c 6 celandines in flower beside the Naden Brook at Ashworth Wood in today's sunshine. Despite the sun I thought the recent frosts might have held them back. Bistort and butterbur just about visible.

David

Thanks for the information, that's interesting.

Hi Colin, in the last 8 years it has been recorded in all major woodlands in Rochdale. It really has spread very quickly, though what a stunning little species it is!

Dave

-- Edited by David Winnard on Tuesday 19th of February 2013 09:28:34 AM

Fungi - Scarlet Elf Cup on the banks of the Naden Brook at Shepherd Mill Bridge - more or less opposite the Bridge chippy. Two or three clumps of it at the moment. Referred to as absent from Rochdale in literature (Peter Hill). I read that it is spreading nationally.

In my garden, on buddleia, a single Red Admiral at last.

David
Thanks for that. I am not alone! I wonder what the experts would make of that? I can't even think of a starter for ten.

-- Edited by Colin Ramsden on Wednesday 29th of August 2012 08:57:44 AM

Colin, I have the same low numbers in my garden. I have a slug/snail eating plant and a regular hedgehog, but I cannot believe they are responsible for such low numbers.

Friends in Bromley Cross say they have a big problem but my only regulars are a couple of Garden Snails feeding on mixed seed on my bird table.

A few days ago I had a slug trail on my living room carpet, but hardly any trails outside all summer.

Slugs & Snails
TV gardening programmes keep talking about a slug mega year, which would seem obvious given the conditions that have prevailed. I am baffled therefore that the slug population in my garden is conspicuously less than in any year I remember. I don't particularly have any plants they would decimate and I have used no deterrents all year so I can't see any reasons why the populations are so diminished. In a normal year, in the wet, I would see many quite visibly around the garden and their trails under the bird feeders where they feed on fragments of food. I am seeing none of this. There is the odd one about but I conclude that the overall local population is a small fraction of what it normally is. Has anyone noticed the same?

Increased numbers of small tortoiseshell on my garden buddleia in today's sunshine - perhaps up to a dozen. Also Comma x 1 and Peacock x 1 - both looking resplendently fresh.

Hummingbird Hawk Moth on my garden buddleia this afternoon. According to the Butterfly Conservation website there are a good number about. Other than that, in the garden, I am only seeing Small Tortoiseshells and the odd White

-- Edited by Ian McKerchar on Saturday 15th of September 2012 10:19:58 PM