Crab apples, arsenic and suburbia – the September garden

Early in the month, autumn was more of an idea than a fact but as September progressed, the predominantly green view from my kitchen window gained increasing yellow and brown tinges. But this was no New England “Fall”, rather a gentle and gradual transformation as the new season took hold. In particular, I watched the three silver birches become increasingly flecked with yellow, transforming their foliage in to a patchwork of bright yellows and dull greens which glowed in the light of the morning sun. By the end of the month, yellow had overtaken green and a thin carpet of autumn leaves began to form under the trees.

Sedum and bumblebee

Himalayan honeysuckle and bumblebee

Down in the Leechwell Garden the signs of autumn were clear although a few residual flowers struggled on. These were received gladly by the bees and I saw them enjoying the thick pink mop heads of sedum and the pendulous white trumpet-flowers and deep red chandelier-bracts of Himalayan honeysuckle (Leycesteria formosa).

Overbalancing mullein

A mullein that had overbalanced under its own weight to form a surprising arch sprouted vertical shoots and flowers as if desperately trying to grab the light; an occasional bee deigned to try these late offerings.
By the end of the month, ivy growing on walls outside the Garden had flowered and the huge clumps announced themselves with their sickly-sweet smell and insect-hum. The bees were lured by this sudden profusion of pollen for a final binge of the year but many other insects also contributed to the ivy-buzz.

Away from the flowers, interest this month has been provided by fruits and seeds as the plants and trees shut down for the season.

Snowberry

A few squidgy white fruits appeared on a snowberry (Symphoricarpos) and, looking at them, I was transported back nearly half a century to a primary school playground where we used these as ammunition. No-one told me at the time that the fruits were highly poisonous but had I eaten one, their strongly emetic effects would have expelled the berry before I succumbed!

Spindle tree foliage and fruit

 

Fruits of the spindle tree

In a somewhat gloomy corner of the Garden, a low shrub glowed with surprising pink leaves and even pinker fruit; this is a Spindle tree (Euonymus Europaeus). There is something slightly unsettling about the fruit with their bulbous four-lobed structure and brash colour. From Cathy, on her Words and Herbs blog, I learnt that the fruit are termed Bishop’s Hats in Germany; this seems most appropriate and the bishops refer to the colour as amaranth. A euonymus gets a mention in one of my favourite poems, “A subaltern’s love song” by John Betjeman. I believe Betjeman chooses the shrub as a symbol of mid 20th century suburbia. Read it to find out!

Crab apples

On the Crab Apple I noticed a few fruit: almost perfect green spheres tinged subtly with red. I am not sure why there are so few fruit given the number of pollinators in the Garden and I shall be intrigued to see how these mature as by last December the residual fruit were yellow.

Cedar flowers with pollen

The blueish needles of a cedar (Atlas Cedar I think) made a statement, and the tree was also adorned with squashy pollen-laden pale brown flowers. The plentiful pollen will be wind-carried from these male flowers to the female flowers higher up the tree to form cones.

………………………………………………………………………..

September this year has been notable for its lack of rain and mild temperatures. Although this has not been good for gardeners, it has prolonged use of the Leechwell Garden by visitors and local residents especially those with children. An unexpected use of the Garden this month was as an outdoor classroom for one of the town’s primary schools. Groups of small children in the Garden gathered around one of the benches with their teacher or ran through the water – mums and dads will have been pleased! The teachers used the Garden in this way when rebuilding work at the school was delayed by the unexpected discovery of contamination. The school occupies land formerly used as the site of the town’s Victorian gasworks and, during the rebuilding, underlying soil was found to be contaminated with arsenic, lead and benzopyrene.

500 dead bumblebees – pesticides leave their deadly trace

Earlier this year, Sheila Horne was walking at Hacton Parkway, a public park and conservation area in Havering, East London. April is normally a good time to see insects in their prime so she was very surprised to find many dead and dying bees near the path. She alerted local naturalist, Tony Gunton who identified the insects as bumblebee queens from three species, red-tailed, buff-tailed and common carder. This was not a minor incident, there were as many as 500 bees affected.

