One sunny morning this week John the bird ringer, newly back from visiting his son in Australia, returned to ring in the meadows. His first day back with his nets was a triumph because he caught six firecrests which amazed us all. Along with their more common cousin, the goldcrest, these are Britain’s smallest birds and what a privilege it was to see them up close:

These tiny birds only weigh about 5g and, to put that in context, six of them would weigh the same as a small bag of crisps. They like to poke around in conifer trees to find invertebrates to eat, such as small spiders and moth eggs. At this time of year firecrests and goldcrests are arriving from Scandinavia and Russia to spend the winter here.

John also caught a goldcrest, which is a similar size to the firecrest but lacks the black stripe through the eye and the white stripe above it. The crest feathers are also more yellow than orange:

A male blackbird that John caught weighed in close to 100g, twenty times more than one of the crests:

All in all he had a very successful morning’s ringing, also catching long tailed tits, a chaffinch and a great tit amongst others. As well as these birds in his net, he saw a stonechat in the hedgerow next to him and siskin, meadow pipits, goldfinch, house martins and a swallow flying over.

This week we have had further insights into the very varied diet of a magpie. They continue to devour next door’s walnuts:

And assist the jays in stripping the holm oaks of their acorns:

But I have never seen them eating wasps before:

There have been several other photos of a magpie with wasps and large flies this week, which is strange since it’s something I’ve never seen before now:

In my last post there was a surprising photo of a magpie eating a wasp spider cocoon. This week we discovered another of these cocoons that had unfortunately been dislodged and flattened where Dave had been doing a bit of tractoring recently:

The light was fading fast and the spiderlings were tiny, but I did my best to get a decent photo of them.

These baby spiders no longer had the shelter of the cocoon and there is still a whole winter to come. The best makeshift egg-sac I could think of was an old gardening glove. I tucked them all up cosily within it and buried it deep within the vegetation:

Tawny owls have been hunting around the meadows at night:

And the pair of pheasants that arrived last week still remain with us and have managed to make an appearance on almost every trail camera:

There has been a lot of badger activity recently as the animals prepare for winter.

The meadows are at the top of a steep cliff, covered in impenetrable vegetation. Last winter we put a trail camera a few metres down the slope, pointing at a badger hole that was being much frequented at the time. However, all summer there has been very little activity there and it had developed an air of abandonment:

The cliff is seriously steep here, to the extent that it would probably be sensible for Dave to get roped up when he goes down to collect the camera card. He doesn’t actually get roped up but he does, I hope, take great care.

Recently lot of housework has been going on in this burrow:

Much lounging around has been going on there:

And also a surprising amount of mating given the time of year:

Once the cubs are born, the female doesn’t allow the male anywhere near them for a while. I have a theory that this section of the tunnel network is where the male will live in seclusion during that time.

Of course the pheasants turned up at this burrow on the cliff as well:

Over in the wood we have had some sightings of an unidentified mustelid this autumn:

Our woodland neighbours have managed to get this fantastic trail camera photo of what I suppose to be the same animal:

A pair of jays take time off from collecting and burying acorns to have a bath:

And sparrowhawks also love to bathe:

As, it appears, do tawny owls, even in late October:

A sturdy ‘woodcrete’ bird box hangs at the edge of the marjoram clearing. But a glimpse of green hazel leaf seen through the hole suggests that there is a dormouse nest in there.

It was a very special moment indeed back in October 2020 when we were clearing old bird nests out of the bird boxes and we found a dormouse instead. This was the first time we realised that we had dormice in the wood:

We have been back in Maidenhead in Berkshire this week and have once more come across the herd of fallow deer on nearby Ashley Hill:

But I still haven’t managed to get a photo of the males with their magnificent antlers. I will keep trying.

A lot of beech woods were planted in the area to supply the High Wycombe furniture industry with timber, but these businesses have now largely gone. Many of the remaining beech woods are now thankfully owned and protected by wildlife organisations.

As Remembrance Day approaches we went to Dungrovehill Wood to pay our respects to those that died in July 1944 when a Halifax bomber crashed there:

There is still a large crater in the ground where the plane, laden with bombs and heading for France, exploded and a moving tribute to the men is strung up along the rim of the crater:

Eighty-one years ago but their sacrifice is definitely not forgotten in Dungrovehill Wood.