30 Days Wild 2021 – Day Twenty-nine.

Posted on June 29, 2021 by Christine Lucas

Day 29: For today’s 30 Days Wild, I’d planned to tune into The Wildlife Trusts’ Wild LIVE: Bringing Back Beavers, however it has been postponed. Beavers went extinct in the UK during the 16th Century. For the past 20 years The Wildlife Trusts’ have been at the forefront in restoring beavers back to the rivers they once inhabited. This Wildlife Trusts’ talk was to celebrate the reintroduction of this ecosystem engineer and why beavers are so essential in the restoration of nature in the UK.

wild live

Here’s some facts on the Eurasian beaver.

The beaver (Castor fiber) was a semi aquatic mammal native to Britain before it was hunted into extinction for its fur and castoreum, a secretion used in perfumes and medicine. They are a keystone species due to their positive influence on the environment. They prefer freshwater habitats. They dig canal systems, coppice trees and shrubs, and create wetlands which in turn has enormous benefits on other species such as otters, fish and birds. As they create their environment, their influence can be seen in the reduction of flooding, increased water retention and cleaner water.

Eurasian Beaver from the Northwitch Guardian

Their home is called a lodge, made up of sticks and branches and they live in small family groups. They are herbivores and willow bark, twigs and leaves are their favourite foods. Beavers are a large mammal weighing in at around 30kg and are as large as a Labrador. Their teeth are orange due to the protective iron enamel and like all rodents they grow continuously throughout their life. They are crepuscular meaning active during dawn/dusk, and can remain underwater for 15 minutes. There are currently eight beaver reintroduction projects across the UK with several more upcoming.

Have you ever seen a beaver in the wild?

Thanks for reading, and stay wild!

Christine xx

30 Days Wild 2021 – Day Twenty-eight.

Posted on June 28, 2021 by Christine Lucas

Day 28: A new series for 30 Days Wild 2021, Mindful Mondays, were we take time out of our busy days and slow down, breathe and experience nature each sense at a time.

Spider Warning:

Today’s theme for Mindful Monday is: stop, observe and wonder at the intricacy of a spider’s web.

The web in question doesn’t look that intricate but the web owner is quite spectacular.

Spider and web

I think it is a giant house spider enjoying the warm weather and abundant insects in my yarden. House spiders spin sheet like webs and is one of our fastest invertebrates. Their body length can be up to 1.8cm, with a leg span of 7.5 cm. They can be seen all year round, but mostly in autumn when the males come into houses looking for females. After mating the females eat the males. Females can live for several years and both males and females can go without food and water for several months. They feast on small invertebrates such as flies, mosquitoes and bees, and are very good pest controllers in the house.

Do you like spiders or like me learning to get over an irrational phobia?

Thanks for reading, and stay wild!

Christine xx

N.B. Thanks to the Wildlife Trusts’ website for the above information.

30 Days Wild 2021 – Day Seven.

Posted on June 7, 2021 by Christine Lucas

Day 7: A new series for 30 Days Wild 2021, Mindful Mondays, were we take time out of our busy days and slow down, breathe and experience nature each sense at a time.

Today’s theme for Mindful Monday is to visit a wild place. Over the weekend I decided to visit the RSPB’s Burton Mere on the Wirral. Since David has a new camera he let me take out his old Nikon. It was my first time using a SLR so some of my photos weren’t great but I did get some decent shots of a shelduck, reed warbler and black headed gull chicks. There was a strange gurgling sound from trees high up in the canopy and a host of spoonbills were sunning themselves there. They are curious birds and were getting a lot of attention from the visitors that day.

christine the photographer

spoonbills

Burton Mere

shelduck

black headed gull chick

reed warbler

black headed gull and chick

During our visit we had a fly by from a secretive bittern but both David and I were too slow to photograph this enigmatic bird.

While walking the boardwalks there were many bees buzzing around and small white butterflies fed on green alkanet, which is a very popular plant for insects. The sound of warblers punctured the sun baked air with their shrill calls and squabbles between coots and moorhens were abundant.