Pablo’s Woodlife

Took a day off today. The weather was so good. It was too good to miss a day out in the woods. Friday 13th? Pah! No worries. I prefer going to Broaks Wood during the week as there are fewer people and dog walkers. I don’t mind dog walkers, in fact when my black Labrador, Ben, was alive, we used to go there often. But dogs do disturb the wildlife. These thoughts came apparent as I had a break in the small valley.

After about 10 minutes sitting in the sun, I spotted a mutjac deer about 20 yards a way. I scrambled for the camera but hit the wrong settings. A wasted opportunity but at least I was able to see it wander off casually down the valley and up the other side of the hill. A couple of seconds later, I heard barking, which I assume was the deer I’d seen.

I’d always wondered why the wood was called Broaks Wood (Brock is an old English names for Badger, but it might not be this) I had never previously seen any signs of Badgers in the woods. This changed as I climbed to the highest point of the wood. I spotted a track mark pointing to a dip in the wood. After guessing where the owner would go, I came across a huge sett with a number of entrances, scratching posts and latrines. It must have been extremely old judging by the scratch marks that had healed in the wood.

I continued up to the highest point of the wood and had lunch. I had dispensed with the trangia today and had just brought sandwiches. I knew I was going to do a bit of walking and wanted to travel light. In fact I only had my sit mat with me. The axe was swapped out for the walking stick, the trangia for ham and cheese sarnies. The view from the top of the wood was wonderful. Looking east, it appeared the epitome of the English countryside with undulating hills, farmland and wood.

On the way back via a different route I discovered a Hornets nest. Not so much discovered as someone had put up a sign, warning of the impending ‘danger’. I spent a while filming the nest actually getting quite close. They appeared not to be too bothered by my presence. I did start to worry as suddenly quite a few came out from the nest at once. I think if you panic in these situations, it just makes things worse and even insects smell your fear, so I got up slowly and walked away.

My last encounter was with fallow deer on top of a hill. Again, I only just managed to catch the deer on film before they ran over the top of the hill. They must have seen me approaching as at that time I wasn’t walking particularly quietly. Most of the trip I had been. I have learned a technique of walking in the woods so as not to spook wildlife. You basically walk toe to heel instead of t’other way round, keeping the feet pointing forward and s l o w l y does it. I also roll my feet out to in. This is quite hard work and can’t be done for long periods, especially if you’re not wearing the right footwear. I tried to follow the deer but they had a greater head start. There were so many tracks in the mud, I didn’t know which ones to follow.

I finished the trip at one of the small ponds, where I spotted a few more dragonfly. You all must be getting fed up with these dragonfly pictures, but I do find them fascinating. Actually, I made an identification error with the previously shown ‘red-dragonflies’. They were in fact Common Darters (but still red in colour). The variation of the Common Darter colour is this brown colour and probably means it’s a female.

Okay. Now here’s something I want to try out. By pressing the wrong button on my camera, I activated video mode which I very rarely use in the woods. I got home and mucked about a bit (a lot actually) and came up with a video of the excursion. I know my technique needs a bit of work and the image isn’t as clear as I thought it would be, but see what you think. It’s about 3 1/2 minutes long and there’s no audio. I might do something on a more bushcraft type subject at a later date.

A bit late posting this one, as I went out Friday (see last post) and Saturday. I wandered back into my usual woods. I’m so delighted to find the ’secret clearing’. If it doesn’t get flooded in the winter, I can see this being one of my favourite spots. I will be careful not to frequent the spot too often. After a while an area does look ‘lived in’ and I don’t intend that to happen in any of the areas I visit. I couldn’t resist though making it a little more comfortable for future visits.

I dragged a couple of loose stumps over from another area. I think it’s quite important to have somewhere to sit on (even though I use the hammock as a seat) and a good solid stump to do some knife and axe work. A smaller stump would do as a stand for the trangia. I call this basic site furniture. Ideally the stump for the knife and axe work should have a ledge at the rear of the stump to rest the wood you’re working on. If it hasn’t been cut through properly then it will have ‘barber chaired’ which will act as a natural rest.

A bit more foraging and enough wood for a some basic tools was found. A baton is always useful especially if no axe is available. This in turn leads to a couple of pot hangers. I practiced battoning until I had made a notch in the pot hanger in about 45 seconds. Next came a couple of ‘Y’ shaped standards and cross pole for a cooking fire. Finally I made a tripod. This could have a number of uses, but primarily I use it as a rucksack holder (for larger rucksacks that can’t be hung on a branch). Another use is as a tripod stand for cooking where, instead of a cross pole, the pot hanger is put on a long pole and balanced on the tripod. The pole can then be varied in height (by using a cantilever method) to raise and lower the pot hanger, hence putting the billy can closer or further to or from the fire.

I had a bit of wood left over and carefully stashed it away for future use.

Before I left the site, I cached the tools and furniture so as not to make it obvious that anyone had visited the site and also to try to keep the wood dry for my next visit.

