Arriving at Dene Park I took some photos of the mines and galls on the herbaceous plants along the entrance path.
I dived into the first compartment planted up mainly with Beech and had a look at some of the dramatic green islands caused by either galls or leaf miners on the leaves. The first was caused by the Beech Leaf Gall Midge Hartigiola annulipes, Hartig 1839, a cecidyomiid midge. The galls are up to 5 mm in height, and in my limited experience nice and fluffy, although the "tree-trees website" claims it can be bare as well as fluffy. They are generally found next to a midrib or a main vein, which may allow them some control over the transport of nutrients as well as the hormonal status of the tissues around it. The gall could well be releasing cytokinins, both to cause the hypertrophy leading to the gall itself, and to cause the green island effect in the otherwise senescing leaves.
The next
As I was going through the central path, following a small valley through some scrubby trees and some oaks, I heard a bird calling quite loudly skreek-skreek-skreek. I couldn't think what it was - not a tit, finch or thrush that I could think of.
The idea that it might be a nuthatch came into my mind, and I saw a bird high up in the tall oaks which looked roughly the right size, although I couldn't get any idea of shape. I checked what I could remember of the sound that night against the call of the Eurasian Nuthatch, Sitta europea, Linnaeus 1758, on Xeno-canto, and I think I must have been right. This was the closest I found to my memory of the call, recorded by Stuart Fisher at Gomshall, Surrey in 2005. The subspecies found in the UK is ssp caesia.
What a nice tick for me in these woods! This not an uncommon bird in the UK, with 20,000+ pairs and numbers generally on the up. It feeds on insects and nuts/seeds and is one of the prettiest UK birds.
Monty does his own exploring while I look for galls or whatever else is around, but he is never too far away and always comes when whistled. Trying to be objective he often looks quite a serious solid dog in photos, but these don't seem to give the full picture of his playfulness and agility in real life. I am so lucky to have him as a companion.
I dived into the first compartment planted up mainly with Beech and had a look at some of the dramatic green islands caused by either galls or leaf miners on the leaves. The first was caused by the Beech Leaf Gall Midge Hartigiola annulipes, Hartig 1839, a cecidyomiid midge. The galls are up to 5 mm in height, and in my limited experience nice and fluffy, although the "tree-trees website" claims it can be bare as well as fluffy. They are generally found next to a midrib or a main vein, which may allow them some control over the transport of nutrients as well as the hormonal status of the tissues around it. The gall could well be releasing cytokinins, both to cause the hypertrophy leading to the gall itself, and to cause the green island effect in the otherwise senescing leaves.
As I was going through the central path, following a small valley through some scrubby trees and some oaks, I heard a bird calling quite loudly skreek-skreek-skreek. I couldn't think what it was - not a tit, finch or thrush that I could think of.
The idea that it might be a nuthatch came into my mind, and I saw a bird high up in the tall oaks which looked roughly the right size, although I couldn't get any idea of shape. I checked what I could remember of the sound that night against the call of the Eurasian Nuthatch, Sitta europea, Linnaeus 1758, on Xeno-canto, and I think I must have been right. This was the closest I found to my memory of the call, recorded by Stuart Fisher at Gomshall, Surrey in 2005. The subspecies found in the UK is ssp caesia.
What a nice tick for me in these woods! This not an uncommon bird in the UK, with 20,000+ pairs and numbers generally on the up. It feeds on insects and nuts/seeds and is one of the prettiest UK birds.
Monty does his own exploring while I look for galls or whatever else is around, but he is never too far away and always comes when whistled. Trying to be objective he often looks quite a serious solid dog in photos, but these don't seem to give the full picture of his playfulness and agility in real life. I am so lucky to have him as a companion.
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