This week we did the final tour of the year around the thirty hazel dormouse boxes in our wood. In October, six dormice had been found in the boxes, but now in November we didn’t find a single one. They have all built winter nests down at ground level, where the temperature is less volatile, in which they will hibernate until spring.

Abandoned summer nests remain in ten of the thirty boxes and these will cleaned out over the winter.

Box 12 has excelled itself this year, I think:

Not only does it have that dormouse nest in it now, but on the May tour it had a brood of marsh tits:

We might not have found any dormice as we went round the boxes this week, but we certainly found a lot of slugs and millipedes. In box 28 we also found a pupal case and egg mass of the gypsy moth.

There was a British native gypsy moth, whose caterpillars ate just two species of plant and was generally very well behaved, but these went extinct in the early 20th century. Unfortunately, the European form then became established in London in the 1990s and has spread widely from there. These caterpillars are a problem because they eat a wide range of plants and can extensively defoliate trees and shrubs.

Even though she has a full set of wings, a female gypsy moth is flightless but emits a strong pheromone to bring a mate in to her. Because she is sedentary, she will then lay her eggs close to where she emerged from her pupa, as has happened in box 28. We will get some gloves on and scrape these eggs off before they hatch out in the spring.

As we walked round the wood this week, it was depressing to see how much squirrel damage there has been this year. So many trees have been ring-barked and killed – mostly the beautiful beech and hornbeam, but other tree species as well.

And practically every dormouse box shows that they have also been under attack from them:

Much work is being done to address the grey squirrel problem in the British Isles, but progress is slow and I can’t see there being a satisfactory resolution for the south of England in my lifetime. An up-to-date map has just been produced by UK Squirrel Accord showing red and grey squirrel distribution 2017-22:

I had always assumed that red squirrels had disappeared from most of England ages ago and was very surprised to see this comparison between 1945 and 2016 which shows that there were still some red squirrels in East Kent in 1945:

Back in the wood, movement at this badger latrine caught my attention when two or three flies flew away as I approached:

It was the flies that interested me because they were sizeable and red and I was fairly sure I hadn’t seen them before. I waited for one to return:

Unfortunately I didn’t have my macro camera with me to get a clear photo of something this size so I returned with it a couple of days later. I had to lie on my stomach and get my face much closer to the latrine than I would have wanted, but was rewarded with a photo that has enabled the fly to be identified as Dryomyza anilis:

Dryomyza anilis, the hooded Dryomyza, is a common and widespread fly, but just not in the places that you might usually look. The males are very territorial and stake out territories at woodland badger latrines and carrion where they hope to find a female and mate, laying their eggs into the decaying organic matter.

In my last post there were photos of woodcock, fieldfare and redpoll, all newly arrived at the wood for the winter. This time I have some more winter visitors. Firecrests, along with their more plentiful cousins the goldcrests, arrive in the UK in the autumn from their breeding grounds in Scandinavia:

Large numbers of blackbirds also arrive in November from the colder parts of Europe and over-winter here:

Last week we cleared out the large raptor boxes in the wood but unfortunately disturbed a tawny owl that was roosting in one of the boxes. We hoped that we hadn’t scared it away for good, and so it was reassuring to see a tawny back in the vicinity of the box again:

It was also nice to see the weasel still in the meadows after its recent encounter with the dog:

It was a bumper year for rabbits in the meadows last year but this year they seem to be back to their normally low numbers:

I remember this rabbit with that distinctive torn left ear from last year:

The ringed female kestrel is still in action in the meadows but we are definitely seeing less of the birds of prey here as autumn recedes and the weather worsens:

In my last post, a heron had started visiting the hide pond and demonstrated what a devastatingly effective hunter it is by catching several hibernating frogs:

Our scarecrow, Mackenzie, was rapidly brought out of the shed and put up by the pond:

And I’m pleased to report that no heron has been seen at the hide pond since he has gone up. However, we now see that the heron has simply moved down to the other pond:

Frogs are nocturnal and, if the moon is fullish and the sky clear, there is enough light for herons to hunt at night when the frogs are most likely to be moving around. Here is a heron down at the wild pond at 2.30 in the morning but, since it was minus three degrees, I hope that the water was frozen and that it had no success:

We do have some protective corrugated squares at the sides of this wild pond for the amphibians to hide under. These are very popular indeed in the summer but I am not sure if the frogs will be hibernating under them at this time of year – I suspect not:

Once we realised that the heron had moved to the other pond instead, we swiftly made a second scarecrow using some of Dave’s old clothes that he was prepared to donate to a good cause:

Storm Bert howled his way across the meadows last weekend. In the nick of time I moved pots of tender plants into the potting shed where they can now remain until the spring:

I like to think of them all safe and protected in there seeing out the winter, just as the onion, garlic and tulip bulbs are now planted into the allotment under a cosy blanket of compost:

We have probably finished most of the jobs we wanted to accomplish in the meadows before the start of winter. But, now that all the dormice are hibernating, it is time to turn our attention the wood where there is more clearing and coppicing to be done than we can ever hope to achieve. Although it’s hard work, being outside in the wood in the cold, short days of winter is actually really lovely and something we look forward to – especially when it also involves boiling water for tea over an open fire and sitting down with a reviving slice of Christmas cake.