On entering Pony Wood we spent some time looking closely at hazel. It was interesting to discuss the different things we noticed, as well as the similarities. It can be so easy to get wrapped up in our own world view, so seeing things from someone else’s perspective increases our connection, and widens our horizons.

We then heard some noise in the trees and I realised this was a sound I knew from the South East; ring-necked parakeets! These gregarious and brightly coloured birds have been spreading north from releases in the home counties since the 1960s and have been very successful. My initial reaction was one of concern as these are considered an alien invasive species and can compete for food and resources with our native birds. But it’s not their fault.

Side note: Ring-necked or rose-ringed parakeets originate from tropical north Africa and the Indian sub-continent, with established populations across much of north-western Europe and elsewhere in the world. This is the UK’s only naturalised parrot species. There is evidence of competition for nesting sites (and fatal attacks) on the great noctule bat in Europe. It is also widely accepted that they aggressively compete for nesting sites with other birds, e.g. starlings, woodpeckers, owls and nuthatches. Whatever the effect of this bird, it’s here to stay, and on a cold and drab winter’s day, they certainly brought colour, noise and interest.

As we walked down through to the bottom of the wood we had wonderful views of a treecreeper (see Poetry Corner, below) and a close encounter with a jay (see image, right, by Chris Armstrong) which was noisily announcing its presence.

Image of a Jay (Garrulus glandarius)  © by Chris Armstrong.

The jay is our most colourful member of the corvid (crow) family, and is associated with oak woodlands – they can be seen with a heavily filled crop (expandable pouch) in a mast (unusually large number of seeds) year!

Moss (Grimmia sp.) on a wall at Fairfield Nature Reserve. Photo © by Ros Jones.

Mosses are remarkably well adapated to their environment. This species forms dense cushions which help to retain moisture and the long, white, hair-like tips to its leaves help to increase surface area for capturing moisture both from rainfall and dew/mist. The leaves will also curl inwards as it dries, preserving the last bits of moisture.

Grimmia are a common family of mosses, found on walls. Species can be tricky to identify from each other (some requiring microscopic examination of cell structure!).

We stopped for quite a while at the bottom of Pony Wood to look at the feeding tables, noticing that a section of the hedgerow has recently been laid. The cut scrub has been left in piles adjacent to the hedgerow, providing cover for the wintering birds coming to feed in the field.

The low tables that are regularly refilled with food (and the cage for smaller birds to exclude, e.g. pigeons and corvids) attracted a range of species, including chaffinches, blue tits, great tits, blackbirds, reed bunting and robins. 

We stood for a couple of minutes, facing the warmth of the sun: in this spot we were quite sheltered from the cold wind, so it was a lovely moment. When we close our eyes, our sense of hearing comes more into focus, and it was lovely to listen to the blue tits in the trees above us, calling to each other.

As we moved on from the wood, we stopped and took a close look at some moss on the wall, marvelling at this miniature world and the tenacity of moss to survive some seriously harsh conditions.

Side note – I’ve been reading up quite a lot on mosses in Robin Wall Kimmerer‘s excellent book, Gathering Moss. Having studied botany 20-odd years ago and used moss test species in my PhD, it is lovely to come back to these remarkable organisms. They are so well adapted to drying out (see the New Year’s Day walk report for more information), but physics also plays a role in them retaining moisture as their stature means they sit beneath the boundary layer where the air is more still, warm and humid.

The last stretch of our walk, took us along the lane back towards either Willow Lane or the Orchard. This high-sided, sheltered stretch showed signs of the warm winter and early spring with cow parsley, cleavers, red campion and other species already well advanced.

Treecreeper, treecreeper: it’s exactly what you do,
Creeping up trees, searching for food.

Little white bellies and cryptic brown backs,
Your feet & curved beaks help you find snacks.

You creep, like a mouse, ’til you reach the tree’s top,
Then with a ‘tseep’ to the base of the next one you drop.

Treecreeper, treecreeper, it’s exactly what you do.
It’s always a joy to catch sight of you.

Poem © by Ros Jones (05-02-2026).

Image of treecreeper, (right) © by Chris Armstrong

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As we turned onto the cycle path at Quay Meadows we soon noticed a few birds and bird songs, and there was quite a lot of activity. On such a cold morning (and after an unseasonably warm start to winter), the birds were in need of food to help sustain them.

As we paused below the Priory to talk about the cemetery (it extends all the way down to the cycle path, although with fewer headstones on the steep hill), we heard a commotion above us and saw a sparrowhawk (like the female here, by Chris Armstrong, a local wildlife photographer). It landed briefly in a tree, before being chased off again, and we gained a glimpse of a second bird. I wonder if they are starting to pair up ahead of the spring?

Side note – In many bird of prey species, the female is significantly larger than the male. Why? As apex predators, they are reliant on availability of their prey, and, if they are competing with each other they are less likely to be successful. So, with different sizes, they occupy slightly different niches (in terms of prey size).  The sparrowhawk shows one of the largest differences (dimorphism) in size between the sexes, with females u to 25% larger, and picking prey items up to 2.5 times larger. A study from 2021 (summarised in The Scotsman) indicated that females had a preference for wood pigeon, whilst the smaller (and therefore more agile) males took mostly sparrows (as their name suggests!) and starlings.

