Rest in peace number 54
This is the third year I’ve attended Paul Darby’s excellent Identifying Trees in Winter course at Ravensroost Wood and thankfully this time the weather was more kind to us. A male buzzard was clearly enjoying the sunshine, wheeling up into the clear blue to put on a spirited if early mating display. Gazing through yellow catkins we did our best to see if buds on twigs were opposite or alternate, whether the texture of bark was smooth or fissured, whilst the keener amongst us scrawled down notes or made quick sketches as an aide-mémoire. All this accompanied by a proper woodland soundtrack of nuthatch, coal tit, song thrush, spotted woodpecker and a tawny owl still up from a night terrorising voles. There were one or two trees I couldn’t identify, Wych Elm and Goat Willow, but overall I was pleased I had remembered far more than I had forgotten. Read more
entomacrographic 