Natural England was appointed to investigate the insect deaths and samples of dead bees were sent to FERA in York for analysis. The results were released a few weeks ago and showed that the bees were contaminated with the neonicotinoid insecticide imidacloprid and two fungicides, flusilazole and epoxiconazole. Imidacloprid is very poisonous to bees with bumblebees being more susceptible to this chemical than honeybees. Imidacloprid is now subject to a two year partial ban for some agricultural uses. Neither fungicide on its own is especially toxic to bees although flusilazole is due to be phased out this October because of its high toxicity to fish and because of other potential toxic effects.

But where did the bumblebees pick up these chemicals? We cannot be sure but as so many dying bees were found together in one place, it seems likely that the source of the poisoning was close by. Hacton Parkway lies alongside arable farmland and at the time of the poisoning some of the land was planted with flowering oil seed rape, so it is a reasonable conclusion that the bees had been feeding there. It is thought that the crop had been sown in autumn 2013 using seed treated with imidacloprid, just ahead of the ban. According to John Rennie of Natural England there had been no spray applications of insecticides or fungicides since the beginning of 2014.

So, why did these bees die? Because there are so many unanswered questions we cannot be sure. The imidacloprid used on the oil seed rape has been blamed by some but I can’t see how this could be a problem if the farmer followed safety guidelines. There is good evidence that exposure to typical agricultural levels of imidacloprid does not kill bumblebees although there is also good evidence for sub-lethal effects on behaviour and reproduction. It is, however, becoming apparent that neonicotinoids such as imidacloprid accumulate in soil so perhaps exposure levels of the dead bees were higher than expected. Soil testing would be informative here.

There is also the question of how the bees were exposed to the two fungicides if no spraying was performed during the flowering season? Does this mean that these chemicals persist for long periods or has there been spraying elsewhere? Perhaps the fungicides weakened the bees or made them more susceptible to the imidacloprid. There is some evidence for such interactions for other insecticide/fungicide pairings.

Although the investigation continues, it may be quite difficult to resolve some of these questions. Despite this uncertainty, the results of the chemical analysis stand. These bees died with three chemicals in their bodies: one insecticide and two fungicides. This was no laboratory experiment; this reflects what is happening around us when these chemicals are used. Our agricultural practices have led to this and the result is the deaths of important pollinators. How often is this occurring on a lower level but not being noticed or reported?

With thanks to Tony Gunton for talking to me about this incident

Watering cans, wild flowers and swifts – looking back at the Garden in July

At this time of year, only a small corner of the Leechwell Garden is visible from our kitchen window; the rest is obscured by the thick green wall erected by the trees. I can still see the three silver birches, also two of the benches and the lower part of the water course, popular with young children who like to paddle, especially during the hot weather we experienced this July.

red valerian in seed

There had been storms about and we did hear distant rumbles of thunder on more than one occasion but in Totnes this month there was little or no rain for more than three weeks. With the sultry temperatures everything began to look rather parched. Many of the flowers on the red valerian lining the paths near the Garden turned to seed; this felt earlier than previous years. The plants acquired a downy covering of numerous seeds equipped with small parachutes to aid windborne dispersal; no wonder it grows everywhere. I was also surprised to see ripe blackberries – in my mind blackberries are a feature of autumn.

blackberries

The swifts were an almost constant feature this month, shrieking over the Leechwell Garden morning and evening. Typically there were ten or so probing the air above the Garden looking for insects. On the 21st, the swift spectacular stepped up a notch and we counted more than 40 that evening. I had noticed flying ants in our garden so I wondered if the extra food had attracted the birds.

swifts over the Garden

What is it about the swifts that captures our attention? We have to look, we have to try to count. They speed past our house, they manoeuvre, change course quickly and regroup like miniature spitfires in an old Battle of Britain film. But suddenly, on the 28th we noticed their absence. They had gone, making their way back to Africa for the winter. We miss them.

Down in the Leechwell Garden, one problem this July has been the lack of easily accessible water. There was no actual shortage; water flows freely through the garden but it has to be carried some distance as there are no taps. This was the first prolonged dry spell for some years and I sensed that plant growth was being affected. The Garden volunteers came up with the clever idea of providing watering cans for visitors so that, as they looked around, they could also water the plants. Some of the watering cans are child-sized so watering can become a game.

The pergola with clematis Perle d’Azur and lavender. The notice urges visitors to help with watering.