Shortly after this, as we continued on along the cycle path, I heard the call of a goldcrest, which suddenly appeared before us, low down in a shrub. For any keen birdwatchers out there, you’ll know that this is a pretty rare occurrence. Normally, these busily-active little birds are found high up in evergreen trees. So this was a particularly magical encounter.

Side note – not sure if this is apocryphal, but a quick internet search suggests that goldcrests were considered to be symbols of luck, fortune and even spiritual guides. True or not, I rather like the thought that this is how our year started!

After watching the goldcrest for a couple of minutes (close enough that we could see its crest without the aid of binoculars) we carried on along our walk, stopping to take a look at the river Lune near Millennium Bridge before continuing on up the path towards the Priory.

We concluded our walk taking time to notice what we could see on the wall at the bottom of the Priory steps. Spotting ferns, like this one (a species of polypody), mosses, lichens and ivy-leaved toadflax.

On New Year’s Eve I had been reading Gathering Moss by Robin Wall Kimmerer, and she described how mosses are unable to regulate their levels of water which is known as poikilohydry (unlike most ‘higher’ plants which are homoiohydric, i.e. able to regulate through means such as closing leaf pores to reduce water loss). 

Side note – you may have heard the term poikilothermic in secondary school biology. It refers to animals that cannot regulate their temperature, such as reptiles. This is why snakes bask in the sun, to gather energy for the day ahead. Mammals and birds, however are homeothermic, able to regulate body temperature through e.g. panting and sweating or shivering.

For most plants, drying out completely would mean death, but for these little miracles of nature, it just means they go into suspended animation. They are unable to grow as they cannot photosynthesise, but can be revived with water decades after they have dried out.

This felt like a wonderful metaphor for going with the flow, and a lovely way to end our walk: I look forward to going more with the flow of nature and the seasons this year.

Happy New Year everyone.

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A fruit-full walk, despite the rain

The summer warmth was very much still with us, but the glowering skies and ripening fruits were clear indicators that autumn is inexorably on its way, and we soon had a short-lived dousing of rain.

The beauty of Fairfield Nature Reserve is ever-changing and no two walks there are ever the same. This is what I love most about being out in nature, you never know what you are going to see.

Fruits galore

It is pretty quiet right now for birdlife, but the fruits are abundant. We started off by doing a comparison of some of the main red fruits of the season, looking at size, colour, shape and appearance on the plant.

The berries of the Rowan or Mountain Ash (Sorbus aucuparia) are an important food source in the autumn for many thrush species (Blackbird, Song Thrush, Mistle Thrush, Fieldfare and Redwing). They are also edible to humans (although very sour) and are often used to make jam or jelly.

The trees were said to ward off witches as well, which might explain why so many are found in parks and gardens (although that might also have something to do with how they are distributed!).

Poetry corner

We paused for a little while after we’d walked through the orchard, and I read a poem which has become quite a favourite of mine: ‘The Song Thrush and the Mountain Ash‘ by Simon Armitage. It was written as a song for a choir who had lost several members to COVID, and had been apart for some time. Very moving.

Arachnophobes beware… spiders below!

Moving on to the lane which leads up to Pony Wood, we noticed that spiders are suddenly a lot more visible. This is another sign of late summer that I was aware of, but unable to answer at the time, so here’s a fuller explanation.

Firstly, spiders are looking for mates at this time of year. In the case of the garden spider above, the males and females mature late in August/early in September and it is only the females that make the classic spoked webs. The males move around in search of them for mating.

Secondly, young spiders are dispersing. Have you ever noticed the long strands of spider silk in a field in the early-morning golden light of autumn? That is from a trait known a ‘ballooning’ where the young spiders let out long lengths of silk and wait for the wind to catch it, enabling them to move vast distances. This is most common in the money-spider family in the UK.

The last few flowers of summer… and many seed-heads

There are still some flowers out for the still-busy Tree bumblebees, including a profusion of Hedge Bindweed (Calystegia sepium) and a few Red Campion (Silene dioica). The latter species has seed-heads which look very similar to those of poppies, and the colour and size of the seeds are near-identical. Apparently the seeds were traditionally used to treat snakebites!

More noticeable, though, were the large numbers of seed-heads. I particularly love those of the Rosebay Willowherb (Chamaenerion angustifolium) and Great Willowherb (Epilobium hirsuitum), where the heads ‘unzip’ as they ripen, disgorging multitudes of seeds on fluffy clouds of plumed hairs.

Creeping Thistle (Circium arvense) is also abundant, particularly around Pony Wood and it’s method of seed dispersal is typical of other plants in the daisy family, of which it is a member.

We walked on up through Pony Wood, enjoying the diversity of trees as we went, and finished up the walk at the canal, just as the darkening clouds presaged an early dusk.

Ros Jones, September 2022

References / Further reading

Rowan trees, The Woodland Trust: https://www.woodlandtrust.org.uk/trees-woods-and-wildlife/british-trees/a-z-of-british-trees/rowan/

Flying spiders, The British Arachnological Society: https://www.britishspiders.org.uk/flying-spiders

Garden Spider (and other British species) factsheet, The British Arachnological Society: https://www.britishspiders.org.uk/factsheets

Red campion, The Woodland Trust: https://www.woodlandtrust.org.uk/trees-woods-and-wildlife/plants/wild-flowers/red-campion/

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