On the way back I bumped into this little chap. As you can tell he wasn’t too pleased to see me! For those not sure, it’s a Devils coach horse and isn’t as harmful as it looks. The threatening posture is enough to put anyone off though. According to Irish folklore, it is a symbol of corruption and eats ’sinners’. The raising of the tail casts a curse. If that’s not enough, if we were lesser animals or birds, we would be on the receiving end of some foul smelling chemicals emitted from anal glands. Nice!

As you can imagine, after a week indoors with a chest infection, I couldn’t wait to go back out to the woods. So far, I’ve not missed a weekend throughout the winter, which was something I didn’t expect when I first started Bushcraft. I think I described myself then as a fine weather Bushcrafter, but I’ve been out in the rain, shine, snow and frost and enjoyed every minute.

I started the weekend by doing a bit of Archery practice. I decided to set up a target as opposed to going into the woods itself. I wanted to really hone my point of aim. After a couple of hours, I was quite pleased with the grouping. I made a mental note to come out a practice more on the target just to ensure the point of aim is consistent.

It felt good to be back in the woods, even though I didn’t really have a specific project. I took the 3×3 tarp just to practice a couple of different configurations. I actually found it more difficult to do this than the smaller tarp and concluded that I would probably just use the larger tarp in the most simple configuration, extending the sides to the ground if the weather got bad. I do like to look out from under the tarp and the raised front type configuration is still my favourite. The large tarp is pretty good for this.

The weather was quite mild (10 degrees C) and the wildlife seemed to appreciate the reprieve from the latest cold snap. I managed to get close to a herd of 35 fallow deer in a nearby field (photo above). I also spotted what I think is arum lilly (poisonous) shooting through the leaf litter. A sighting of a dog fox, red legged partridges and mosquito larvae in a slow moving stream finished off a good weekend for wildlife spotting.

My mate Paul and I headed south to meet up with the Reading Group on Friday afternoon. A little rain was forecast but the whole weekend turned out fine and dry.

After a hot and sticky walk-in we arrived to find the parachute already up and a brew on the go. Mark presented me with a fine looking kuksa as a gift for doing the Reading group forum. I was completely overwhelmed and promptly planned what liquid substance should go in it. Well – it’s got to be sealed properly hasn’t it?

We woke up to a beautiful day on Saturday and after breakfast, a couple of us went roving with the bows to do a bit of stump shooting. I’d brought along the Samick SKB, the length of which proved ideal in the particular closed-in area of woodland we chose to shoot in. We all did pretty well getting close to the challenging choices of target and in a couple of instances even killed a stump or two!

Mark had brought along a large awl which enabled the construction of some wooden chairs. John decided to assemble what can only be described as a throne, which was in keeping with his heavy-weight style of camping. Hence he was dubbed “His Majesty, King John” for the rest of the meet. The chairs will be kept on site ready for the next meet.

Some of us went for a wander after lunch and ended up tracking along the moderately fast flowing stream. There was a lot of damselfly activity and I spent some time trying to photograph the amazingly coloured and aptly named Beautiful demoiselle (Calopteryx virgo).

We followed some tracks along the stream bank and decided it belonged to a small fox. The tracks ended up at a kill site where the only evidence left of the prey was a claw of a crustacian. Looking again at the photo I’m not too sure if there might be other tracks in there and I wish I’d studied the area in more detail at the time. Other tracks seen were roe, fallow, muntjac, mouse and a number of birds that had hopped along the bank. There was still no sign of the elusive water vole tracks.

The evening meal was a barbeque of literally tons of meat mostly provided by King John.
Earlier, Steve (who was on my Shadowhawk tracking course) and I identified a good sit spot covering an area where there might be some evening mammal activity. Andy had already spotted a fox cub, and muntjac had been heard the previous evening. After the barbeque, along with Andy we sat for an hour being bitten to death by mosquitos! The sum total of our sightings? One rabbit, five hundred and three mosquitos - oh and some sheep! Well, you can’t win them all.

One of the best things about meets is that you can share experiences and stories around the fire. With new faces comes new stories and experiences. Knowledge is shared, kit examined and compared, and tips are passed on. This meet was no exception. John was busy dying a leather water bottle while Mark had made a fantastic flute case. You can see these pics on the network.

Prior to packing up on Sunday, conversation meandered on to the dreaded tick subject mentioned in my last post. This prompted everyone to start examining themselves. Low and behold ticks were found on nearly everyone’s legs. A tick removal session then took place. Anyone watching would be forgiven in thinking that a strange bunch of primates had invaded the woods and were busy de-fleaing themselves. Mark’s pocket microscope (is there nothing that he dosesn’t have handy?) showed in real terms what a monstrous looking creature the tick is.

A certain lesson learned and a good tip is to tuck the trousers in to socks or put elastics around the bottom of the trousers. Those with sleeping areas on the bracken slopes (myself included) should also have cleared a path through the bracken leading to the hammock. Whatever the precautions though, it’s inevitable that you will get a couple if you go tracking or exploring through the undergrowth.

All too soon it was time to say our goodbyes and leave the site. We doused the fire and cached the pot hangers. Another excellent weekend and a big thanks to Mark for organising the meet and everyone else that came along.

Pablo.

