A hedgerow rant - already???

The Safari was up and down the motorway the other day and saw mile upon mile of mid-summer hedgerow tidying, 99% of  it unnecessary for road safety or any obvious agricultural benefit. so why do it - what on earth is the purpose? If there were any flowers in the spring there sure ain't gonna be no berries for the autumn and not a lot of shelter if we get spells of severe cold again. And we wonder why some of our farmland birds aren't doing to well!

Not only that in our 200 mile trip in glorious hot and humid summery conditions we didn't need to squirty dead bugs off the windscreen - where are they??? No wonder there's trouble with some most farmland birds.

We traveled through some prime dairy country and got the impression that even in these frugal times  more of us should be drinking organic milk and pay the small premium at the till because the cost of silage and fodder maize fed milk is extremely high on the environment, but of course if you don't care about the environment, and the food-chains therein, keep buying the cheaper stuff. Must be better for the cows too.

One day we'll break one of those chains that is one we're connected too - then we'll know it! We're already tempting fate with the use of neonictinoids on crop seeds resulting in the poisoning of beneficial pollinating insects weeks or months later - surely that's not clever...apparently the French and Germans have banned their use.

One of our neighbours removed a long swathe of (non-native) Campanula plants from the bottom of her fence - it was in full flower and looking lovely and full of bees and other insects so why do it? Because it looks slightly straggly? No all you can see is a thin strip of bare soil and the gaps at the bottom of the fence panels - hardly aesthetic...and of course the bees are now gone.

The local Privet flower purge continues unabated - why is it so necessary to remove the lovely white flowers from this otherwise fairly boring boring shrub, and  of course no flowers means no berries later in the year.

Best stop now before we find something else to rant about!
...Today...Now we really do have something serious to rant about...we had a hand malfunction and dropped our SD card with all today's and all the family pics from Tuesdday in to a pot of Strawberry Yoghurt and now it;s asking to be formatted...AAAARRRRGGGGHHHH. What's worse is it worked fine after a little bit of a wipe on the t-shirt and we didn't take advantage and download everything to the laptop's hard-drive.
So no pic of that stinky but interesting fish skeleton with a similar skull to the one we found the other day and no pic of the complete Bean-like Telin which is a rare find for us.
Where to next? National Whale and Dolphin Watch weekend starts tomorrow and we'll be watching with a group of eager volunteers.
In the meantime let us know what's gone horribly wrong in your outback

Some saved pictures from the dead card - we had to format it in the end :-(

 

The safari that never was

The Safari bottled out of going on safari this arvo. The temperature dropped to a seriously cold daytime 4.8C which combined with miserable driving rain meant we stayed very close to Little Bertha

Early this morning, between Frank's first and second breakfasts, an Oystercatcher was heard as it flew over the garden, or at least very close by, bringing the garden list to 33.

This afternoon was spent faffing around on the puter and staring out of the new windows at a few Greenfinches at the feeders, a regular visiting Woodpigeon and a great Blackbird fight.

Any one know the best way to present dried Mealworms to the Great Tits which are nesting in our House Sparrow terrace; seed feeder?

Where to next? Would you believe it, one forecast is giving a top temperature of 17C here tomorrow!!! Good job we've got an event on the beach in the morning.

In the meantime let us know if the rain eased off in your outback.

Great Garden Bird Watch

This weekend is the time for this year's RSPB's Great Garden Bird Watch. Literally millions of households up and down the country will be glued to their gardens for an hour's recording. The safari will be no exception, after the traditional Sunday morning bacon butty it will be pencil and notebook in hand. The garden has already been 'seeded' with sunflower seeds, a fat-ball hangs in the tree and in the morning half a loaf of stale bread will be thrown on the garage roof. The event depicted in the picture in the previous post will no doubt be repeated, but other than gulls and Magpies, will there be anything else...birdlife in the garden has been a bit sparse recently...oh to have the House Sparrow flock from my previous house!

I really miss those little guys. This is only about a quater of the full flock - wonder if they are still there and doing OK?

I came across this old photo whilst searching for the sparrow pic above. It shows Yours Truly in a spot of bother at a 4x4 driver training day my boss and I attended some time ago. Where is he, he ain't in the car! Despite being told to sit very still and not to shift about he opened the door and fled up the hill. (I think the guy in the background is watching him zoom past). Aficionados of off road driving will notice I have the wheels pointing up the hill - - never but never do this on a tricky side slope or you will very likely roll the vehicle over...I should have the lock on the downhill side and allowed the car to slither gently into the muddy hole.

Trouble was no one seemed to know how deep it was; eventually two more of the chap with the very clean boots friends appeared to counter balance the vehicle whilst I was winched out backwards. Next rule...get some decent tyres, these were only 80% on road/20% off and it really showed, with decent mud terrains the initial slide to port wouldn't have happened and there wouldn't have been a predicament.

So there you go... a bit of seat of the pants fun.

Where to next? The back garden beckons after the bacon butties...update on what was spotted tomorrow.

In the meantime what have you recorded in your garden and tell us about your hair raisng predicaments.