On the pergola, purple seemed to be the colour of the month. The later flowering clematis showed well and the path was lined with burgeoning banks of lavender.

wild flower bank

At the far end of the pergola there is a long wild flower bank. This has been carefully planted and showed a fine mixture of native plants in July – I saw proud yellow-flowered stems of mullein, floppy flowers of evening primrose, peering ox eye daisies, wild marjoram, musk mallow, knapweed, and, towering above them all, spindly purple-flowered verbena bonariensis (native to South America).

marjoram

It’s very good to see the wild flower bank as it’s one way to provide extra habitat for pollinators. I saw plenty of insects there in the morning but later they seemed to desert this part of the Garden for the attractions of other flowers. One of the competitors was a large patch of golden marjoram covered with white flowers; on sunny afternoons this positively pulsated with honeybees and hoverflies. The beautiful borage also continued to flower well and its starry blooms were well used by bumble bees.

borage

borage with bumblebee

 

I want to finish with more pictures of bees and flowers.

 

scabious with honeybee

I found this marigold with a bee turning in circles rubbing its abdomen around the flower centre. I think this might have been a leaf-cutter bee. I hope so.

The picture of the swifts was taken by Hazel Strange.

A loo with a view

[This article appeared in the June edition of the Dorset-based  Marshwood Vale Magazine]

 

The hamlet of Monkton Wyld lies in a deep wooded valley in the far west of Dorset a few miles inland from Lyme Regis. The hamlet is dominated by the Victorian church and neo-gothic rectory, Monkton Wyld Court. For many years, the rectory was home to an alternative school and is now an education centre for sustainable living. It has also acquired a reputation for its award-winning compost toilets. In 2011, its compost loos made Permaculture Magazine’s top five and in 2013, Monkton Wyld Court’s sustainable privy was rated world number one in a competition organised by Transition Town Totnes.

I wanted to find out what was so special about these compost toilets so, on an overcast but mild April day, I drove down the narrow road to Monkton Wyld. The setting is idyllic and the high verges were heavy with spring flowers: bluebells, wood anemones, stitchwort, primrose, red campion and wild garlic. At the old rectory, I was welcomed by Lynden Miles, who designed and built the compost loos. Lynden works and lives at the Court with his family and he took me to see the
conveniences.

Monkton Wyld Court

Monkton Wyld Court does have conventional flushing toilets but there are also two compost loos, both situated in the grounds a short walk from the house and shielded by trees. Each toilet consists of an attractive wooden building, constructed from locally sourced larch, on a raised platform. Within each building is a toilet with a decorative wooden seat and a hand-washing sink which uses harvested and filtered rain water. There is also a supply of sawdust for visitors to add after they have used the toilet. Lighting is solar-powered and the windows afford lovely leafy views. Using the toilet is a pleasant experience and there was no smell that I could detect.

One of the compost toilets

The rather beautiful toilet

A loo with a view

There is, however, the question of the waste. We are so used to “flush and forget” systems that we don’t normally give this a thought. In the award-winning compost toilet, waste accumulates in a chamber below, where it gradually decomposes under the influence of bacteria. The process is termed “aerobic” because the bacteria depend on oxygen so it is essential to maintain good ventilation. The sawdust is also an important part of the process: it keeps the moisture content of the decomposing waste low and provides carbon as a fuel for the bacteria to do their work. The bacteria also consume any pathogens in the human waste. Eventually the chamber will be “full” and at that point Lynden will move the toilet above a second chamber. He expects this will be in about two years. The waste in the first chamber will then be left for a further two years before it can be recycled as fertiliser for fruit trees; it will never be used directly on edible crops.

Lynden Miles

I asked Lynden why he had developed these novel toilets. He told me that he had experienced awful compost toilets elsewhere and thought he could do better. Compost toilets also fit well with the ethos of sustainable living at Monkton Wyld Court. Conventional “flush and forget” toilets consume vast amounts of water which disappear in to the sewers along with the human waste. This water has been carefully purified to drinking standard only to be flushed away using up to a third of our domestic water supply. The human waste is only partly recycled and important nutrients are lost. By comparison, Lynden’s compost toilets consume a little rainwater and potentially recycle all the human waste.

