autumn is upon us

Autumn is here even though it is warm and sunny.  Early in the morning the mist lends a mysterious feel to the lane. Meanwhile stinkhorns are out. When they first emerge the head is covered in a glistening grey green slimy skin. It has a very pungent smell which attracts flies. This one was covered in blue flies, many of which flew away at the approach of the camera lens, but enough remained to illustrate how effective this method of spore dispersal is.

moulty

Something that caught our eye this morning was seed heads of grass bent over by silk. As can be seen in the bottom picture the cast-off shell of a spider is attached to the web on the outside, and inside the silk cocoon one can see the tips of the legs of the previous owner (I guess) in its new skin. I am not sure whether this is for protection from predators while the exoskeleton hardens or some sort of devious spider trap.

giant wood wasp

 

Every now and again one comes across something genuinely strange. This is a giant wood wasp (urocerus gigas), about 4 cms long. The brown rod beneath her sting is the sheath of her ovipositor, and gives it the common name of horntail. She lays her eggs in sick or recently felled pine. The black rod is the actual ovipositor and she is pushing it into the pine wood. Her abdominal muscles ripple with the effort required. The larvae take up to three years to mature

things we find in the attic

It is little surprise that we seem to have a lot of wasps about in the late summer. There were at least three of these beautifully constructed wasp's nests in our attic. No bats thank goodness. And the martins returned today although after a brief reconnaissance of the old nest site they didn't stay.

cuckoo pint

Lords and Ladies (aka cuckoo pint and other scurrilous names ) in flower. Almost all have the tip of the spadix eaten away. Wiki states that many small rodents appear to find the spadix particularly attractive and it is common to find examples of the plant with much of the spadix eaten away. The spadix has a distinctive, unpleasant smell, and manages to generate a lot of heat (up to 15 degrees C above ambient temperature) and it may be this that attracts mice etc.

witches broom

witches broom is a common sight locally, and is the result of a fascinating and ill understood process whereby bacteria harness and corrupt the growth pattern of plant cells, see link. This occurs at a deep metabolic level and may help us to understand the way genes control growth and development... of such simple things are advances made.

Christmas tidings from Duchy College

a giant corn dolly prepared by Duchy college ready for the ritual sacrifice of a student (still to be selected) at the winter solstice.

Hard though it is to remember, these meadows were full of butterflies only a few months ago (see link). Below is an example of witches' broom, a gall of birch caused by a fungal infection

autumn

Light pouring into the woods today, and, away from the sun's warmth, a frost flower in bloom.

we'll ring you

Not all of our red telephone boxes have been removed, and some have been pressed into new life. Not sure that there will be a riot in Latchley any time soon.

a different universe

The location of this image is given away by the fine silk strands holding the bubbles.

beetle mania

we came across this group of dor beetles on a track in the conifer woods near Carthamartha. There was no obvious evidence of droppings and the beetles seemed to be producing the moist mud balls by themselves. Some beetles had paired off and were burrowing deeper. Very faint stridulations were audible. Is this common behaviour and what were they doing? I have posted these pictures on Wild about Britain where someone will definitely be able to provide an answer. I feel fairly sure they are mating but I have never seen a collection of these beetles like this before (a colony seems to be the correct collective noun).

old walls

we are surrounded by old cornish hedges and walls (they are much the same sort of structure). Hedge trees grow on top and in these walls and reach enormous sizes given the precarious nature of their base.

these childish things

This little bike has been parked here for a week or more. Don't ask me, I don't know.

frost beard

The best example yet of this strange phenomenon. 

And the eerie light on a snowy Kit Hill this morning.

frost tricks

the magical frost sticks are back (see previous pages and this link). This was a surprising find because it has not been that cold and there was no frost on the ground at all. The ice crystals must be the product of an unusual combination of air temperature and saturated vapour pressure in the still air of the sheltered river valleys. The picture below shows butterbur beginning to flower, this is very early indeed based on past years at this spot where it normally comes intop flower towards the end of February. The  ground has been scoured clean by the floods over the Christmas period. It may be that that butterbur likes a good soaking. At this point where the Inny runs into the Tamar the flood waters can reach 3 or 4 meters above normal, and very large trunks etc can be found well above river level. The volume of water involved in these floods is massive.

the Temple of Diana

the huntress caught watching over the Temple

(at which you can come and stay for a weekend see link and we would come and visit you!).

tamar valley news

I only show again this unusual picture of our beloved river Tamar looking unusually blue to provide an opportunity to advertise a BBC programme on the valley which manages to capture some of the essence of the beautiful place we live in (minus the mispronunciation of the place names) and which lies at the heart of this blog. The village of Gunnislake mentioned in the programme lies across the ridge at the top, and Cotehele is the building below the woods to the left of the picture. I am not sure if visitors from outside UK will be able to access the film but if you can it is well worth watching.

link to BBC programme

UFOs spotted

I know this is April 1, all fools day, but the photographs above are absolutely genuine and worth closer inspection. I noticed two small white round (to the naked eye) objects floating across the sky over us. They caught my attention because they did not seem to move like birds, floating rather than flying. Buzzards sometimes do this on thermals around here but they did not have the outline of a buzzard. They were moving steadily rather than swiftly west east, and looked very white in the morning sun. I took three photos, hard to get a very sharp focus pointing at the sky. To my surprise there was a third white thing to the top left, which I had not noticed, and two fuzzy white things. Maybe they are balloons. On the unresized RAW files they appear white with a fuzzy grey outline. Help!! I promise you this is not an April Fool's joke, and they are not camera artefacts or manipulated with photo imaging software. Very strange.

On close inspection I wonder if these are parachutes although there were no planes overhead at the time and I have never seen anyone parachute around here. The two lower photos are enlarged and slightly enhanced. And two more in the last photo I took yesterday.

just built

 

the heart suggests this barn at Treven farm (home of Jill and Den Long) was built or rebuilt as part of a marriage settlement (not Jill and Den's I should add). Below is a picture of the stone at the end of the pig barn. It clearly has an ecclesiastical origin but when and where from?