Salix viminalis hybrid?

Went back to the probable Salix viminalis (L.) x ? hybrid by the gate along by the newly planted birch) today and took a photo of some retrieved leaves. These may not be entirely characteristic as the tree has been pollarded in the recent past, so the shoots are perhaps a bit sucker-like.

My best guess is that it is a hybrid with Salix caprea (L.), known as Salix x sericans Tausch ex A. Kerner or Salix x laurina in the older version of the Kent flora. However it could be the hybrid with S. cinerea

This is a cklose up of the leaves, two upper sides and one lower (the topmost leaf). There appears to be fairly strong reticulate venation patterns (this is what seems to me to be giving a "Goat Willow" look to the upperside of the leaf, and what we hope is a fairly tomentellous underside.

Here is a slightly enlarged view, again showing the "Goat-Willow" appearance of the leaf. The insect damage could perhaps be early Capsid Bug.

Other clues are a largely yellow-green sometimes glossy (lustrous) twig, a slightly recurved, somewhat undulate margin to the leaf, no obvious striae. I could see no stipules at all - possibly they are not noticeable at this time of year?  I am not sure how much before the leaves that the catkins appeared, I need to double-check next year. , The female catkins are of close to 5 cm in length, and are quite numerous clustered towards the ends of the twigs

Osier

I did a small "Wonderful Willows" walk at Leybourne this morning. There are various cultivars of Salix viminalis ‘Black Hollander’, ‘Black Osier’, ‘Brown Merrin’, ‘English Rod’, ‘Green Gotz’, ‘Reader’s Red’, ‘Whipcord’ are known. However generally the twigs are yellowish-green, often on top of a grey green branch. Quite a few of the apparent Osiers at Leybourne like this, but at least one has reddish twigs on a brown branch (path by lake to North of West Scrub.

Cliffe Pools

About 30 Redshank, half a dozen Ringed Plover, two or three Black-Tailed Godwits starting to show brick-red chests, a dozen Golden Plover developing summer plumage, being beaten up by some of the dozen or so Lapwing, one female Goldeneye, three or so Shelduck, a few Mallard, a few Shoveller, 50 or more Coot, half a dozen Teal, several hundred Black-headed Gulls, three or more Mediterranean Gulls, two plus Common Gulls, Larus canus, possibly a few Herring Gulls, a couple of Cormorants.

New Zealand trip - Peel Forest Park

This looks like the Button Fern, Tarawera in Maori, Pellaea rotundifolia, close to the ground in the Forest Park, along the walk to the Acland Falls. This doesn't sound much like the rocky bush or open habitat referred to in Julian Fitter's book.

The calm before the storm at Leybourne

Not a bad afternoon before the rain started in. The water was rough on the lake, with coots, black-headed gulls and a few cormorants, scattered across the water. No longer any sign of surface ice.

There were plenty of gulls around and then I saw a Sparrowhawk circling over Snodland flapping quickly, then soaring, in quite tight circles, the first I have seen since the one at Milton Creek.

I walked between the Round Pond and the Key Conservation Area, but there was little there, apart from overflying gulls and noisy magpies. On one of the bramble piles there was a (just) possible redstart - but it was probably really a robin! Several blackbirds in among the brambles and long grass.

On the way out at the junction for Nevil Park there were a few Blue Tits, Great Tits, and on the way back there was a singing Songthrush, and then a Greater Spotted Woodpecker, Dendrocopos major, arrived in the large Willow, and searched some of the upper branches. I went along as far as the entrance to the treatment site, and there were a couple of birds I couldn't identify on the wires at the plant. I wondered about Meadow Pipits. There were plenty of hazel catkins on bushes by this drive and along the stream by the Key Conservation Area, together with a few young ashes with some Chalara damage.

I moved further on and there was a small crows of Black-headed Gulls, Chroicocephalus ridibundus, all ducking their heads and apparently preening on the NW end of Larkfield Lake. There were up to a dozen Tufted Duck, Aythya fuligula, on the other side of the lake.

A cormorant went over the aquatic centre at the Ocean as we returned. Going back to the Wardens Office, there was at least one singing Blue Tit in the Bluebell Wood, and several singing Great Tits in the hedges by the offices, quite close together.  

Icy Leybourne

Part of the far side of the Ocean was iced over this morning, and a group of Gulls were resting there. They looked fairly settled, until I got round there with the tripod, when I quickly spooked them all - TWICE. Its the tripod, honest, I need not to hold it like a gun.

This is one of the Herring Gulls, Larus argentatus, this one in the group on the ice. It looks like a third year bird, with limited development of the white windows in this plumage. The beak looked quite adult oddly enough, and the head was quite white.There is a lot of dark further in on the wing, just visible on the underside here.

There were several Common Gulls, Larus canus, around, both that I had good views of having relatively whitish heads. Nothing else they could be, but its interesting to note the variation. Earlier in the year I have tended to see much darker streaked heads, but the moult to summer plumages is a long way off, so it must simply be individual variation.

Good numbers of Goldfinches

Bough Beech

Lots of Greylags, Shoveller, Mallard, Teal, Coot, Moorhen, Cormorant and some Mandarin Duck on the main lake. Possibly some Wigeon as well.

The smaller lake was largely iced over, with only a couple of Carrion Crows.