Although Lynden’s compost toilets may seem very innovative, the idea is by no means a new one and a different kind of compost toilet was invented a century and a half ago, also in Dorset, by the Rev Henry Moule, vicar of Fordington near Dorchester. At that time, sewage disposal was very primitive and Moule became convinced that poor disposal was a source of much disease. He experimented by mixing his own excreta with dry earth and was surprised that within 3-4 weeks the mixture was odourless having fully broken down. With the help of a local farmer, he showed that earth reused five times in this way was an excellent fertiliser for crops. Moule designed and patented his “earth closet” in 1860. This had a handle that, when turned, delivered a measured amount of earth on to the human excrement. For a time the earth closet was very popular and competed with the water closet as a sanitary device. Indeed, Queen Victoria had an earth closet installed at Windsor Castle. Earth closets were adopted in some schools in the UK and in gaols, government buildings and mental hospitals in Australia and India.

As we know, “earth closets” did not persist in the UK and this may have had something to do with the difficulty of ensuring that the waste was properly disposed of by individual users. Because it is so important to deal effectively with the waste problem, especially in big towns, the “flush and forget” system linked to sewerage works has been adopted. This may also have had something to do with our attitude to human excrement.

Although the earth closet now appears a historical curiosity, with increased awareness of the need to conserve water there has been an upsurge of interest in compost toilets. They are particularly useful where mains sewerage is not available, for example at allotments and at music festivals. They are popular at roadside locations in rural Scandinavia and in national parks in the US. These modern designs, including of course Lynden’s world number one, are not exactly the same as Moule’s but they are certainly in the same spirit.

A Monkton Wyld bee pollinating a fruit tree

Flowering Dogwood, Bachelor’s Buttons and a living fossil – the Garden in June

Many mornings this month when I have looked out of the kitchen window, the Leechwell Garden has been bathed in a warm, clear light that I hadn’t noticed previously this year. Perhaps it’s the early sunrise, perhaps it’s the dry weather, and the lack of rain and mist, that has persisted throughout much of the month.

As well as being dry, the weather has been quite warm at times, re-creating that summery feeling expressed so well by Edward Thomas in his poem “Adlestrop”, written 100 years ago this June after his train stopped unwontedly at the station.

Yes. I remember Adlestrop –
The name, because one afternoon
Of heat the express-train drew up there
Unwontedly. It was late June.

The steam hissed. Someone cleared his throat.
No one left and no one came
On the bare platform. What I saw
Was Adlestrop — only the name

And willows, willow-herb, and grass,
And meadowsweet, and haycocks dry,
No whit less still and lonely fair
Than the high cloudlets in the sky.

And for that minute a blackbird sang
Close by, and round him, mistier,
Farther and farther, all the birds
Of Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire.

But let me drag you away from the Cotswolds to look at some of the highlights of the month in the Leechwell Garden here in Devon.

The pergola with the wild flower bank on the left

On the pergola, the climbing roses put on a wonderful show as if they were saluting the warm weather. For a short time, they cloaked the natural wood structure with a luxuriant overcoat of pink and white petals.

Clary Sage with immature flowers

In the herb garden, large fleshy leaves and flower spikes of clary sage rose from the ground. The closed buds were very pale and reminded me of ghostly toothwort. They opened to a mass of very pale lilac flowers. The plant was called “clear eye” by Culpeper in his 17th century herbal and its sticky seeds were recommended for removing foreign objects from the eye. Nowadays, clary sage is grown commercially for its essential oil.

The patch of feverfew (behind and to the left are some mature flowers of clary sage)

Nearby is a large patch of feverfew, impressive for its many small yellow and white daisy-like flowers, also called “bachelor’s buttons.” The flowers grow so densely that they seem to coalesce to a bright yellow and white mosaic which glows when the sun shines.

I like Culpeper’s dedication for feverfew in his herbal: “Venus has commended this herb to succour her sisters” – in the past it was indeed used to treat gynaecological problems. Nowadays, feverfew is commonly used as a herbal remedy for migraine headaches, although a systematic review of clinical trials of feverfew failed to show any effect over placebo.

Flowering dogwood

Elsewhere in the Garden I found two interesting trees. One is a Flowering Dogwood (probably Cornus kousa), notable for its unassuming, small flowers each surrounded by four large, white bracts performing the function of petals. The bracts take on a pink tinge as they mature.

