin
  • Ballina bookshop: Pangur Bán 
  • Lough Conn and views of Nephin
  • Flowers found on the shores of Lough Conn
  • Bog myrtle’s use as bath oil and its folklore in Ireland
  • How wildlife is faring in Nephin’s conifer plantation
  • Future management of lodgepole pine and sitka spruce
  • Mayo’s dry summer of 2022
  • Irish views of natural landscapes
  • The role of bogs in preventing climate breakdown
  • Bogs as ‘wastelands’
  • Cutting turf in peatlands – sustainable practices versus mechanised extraction
  • Herons crossing Lough Conn
  • Seán’s hopes of seeing a newly-introduced sea eagle on Lough Conn
  • Reintroduction of sea eagles, progress in Kerry, West Cork and Co. Clare, and the Shannon

Links:

Can you really ‘transplant’ an ancient woodland?

Daniel Greenwood12 Comments

I was listening to Nicky Campbell’s BBC Radio 5 Live call-in the other day when a comment from one of the guests stopped me in my typing tracks. The subject was whether the government should ditch the midlands/northern leg of High Speed Rail 2 (HS2) from Birmingham to Manchester, which they now have scrapped.

The rail expert said that he had ‘regrown an ancient woodland’ with acorns from a felled or cleared site during the creation of High Speed 1 (HS1), the line that runs from Kent to London St. Pancras International. There was no confirmation of which woodland the man was talking about.

Nicky Campbell did question this clearly unusual comment about ‘ancientness’, but it wasn’t final and the rail expert had the last word. Let’s look at the facts.

Wood anemone, an ancient woodland indicator plant

Ancient woodlands are wooded landscapes home to assemblages of particular species relevant to their locale (trees and wildflowers, fungi, invertebrates) that have been on maps since the year 1600. Their soils are rich in fungi and invertebrates, ecosystems that have developed over a very long time.

So is it possible to remove this landscape and put it somewhere else?

HS2 has been trying. They have been moving soil and, apparently, in some cases trees. This method says so much about our relationship with landscapes today – we can just move things around like pieces of Lego, and surely everything will be fine?

In my view, the equivalent of this is wheeling a patient out of a hospital and leaving them in the car park. ‘There you go,’ the doctors might say. ‘Consider yourself replanted.’

It’s like taking the Mona Lisa and chucking it into the sea.

To some ecologists it’s just beyond belief.

What is so problematic about this rail expert’s statement, beyond the obvious? It’s greenwashing from people, intentional or not, who profit from development of ancient woodland, or who think their expertise in one area allows them free reign elsewhere. I’m sure there are housebuilders out there lamenting environmentalists who think they are also experts in constructing properties.

This kind of greenwashing is a green light for bad planning, dodgy development and accelerated destruction of England’s already depleted wild and natural places. I think it’s important to challenge it when it does rear its head. Once an ancient woodland and all its wildlife and heritage is gone, it’s not coming back.

Thanks for reading.

Somewhere between a cuckoo and a high speed train

Woods under threat from HS2 – The Woodland Trust

Brighton, September 2023

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Brighton, Sussex, September 2023

I’ve been visiting Brighton since I was a child on family holidays and it holds a special place in my photographic life as well. The sea at Brighton and Hove’s beaches are some of the places where I began to take landscape (seascape!) photos, using a Nikon F film camera.

Thanks for reading.

Also: Set: London to Brighton | Set: Hove beach

August mushrooms in the New Forest National Park 🐴

Daniel Greenwood3 Comments

New Forest National Park, Hampshire, August 2023

I was in the New Forest National Park camping for a couple of nights in August. The rainy July in southern England gave me great hope of finding some nice shrooms in what is one of England’s mushroom wonderlands. It didn’t disappoint!

Bolete bonanza

I was so happy to find these boletes, one having already been uprooted. They were the perfect shape and just an absolute joy to see. I have been told these are ceps, but I’m not entirely sure if they’re not another species. I’m unclear on the variety among cep-like boletes, and if the colouring isn’t indicative of another species.

These lovely yellow-pored boletes are in the genus Xerocomus.

About half a mile or less away we found this beauty sitting alone among the grass and leaf litter. It’s an orange bolete. It doesn’t appear to have a distinct association with one species of tree, but this area was common in oak and birch.

Much later that day, on the return stretch, we found this well-camouflaged group of what I am sure are ceps due to their colouring and other diagnostic features.

