Charming Wooden Animal Trail at Gunnersbury Triangle

29 November 2017 Ian Alexander

Wooden Animal Trail Camouflaged Smooth Newt

Netty found some dusty but very well-made wooden animals, complete with attachment rings, evidently designed for use on a Nature Trail. She repainted all of them and we hung them around the reserve. The camouflaged animals – the newt and the frog – seemed to ‘work’ the best. We hope the children will have fun going around with their parents to find them. One or two may be quite difficult!

It wasn’t all wooden animals. As it happens, we saw some of the real things, November or not.

[Spoiler alert!] We went down to the pond to affix the Dragonfly, and spotted a small limp orange shape floating apparently lifeless at the surface…

Rescuing a drowning newt. We put it in one of the Anthill Meadow refugia (under a carpet mat), it seemed to be fine.

Then we started mowing the Ramp Meadow with its remarkably fine stand of Evening Primroses …

Mowing the Ramp Meadow, Evening Primroses and all

… and found a real frog, escaping the scythes and boots.

Plumply pregnant frog escaping the mowers’ boots and scythes to wriggle under the boundary fence of Ramp Meadow

The Forest School decorated Christmas Candles very gracefully.

Christmas Candles with fresh Holly, Ivy, and Yew

Natural Patterns

Late Autumn Leaves

Image 19 November 2017 Ian Alexander

Fallen leaf mosaic (there are cherry, sycamore, oak, and hawthorn)

Natural History

Bughunters at work – with a rare spider

16 November 2017 Ian Alexander

Anyphaena numida in GT – only the 2nd UK record for this North African spider. Many thanks to Mick Massie for letting me photograph his specimen! This is the female. Mick also caught a male (smaller), so presumably they are breeding here. She certainly looks plumply pregnant.

Entomologists in the Triangle on a beautiful autumn day

Conservation, Natural History

Pond-Skimming Reveals Hornwort, Newts, Pondweed, Water Scorpion, Leeches

14 November 2017 Ian Alexander

Pond-skimming. Netty is rescuing pondweed and animals especially damselfly nymphs to return them to the water.

We spent the time skimming off as much of the duckweed that was blanketing the surface of the pond as possible using pole nets. The idea is to let light filter down to the bottom of the pond to encourage the more delicate pondweeds. In the process, we had a good opportunity to check the status of some of the pond life that we don’t usually get to see, as the underwater plants are rather few beside the boardwalk – most likely because the continual sampling keeps them from growing much. But the rest of the pond is another story.

Rigid Hornwort, its shoots stiff as if covered in limescale

Damselfly nymph with leaflike tail appendages

A stubby damselfly nymph with spiky tail appendages

There were at least two kinds of damselfly nymph, possibly bluetail and azure damselflies, judging by a pondside look at the book without a handlens. The little camera in close-up mode is just about capable of resolving detail at this scale, given good light. The various damselfly nymphs have differently-shaped tail appendages, which the book says are diagnostic.