Ginkgo biloba

The other was a Ginkgo Biloba, the world’s oldest tree. The Ginkgo has unique leaves, fan shaped with veins radiating in to the leaf blade which sometimes splits. It is referred to as a living fossil as the modern species has been found to be related to fossils dating back 270 million years.

Extracts of Ginkgo Biloba have been long used in traditional Chinese medicine to treat a range of disorders. There has been great interest in the western world in the use of Ginkgo extracts to improve memory and prevent Alzheimer’s disease but controlled clinical trials do not support this idea.

I first heard of the Ginkgo tree through a painting, not via a garden. In the mid 1980s, the artist Tom Phillips had been commissioned by the National Portrait Gallery to paint a portrait of the author and philosopher, Iris Murdoch. I used to be a fan of the writer and I remember going to see the painting; I was surprised to find that it also contained a branch of a tree. Apparently, the artist wanted to include “a bit of nature” in the picture and after consultation with Murdoch they agreed on Ginkgo. Here is a link to the story and the picture.

The bees have been busy whenever the weather has allowed and I have included a couple of pictures.

Flowering thyme with a bumblebee

Brambles with a honeybee

Red Valerian growing from walls near the Leechwell Garden. Three flower colours are seen: the predominant pink, also red and white

The enclosed narrow paths leading to the Garden were striking earlier in the month, bathed in the mostly pink flowers and fleshy green leaves of red valerian growing from the walls. This plant, which was introduced from the Mediterranean many years ago, is now naturalised and grows widely in the South West wherever it can – in walls, on waste ground, in gardens. It was recently also featured on the Words and Herbs blog. Red Valerian (Centranthus ruber) is very much a feature of the urban landscape of this part of Devon and contributes to a southern European feel, at least until it rains heavily. By the end of the month, much of the red valerian near the Leechwell Garden had lost its petals contributing to the slightly dried-out look that has replaced the lush greenness of gardens and hedgerows just a month ago.

Bee bread, benches and a crows nest in the April garden

 

There is no escaping it. Wherever you look, there is pulsating growth: trees, plants, birds, insects, all swept up in an orgy of renewal. From my vantage point overlooking the Leechwell Garden, the predominant feeling is green, although there were days in the middle of the month when the sun picked out the white blaze of blossom on nearby trees. Trilling wrens and chiding blackbirds provided the soundtrack, saluting the warmer weather.

It’s a favourite time of year for me, I like the feeling of everything starting afresh and alive. Shakespeare gets it right for me in Sonnet 98
When proud-pied April dress’d in all his trim
Hath put a spirit of youth in every thing,

Others, however, see April as a time of hopes and aspirations that can never be fulfilled. TS Eliot began his poem The Waste Land: “April is the cruellest month” and, in Spring Edna St Vincent Millay wrote “To what purpose, April, do you return again?”

I don’t share their pessimism; I know autumn will come and these new leaves will wither and fall, but I also know that there will be another season of growth next year.

Down in the Garden, there has been much to see. Three new rustic benches have been installed making it even better for people to visit and spend time here. On the pergola, the clematis continue to entertain.

Clematis Francis Rivis

The tear-like buds of the Francis Rivis that I admired last month have now opened showing delicate mauve outer petals and white inner petals.

 

 

Clematis Montana

Another clematis, a Montana, has been covered with round pinkish buds resembling small grapes.

 

 

Golden Marjoram

In the herb garden, a burgeoning patch of golden marjoram comes alight when the sun shines.

 

 

Sweet Cicely

A clump of sweet cicely shows frothy white flowers above the fern-like, green foliage; the leaves of this plant are edible and have a mild aniseed-like flavour with sugary overtones.

 

 

Borage

Several spikes of borage seem to have appeared from nowhere as if called to stand to attention. Bees love borage; the plant is sometimes called Bee Bread so they will be eagerly awaiting the full opening of the flowers.

 

 

 

Wild Garlic

The far side of the Garden has a much wilder feel. A small bank of wild garlic (Ramsons) shows starry flowers beginning to appear above the fleshy leaves. Wild garlic is very abundant in the Devon countryside and the spring-smell of a woodland path lined with the plant is unmistakable. The leaves now find favour with celebrity chefs as a gentle garlic substitute.