You can see the distinctive webbing on the stipe here, and the pennybun cap is all you need really:

As the evening drew in, I found this orange bolete that may have been picked by a deer (there was a herd in the area).

Webcaps

Earlier in the day, while passing between two plantations on a grassy ride, I noticed this uprooted mushroom on the ground. Two bites had been taken from it, probably by deer or a small mammal. The remnants of the veil between the cap and stipe, covering the gills, gave me the thought that this was a webcap. The gills were very beautiful, embellished by the water droplets.

iNaturalist has come back with an ID of webcap subsect ‘Purpurascentes‘. I can’t find any other info on the subgroup distinction.

Rustgills

Rustgills are a group I’m not particularly familiar with. Having developed my fungi knowledge in isolated city woodlands, I didn’t really see rustgills until I moved to Sussex and spent time in larger areas of woodland. This patch was unavoidable. No wonder there is a species known as the spectacular rustgill.

Rustgills are in the genus Gymnophilus. They’re confusable with scalycaps (Stropharia) due to shape and colour.

Chantarelles

And finally some golden chantarelles, already nibbled by slugs and uprooted, probably by deer (as I have said 1000 times in this post!).

The New Forest has a “no pick” policy and there are concerns about illegal, commercial-scale picking for posh restaurants, just FYI. All of these mushrooms had already been “naturally” uprooted (probably by deer).

Thanks for reading.

Fungi

Fungi walk at Bramshott Common – 21st Oct 2023

Daniel GreenwoodLeave a comment

I’m pleased to be leading a fungi walk with the Heathlands Reunited team in the South Downs National Park this October:

Date/time: Saturday 21st October 2023, 11am

Location: Bramshott Common, Hampshire (near Haslemere)

Bramshott is in Hampshire, close to the border with Surrey and not far from West Sussex.

You can book a ticket (£3 admin charge) via Eventbrite.

I posted about Bramshott Common last year:

Basketful of Boletes

Earpick fungus in Hampshire

This walk will be a good way to learn about the common species of fungi in woodlands, their ecology and cultural significance. Though we won’t be picking mushrooms to eat, there will be some guidance around edibility generally as a safety guide. This is a great site for fungi with a lot of the ‘big-hitters’ and other unusual species to be found.

Thanks for reading.

Fungi

Night photography: Milky Way in Mayo’s dark skies, August 2023

Daniel Greenwood4 Comments

Mayo, Ireland, August 2023

Here are my recent astro photos from Mayo’s International Dark Sky Park. County Mayo is of course in the north-west of the Republic of Ireland.

During this short period of skywatching I saw a meteor streak across the sky. It was amazing.

The weather on this trip was typical August in Ireland – rainy! Luckily there was a couple of clear hours one night, and the Milky Way was clear to the naked eye.

Here’s the view south with the Milky Way stretching across the sky. The shapes at the base of the photo are a conifer plantation. The light pollution is coming from the direction of Foxford.

I love the images of a glowing window with stars above. Here you can see the plough (Ursa major) over the rooftop.

Thanks for reading.

Fungi: Bedgebury Pinetum – one of the best places for fungi in England? 🌲

Daniel Greenwood3 Comments

Bedgebury Pinetum, Kent, September 2023

Disclaimer: this blog is now riding high in the search engines under the tag ‘Kent Fungi’ (not sure why, to be honest). On the back of this Forestry England contacted me to ask for me to point out to any readers that foraging is an offence, or more specifically:

‘Bedgebury Pinetum is protected by Forestry Commission bylaws that prohibit the damage or removal of any plant on site.’

While this is a photography and mycology post and not a foraging blog, it’s important that if you do go looking for fungi at Bedgebury that you don’t get caught out. Regardless of the fact that fungi are not plants, I think that byelaw must include fungi for some taxonomically archaic reason. I’ve written about this wider issue here. Thanks.

I visited Bedgebury Pinetum in Kent for the first time in early September 2023. It was impressive to see a noticeboard highlighting the Pinetum as one of ‘the best places for fungi in the country’!

Here’s the proof:

It has 12,000 specimen trees and a ‘world-leading collection of conifers’

Tell you what, though – they were not wrong about the dragonflies. The most impressive sight of the visit was dragonflies swarming on the margins of a field of, erm, monkey puzzles! Here’s the video:

It was dry and rather hot so I don’t think the Pinetum was at its best in the funga stakes, compared with the dragons.

As usual, I wasn’t there to forage, just to photograph. I don’t think Forestry England are fans of foraging on their sites. One of the first sightings of the visit was that common species in this part of the world – sulphur tuft.

