January: What to look out for?
In this month's magazine, in the Country Matters feature, the wildlife to look out for in January is:
- Hibernating long-eared bats
- Ivy berries, which ripen and provide food for a wide range of birds
- King Alfred’s cakes, a type of fungus found on the stumps of rotting ash trees
- Ravens collecting nesting materials
Have you spotted any of the above and if so do you have any pictures? What else can we spot this January?
Comments
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At the moment there are a number of Parrot Crossbills, Hawfinches, Snow Buntings and Shore Larks around this year. In Norfolk there are 10s of thousands waders and geese.
If you look at surfbirds and enter your own county you will be able see what’s about
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Looking around our garden just now we have Fatsia growing (castor oil plant) it's a big shrub and it's flowers are very similar to ivy, it's sometimes called Tree Ivy. On a warm day the hover flies love the flowers and when they turn to berries the birds like them too.
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Parrot Cross Bill x 1, Shore Larks x 3 and Snow Buntings x 2
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Indeed we do not want to encourage anyone to disturb hibernating creatures and I apologise for the confusion.
However, if you do know where long eared bats are hibernating it's worth letting bats.org.uk know. They state on their website that to conserve bats we need to establish the size of current bat populations, working out which bats are where and how they are responding to the threats and pressures they face. BCT's network of volunteers and the general public monitor bats for national and international programmes.
However, as rightly stated by Wherenext please never disturb a hibernating creature.
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There are some interesting projects helping bats colonise. Some of the old tin mine shafts in Cornwall have been utilised, and last year we visited Carew Castle in South Wales, which has a whole tower now locked to human visitors as bats are roosting. Lots of information provided telling visitors about the project.
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