 

 

Hidcote-blue Comfrey

In a hidden corner, I found some beautiful comfrey, another bee favourite. Its buds are a deep red and, once opened, there are clusters of bell-like flowers; that part of the flower nearest the plant is pale blue with the remainder being white. This unusual variety is Hidcote-blue comfrey.

 

 

Garlic Mustard

Near the comfrey was an upstanding plant with copious green, heart-shaped leaves and small white flowers. This is garlic mustard or Jack-by-the-Hedge; when bruised or chopped, its leaves emit a mild garlic smell.

 

The bees are out and about and I have seen a common carder and a hairy footed flower bee on the white lungwort.

Common carder bee on white lungwort

 

On April 20th I noticed a bird glide gracefully down between the trees to land on the grass. It was quite large, predominantly dark but with pale patches on its wings and my first reaction was that it was a buzzard. It stalked about the Garden, occasionally stopping to eat and with its long tale and dark plumage it reminded me of the proprietor of a posh French restaurant eyeing up his staff and clientele while keeping his hands clasped firmly behind his back. The more I looked the more I realised this was no buzzard and most likely it was a very large crow with a few pale feathers. The bird kept returning to the Garden and I found this puzzling until one day I saw it land on a nearby tree. On the tree was another crow sitting on a nest made of twigs balanced between two branches. Both birds are occasionally on the nest together; there will be a new crow-family before too long.

This is the fifth of my monthly reflections on the Leechwell Garden in Totnes. To see what I wrote in earlier months, follow the links at the end of this post or put “leechwell” in the search window.

Thanks to Hazel Strange for improving the photos I took on April 19, 26 and 27.

Tightrope walkers and a Geisha Girl in the March garden

“March comes in like a lion, and goes out like a lamb”

Or so the traditional proverb tells us, but that’s not what happened this year, in fact it was almost the reverse. March gambolled in like a young lamb brimming with dry weather and sunshine. As the temperature went up, so people’s spirits rose and you could almost imagine it was spring.

A mid-month sunny Sunday stays in my memory: bright and clear, blue skies, one of the warmest days so far this year and lacking the mistiness of sunny days earlier in the month. From my vantage point overlooking the Leechwell Garden, I saw several families arriving with blankets and picnic lunches, probably bought at the bustling Food Market held that day in the civic square. Children played in the marrow-chilling water and probably frightened the tadpoles. Fathers exposed too much white flesh.

In a quieter corner of the Garden, I noticed a young woman sitting peacefully with her hands turned upwards enjoying the sunshine. I initially thought she was meditating but when she stood up and performed a series of deliberate, sculpted and fluid movements, I decided it was more likely yoga.
The Garden was doing its job by acting as a pleasant and welcoming community space.

Later in the month, March did leave like a lion but it was a bedraggled, shivering and slouching lion: the weather had turned cooler and wetter with some spirited hail storms.

Despite the recent mixed weather, change still continues and a green haze of new leaves now covers several of the trees in the Garden.

I was surprised to see new leaves also appearing on one of the installations in the children’s play area – I hadn’t realised it was a living willow sculpture.

Elsewhere, a young fruit tree, I think it’s a plum, was, for a while, covered with white blossom, as if there had been a sudden blizzard. The snowy white petals on each flower were arranged in five fold symmetry around delicate yellow-tipped stamens. It’s a beautiful tree but I am concerned for its welfare: Garden visitors are giving it a bit of a battering and I wonder if it needs some sort of protection.

On the pergola, the climbers have cloaked themselves in green leaves but my attention was taken by the striking flower buds of an early clematis (Francis Rivis). The buds stand out against the green-leaved background as if someone had cried massive purple/blue teardrops which have been caught by the lush new matrix of leaves.

 

Against one of the old walls I found several flowering quince (Chaenomeles Geisha Girl) with their papery, double, salmon-pink flowers and buttercup-yellow stamens. A bumblebee shared my admiration and fed from the flowers.

Early in the month, Susan Taylor, one of the Garden volunteers came to see me with the exciting news that she had spotted a Hairy Footed Flower Bee in the sunshine on some rosemary growing against one of the old walls. The following day, I also saw one on a patch of lungwort in another part of town near the river. I noticed the staccato flight pattern and the loud buzz. Both bees were gingery coloured males who emerge first after the winter. The black females emerge about a fortnight later to mate with the waiting males before setting up a nest.