I haven’t seen brick or conifer tuft yet, to my knowledge, so was wondering if this landscape where conifers were so dominant might change that. Looking at the gills and the caps, I don’t think I’m there yet.

Here’s the nice early stages of a bracket, which I haven’t identified yet. Might be a mazegill.

Tawny grisette is a lovely early Amanita. There were a couple at Bedgebury.

I have cobbled these together, even though they’re in different stages. I think they’re in the Clitocybe group, and are very likely funnels. The habitat and seasons are right, and the features look right (gills). It seems that there has been a taxonomic shake-up with this group, but it’s beyond this blogpost (and author!) to go into detail on that. Please comment if you have any suggestions.

It’s easy enough to plop these mushrooms into the ‘dungi’ category, and am confident that they’re mottlegills (Panaeolus). I’m half suspicous that the pale-capped shroom is a yellow fieldcap, rather than a saturated older fruiting body, just hanging out in the dung.

I haven’t done much work on trying to identify these yet, but they look like a group I am not familiar with. They were growing under an unusual type of turkey oak, but I don’t think there will be a mycelial connection there. Then again, what do I know.

So was it one of the best places to see fungi in England? I have no idea, but it will definitely be a good place to visit in the autumn months. Bear in mind the car parking fee is about £14, and I don’t know about public transport links in the area.

Thanks for reading.

This is a version of a previously-published post on my fungi blog.

Fungi

You may also be interested in:

#FungiFriday: 10 miles of mushrooms in the New Forest

Books: Owls of the Eastern Ice by Jonathan C. Slaght 🦉

Daniel GreenwoodLeave a comment

Ever felt you couldn’t sleep at night because elves were tickling your feet? 

No? You obviously haven’t lived alone in the remote forested regions of eastern Russia. Then again, most of us in the ‘Western World’ never will. Judging from Owls of the Eastern Ice, that sounds like a good thing, it must be said. 

So here we have the tonic to the ‘My Search for insert species‘ books that dominate the ever-growing nature writing bookshelf. It’s the story of years of scientific research trips conducted by American PhD student Jonathan C. Slaght seeking the endangered Blackiston’s fish owl of far eastern Russia, before their illegal war and genocide in Ukraine began (Russia, not the owls).

But it’s not necessarily the owls that draw the most interest here, it’s the people:

People arrive at the author’s shabby accommodation with bottles of ethanol (and sometimes cleaning fluid) as their ‘poison’ of an evening.

A local man shows up drunk, having been that way for days, perhaps weeks.

Bottles of vodka are sold without caps but instead foil tops, as it’s rude not to finish a bottle among strangers.

Anatoliy, a man who lives in a cabin in a remote part of the woodlands the author is surveying, says he can’t sleep at night sometimes because the elves tickle his toes. He is said to be hiding out after a business deal with dangerous Vladivostok people went awry.

Blackiston’s fish owl by Takashi Muramatsu

There are the hunters and the poachers (poaching being extremely frowned-upon), the young lad who admits to shooting a fish owl to provide meat for his trap. An endangered bird killed for scraps by someone who doesn’t know better. Though it has to be said it’s not the same for all the hunters who appear in the pages of the book. The author fumes at the news, but what can he do? Work harder, complete his project and get his conservation scheme approved.

One of Slaght’s recurring themes is the viscousness of poverty, which leads local people to brutalise starving deer wandering into the villages when a terrible snow storm strikes.

Then there are the loggers expanding their roads and business into the old growth forests likely never touched by forestry of this scale and intrusion. Thankfully (spoiler) the author does conclude that the logging companies work with his findings to help preserve the owls’ habitat and feeding areas.

Even the despot Putin gets a mention for his conservation interest in the Siberian tiger (there are no tigers in Siberia, and should really be called ‘Amur tigers’), more evidence that even the most vile public figures will use nature to embellish their popularity. That man has since visited ecocide on an epic scale in Ukraine.

Tigers stalk the pages of this book like mythological creatures, but still the focus of persecution from fearful and poorly-informed locals.

I loved this book (sent to me by my friend Eddie, thanks!). It’s probably not for everyone due to the talk of surveying and monitoring, the detail of the owl’s territory and behaviour. But the stories of the people who could either threaten or salvage the lives of these precious birds, are perhaps what really bring the book to life. An absolute classic of the bird writing genre, if there is one.

Thanks for reading.