Two Chews

Tags

Bristol Water, British Dam Society, Californian redwood, Canada goose, Chew Magna, Chew Stoke, Chew Valley, Chew Valley Films, Chew Valley Lake, Chew Valley Lake Sailing Club, Chota Castle, dabchick, little grebe, scabious, Sequoia, small blue, Treecreeper, Wellingtonia, Woodford Lodge

Chew Magna Lake is the fifth largest artificial lake in England, a reservoir in Chew Stoke, Somerset, opened by H M Queen Elizabeth II on 17th April, 1956. It is owned by Bristol Water, who encourage the use of the lake for leisure purposes.

Last week’s ‘first Friday’ walk was a circular one from its north-western edge up part of the 17-mile Chew Valley nearly to Chew Magna, and back along a different route. It is only a small river at the best of times. In the present drought conditions, it is even smaller, and slow-moving.

We parked our cars at Woodford Lodge, which now calles itself the Woodford at Chew. The Chew Valley Lake Sailing Club is adjacent.

You don’t need a boat to go fishing, but it must make for a different experience.

As we approached the dam at the lake’s northern end, we could appreciate just how low the water was, with spillway on the left and outlet tower to the right. (I have, minutes ago, just learned the term ‘outlet tower’, and much more from The British Dam Society.)

I think this would be called a ‘shaft’ spillway (same source). Whatever it is called, it is not needed right now.

We heard the tower humming as we passed it.

In the far distance, we could see dabchicks (aka little grebes) and Canada geese. I have not been able to find a collective noun for dabchicks, or any grebe, but did find in this list a wedge, nide, skein or plump of geese, depending on where they are located.

We turned away from the lake and walked northwards, along the Chew valley, frequently encountering the small river or its even smaller tributary streams.

At one point we came across a large patch of scabious,

and I was thrilled to capture this small blue butterfly, even if it was clearly nearing the end of its life cycle.

Many small bridges – or was this a stile? – helped us along. I loved this huge slab across a small stream. I wonder how long it’s been serving.

One information sheet pinned to this tree told us, among other things, that it was Californian redwood, (aka Sequoia, and Wellingtonia) and the other how much treecreepers loved the arrival of the species in the UK because of its soft bark.

Zoe for scale

I like to think that this is a packhorse bridge, though it is not included in the ‘official list‘. Note the ‘tidemark’.

This is Chota Castle, described on one site as a cottage and on another as a 19th century folly-castle. Chew Valley Films have made a 52-minute film about one of its post-war residents. Or, lasting one minute, here is a Facebook entry by British Country Homes, giving a good look round!

But perhaps this magnificent tree is its greatest attribute.

We thought that perhaps these steps were to help cattle escape should they fall into the stream. Though, come to think of it, why not humans too?

Zoe spotted this deer in the distance.

This beautiful tree greeted us as we neared Woodford Lodge again,

where we had lunch enjoying this view.

Wildlife in the garden, part 2

Tags

comfrey, comma butterfly, gatekeeper butterfly, hornbeam, hornet mimc hoverfly, Orange hawkbit, scabious, verbena bonariensis

More August photos. When I let ‘the meadow’ grow, it was interesting to see the flowers that the grasses produced.  Here are just two of them:

Here’s a spider nursery in the long grass:

Bumble bee on Verbena bonariensis, spreading the pollen.

Wood pigeon taken from, rather than in, my garden, though I suspect there was a nest in my hornbeam as I once found a broken egg underneath it. (Bella, cat, licked it up later.)

Mallow

Comma butterfly on v.b. You can just make out the little symbol for which it is named on its back wing.

Small tortoiseshell on v.b. The whole plant is not the most attractive, being very spindly, but the insects love it and the small flowers are very pretty.

Gatekeeper on …? I planted it but I can’t remember what it is. Possibly Burning bush, Dictamnus albus.

My lavender is right at my feet where I sit for coffee on nice days. I took many tens of photos of insects on it this summer.

Gatekeeper and friends on eryngium

My neighbour Sue gave me this Orange hawkbit to plant in my meadow. It flourished and I hope it will have offspring next year. Being of the dandelion family, the insects love it. I find that it is also called Fox and Cubs.

You don’t see grasshoppers until you move around in the long grass, at which point they start living up to their name.

Honeybee on scabious.

Two gatekeepers on eryngium

I have to admit that I was a little afraid when I first saw this, 2 cm long, though hornets are not in fact very aggressive. But I was relieved when further research introduced me to the Hornet mimic hoverfly, of which this is fine example. It’s on water mint at the side of my pond.

This micro-moth is on lavender. It is no more than 6 or 7 millimetres from nose to tail.

Arachnophobes alert. There will be a couple more photos of spiders at the end of the week…

This is comfrey. Some weeks previously the plant had been in tatters. I could have prevented that by removing the larvae of the tiger moths which were munching away at its leaves, but I preferred to wait and enjoy the beautiful moths that would emerge later. To my great pleasure the plant fought back once the larvae had had their fill, grew three times as big and flowered again.

Here are a few of the plants in my pond.  Not strictly wildlife, but placed with wildlife in mind.

Pontederia (lanceolata I think)

I just fell for this at a garden centre a couple of years ago, and I can’t find it in any of my books. Any help with the name would be appreciated.

This is about 2 metres tall. I think it’s a verbascum, but I’m not sure.

It is clear that I am not very good at retaining the names of cultivated plants.

Young sparrows caught red-beaked

A wren thinking of getting in on the act.

My three feeders all hang from my hornbeam at about 8 feet off the ground. This is good because the tree’s bark is very smooth and the cats cannot climb up it. This is a little bad because the light is poor where they hang, and clear photographs are difficult to obtain.  That’s my excuse anyway.

Blue tit

 

Some of those dozens of hungry sparrows

Back to the last flowers of the very popular lavender.

Female Common darter I think. Definitely a dragonfly – wings open and considerably larger than damselfly.

Final post on this subject in another couple of days’ time, when we get to September.