In the middle of the month, Susan told me about some different insects she had seen in one of the town centre car parks, not far from the Garden. I went to investigate and found a south facing sunny bank covered with flowering dandelions and celandine and sure enough there was also a host of small insects, between half and two thirds the size of honeybees. They were flying around in a purposeful manner, occasionally landing and occasionally feeding from the dandelion flowers. The underlying soil in the bank was fairly crumbly and I thought I could see some holes so I wondered if these were mining bees but I don’t think I can rule out the possibility that they are hoverflies. Here are some photos; any help in identifying these would be most welcome.

I did see two of the insects get together and form what I can only describe as a ball. A third came to join in but was seen off. I assume the two were mating and I wonder if they are solitary bees (Collletes), known for forming a mating ball. When these two had finished, one flew off immediately but the other stayed for a while, shaking legs and wings and putting everything in order, as though it was adjusting clothing rumpled in an embrace.

One sad story. Last month I described some trees covered with catkins growing near the edge of the Garden. The day after I posted the story, one of the local residents cut most of these down. The trunks have been left and I suppose they will grow back but it will take time. I can’t really see why they did this but I suspect it’s to do with wanting order. There is now much less for the birds and insects, nature likes a little untidiness.

I don’t want to end on a low note so I shall tell you about the tightrope walkers. These are two young women who come to the Garden to practise their art and they appeared on a recent sunny day. They have a plastic ribbon which they attach between two sturdy trees. The ribbon is about the width of a human foot and is suspended less than a metre above the ground. They hop deftly on to the ribbon, walk along it, they jump hoping to land on the ribbon again, they use only their outstretched arms to provide balance. At one point, they both got on to the ribbon at the same time but at different ends. They then advanced towards the middle before falling off in fits of laughter.

The photos were taken on March 19th 2014

National Pollinator Strategy – if you love your pollinators, now is the time to speak out

 

Last year the UK Government agreed to prepare a National Pollinator Strategy to address the decline in pollinators and the potential impact of this decline on growth of crops, flowers and fruit. The draft Strategy was published earlier this month and barely caused a ripple in the mainstream media. Andy Atkins of Friends of the Earth wrote about this on the Huffington Post blog and it’s worth having a look at what he says.

I think it’s very positive that the government has compiled this Strategy, it means they recognise that there is a problem. The devil is in the detail, however, and although there are some very good aspects to the Strategy there are several rather surprising proposals. Damian Carrington, writing in the Guardian, skewered some of the ideas around pesticides, especially the proposal to leave field testing to the pesticide companies. The National Allotment Society also made some good points.

The most important issue, however, is that a consultation about the draft Strategy is now open and anyone can contribute on line with a deadline of May 2nd 2014. If you love your pollinators then this is the time to have your say.

Even better, they are also holding a series of workshops related to the consultation. These are being held in London, Bristol and York during March and April. I would like to go to one of these but I can’t make the dates; perhaps others can. The workshops will be very interesting and very important sessions to attend and report on.

Bees and Trees seen in Devon

On a sunny day last week, we walked around Salcombe and the nearby coast path. We enjoyed wonderful views over the sea and the coast in this part of Devon. This is not a catalogue of the walk; rather I wanted to highlight two interesting encounters.

red-tailed bumblebee

Between Salcombe’s North and South Sands beaches we came across a grassy bank in full sunshine. There were many purple flowers, violets and periwinkle, with quite a few bees enjoying the forage and sunshine. One of them was, I think, a beautiful red-tailed bumblebee. (There is a good discussion of identification issues here).

Magnolia campbelli at Overbeck’s

Later on as we descended the coast path from Bolt Tail towards Salcombe, we walked along the boundary wall of the National Trust property of Overbeck’s. This has a beautiful garden built alongside and above the Salcombe estuary. Conditions here are very mild and they can grow a number of tender plants including bananas. Overbeck’s is renowned for its magnolias and over the wall we were able to glimpse the Magnolia campbelli covered in their huge bright pink flowers, looking all the more surprising in the absence of other colour. Originally from the Himalayas, M. campbelli is known for flowering early and for the size of its flowers (at least 20cm across). One of the Overbeck’s Magnolia campbelli was planted in 1901 and a second daughter tree was grown from seed in the 1950s. The early flowering makes the tree vulnerable to frost and in some years the flowers are damaged by a sudden drop in temperature.

The picture doesn’t do justice to the flowers but further down the road we came across two more Magnolia campbelli growing in a private garden.

Magnolia campbelli in private garden

Although these were not as advanced as those at Overbeck’s itself, they show rather well the mature olive green flower buds and the bright pink flowers. I saw these two trees for the first time three years ago just after they had been frosted. Some petals were still hanging on the tree and some lay on the ground. These thick pink petals the size of pocket handkerchiefs reminded me of the flags used at music festivals such as WOMAD.

With the exception of the WOMAD picture, which comes from Wikipedia, the pictures were taken by Hazel Strange on February 26th 2014.

Bumblebees and honeybees share diseases and the outcome is not a good one.

Bumblebee on Rosemary on Lyme Regis sea front (February 22nd 2014) (photo by Hazel Strange)

I recently read Dave Goulson’s excellent book “A Sting in the Tale” and learnt a lot about bumblebees. Although I was aware of the global trade in honeybees, I hadn’t realised that there was an equivalent trade in bumblebees. Some crops such as tomatoes and peppers require buzz-pollination, the rapid vibration of the flower. Bumblebees do this very well and are now used extensively by commercial growers of tomatoes and other crops. To supply the demand for these useful insects there are at least thirty factories producing bumblebees for shipping all over the world. The numbers are staggering with European factories producing up to a million nests per year. This is big business with huge financial rewards but keeping so many insects together in one place risks the rapid spread of disease unless stringent hygiene precautions are observed. To complicate matters, commercially-reared bumblebees are fed pollen from honeybees so that they are potentially exposed to all the diseases that affect honeybees.

But what about wild bumblebees? What happens when a wild bumblebee forages at a flower that has already been visited by a honeybee? Are the bumblebees exposed to honeybee diseases and what might the consequences be?

 

Last week’s Nature magazine carried an article addressing this issue. The team who carried out the work were from Royal Holloway London, Queen’s University Belfast and Exeter University. They showed that some honeybee diseases are indeed a problem for wild bumblebees and could be causing a decline in these wild pollinators. They studied two diseases: the fungal parasite Nosema which weakens honeybee colonies, and Deformed Wing Virus (DWV) which causes abnormalities in the wings and abdomen of infected honeybees as well as severely curtailing their lifespan.

The starting point for the work was to test whether these honeybee diseases could actually infect bumblebees. The researchers inoculated bumblebees (B.terrestris) with DWV or Nosema, and found that bumblebees were indeed susceptible to infection by both diseases. In the case of DWV, infection led to reduced survival of B.terrestris workers. For Nosema, although it could infect bumblebees, this did not reduce their lifespan.

Having established that the two honeybee diseases could infect bumblebees, the researchers examined the incidence of the two diseases. They performed a large scale study on the prevalence of DWV and Nosema in honeybees and bumblebees across 26 sites in Great Britain and the Isle of Man. DWV was found in 36% of honeybees tested and in 11% of bumblebees tested. For many of the infected bumblebees, the virus was active showing that the bumblebees were not simply acting as carriers. Nosema was less prevalent being found in 9% of honeybees and 7% of bumblebees. When the geographical distribution was analysed, there was some evidence for clustering, indicating disease hotspots. Hotspots for DWV were found in the south west and east of Great Britain and for Nosema in the south east. By analysing the distribution of the two diseases they were also able to show that the prevalence of DWV in honeybees influenced the prevalence of DWV in bumblebees, implying local transmission between the two insects. Local transmission was confirmed by analysing the form (nucleotide sequence) of the virus present in the two types of bee collected from the same site.

Honeybees have a high prevalence of DWV, a consequence of infestation of colonies by Varroa mites. The most obvious conclusion from this new work is that honeybee DWV is spreading to wild bumblebees. This probably occurs when the two types of bee forage in the same environment. Because DWV infection of bumblebees reduces their lifespan, the spread of this pathogen could be contributing to the decline in bumblebee numbers.

Both honeybees and bumblebees are important pollinators and need to be maintained. Their loss would have immense financial implications. This research shows that disease control in honeybee populations, for example through the efforts of beekeepers, has important implications for the health of other pollinators as well.