 

I could only manage a few hours in the woods this weekend. I decided on the spur of the moment to have a go at making a fork. If you’ve ever tried this you’ll know that it’s not easy. I gouged away carefully at the gap between the prongs, but still managed to split the wood slightly. I’ll probably also have to harden the ends of the prongs over a fire or they’ll break too easily. Although it doesn’t look too bad, I don’t think it will last very long under constant use. I think I need more practice!

 

I spent the rest of the time looking at the plants growing on some waste ground. This is a good time to identify these plants as there’s a lot in bloom.

Cinnibar Moth catapillar on Ragwort – Ragwort is poisoness to most mammals

[edit] Burnet moth (possibly six-pot Burnet) on Common centaury

Tall melilot

Great willowherb

Birds-foot trefoil

Scarlet pimpernel

Vetch

Field bindweed

Cinqfoil

Common mallow

Small tortoishell on thistle

Self-heal

Thanks for the visit.

Pablo.

Despite a couple of quite sunny days, the temperature dropped and the wind turned a little chilly. I could just feel a slight coolness on my fingers as the wind turned to blow from the north. Some say Autumn has started but I still say it’s late summer. (Ever the optimist.)

I went out to Poor Park Woods yesterday and unsuccessfully tracked the Fallow deer around the woods for a few hours. They led me on a hilarious merry dance which I’ll talk about another time. I ended up exhausted and, after a rest, decided to gather the last of the blackberries for my special Christmas brew. I had to be selective as many had passed their sell by date.

The landscape looked decidedly weary. Fields have been ploughed and the foliage looks decidedly tired and droopy. An occasional yellow leaf fluttered gently earthward on the breeze. No. It won’t be long, but it’s not here yet.

To prove a point I went to Broaks Wood today. It was actually warmer and the wind was again coming from the south west . 

I concentrated my efforts on the ponds and the dragonflies. I’ve not taken many photos of dragonflies this year and there wouldn’t be too many chances left.

The bright morning sunshine brought out the larger ones first. An Emperor was hawking the main pond. Despite the 45 degree angled stick trick, he wouldn’t land for love nor money.

The male Common darter didn’t disappoint when I tried to get it on my finger.

The female’s were a little more shy and tended to stay in the higher branches.

The Southern hawker preferred to “hang” on the gorse waiting until a little later for his flight.

This Forest bug clung to my trousers as if to hide from the aerial battles although with all that armour, I’m sure he would be fine.

This unidentified spider spun it’s web quickly in the hopes of catching one of the dragonflies.

You find strange things in Broaks Wood ponds (after a design by Fenlander – cheers mate) much to the delight of the young naturalists in the area, who didn’t see me put it in the pond!

Yes, it will soon be Autumn by my calculations. This weekend was definitely the Last of the Summer Wine.

Thanks for the visit.

Pablo.

As I suggested, over the last month or so I’ve been busy filming spring in the woodlands around and about where I live.

I’ve enjoyed my new found freedom by occasionally taking off my aircast and I have been limping about the woods pointing the camera shakily at everything that moves.

I’ve put up the compilation of the footage on my YouTube channel (have look if you haven’t been there before).

If you don’t want to go to the channel, you can view the video footage below. It’s about 5 minutes long. By the way, this is the first footage in something called High Definition so I hope you enjoy it. If your connection is too slow, you can view it without HD by clicking on the HD button.

Pablo.

The temperature went up into the low twenties centigrade this weekend in the East of England with bright sunshine. There was an air of expectancy as I made my way into Poor Park woods on Saturday.

Watching wildlife is like playing golf – not that I play myself, but I hear it all the time from my old man. You can employ all the tricks you know and you can even be a good player, but when you have a bad day, you certainly have a bad day. All your shots seems to land in the bunker.

I came up with a big fat zero as far as photographing anything interesting and eventually had to content myself with photographing snails and bugs.

After a while I started to get fascinated with the macro world, but inexperience showed as most of the photos came out blurred.

Sunday, and I was up with the larks and heading off to Broaks wood. I wanted to get some more video footage of the dragonflies.

I saw the usual suspects; Four-spotted chasers, Small reds, Azures, and Broad-bodied chasers. I also saw a one of the hawkers (difficult to ID on the wing) and a Banded-demoiselle although I couldn’t get any footage of the last two. They were just too quick for me and wouldn’t settle.

I realised that the idea of this next big High Definition production with dragonflies as the subject isn’t going to be as easy as I thought. In fact, I think it’s going to take me a good couple of  months to capture what I really want to show and make it worthwhile.

I was contemplating this in a state of melancholy sitting on a log before heading back to the car. I had spent the best part 2-days and all I had to show was blurred bugs and dodgy dragonflies. Then I looked up…

A Muntjac doe about 20 yards away. Hole in one!!

Thanks for the visit.

Pablo.

The natural world never ceases to amaze me. I’ve been wandering around this area with an amateur naturalists eye for nearly 16 years and I’ve never seen anything like this.

I was walking around the field area. Parts of this fields have not been farmed and have laid fallow for a number of years. I had previously spotted a couple of 6-spot Burnet moths on some Field scabious as I approached the field. On closer inspection I realised that the whole field was dotted with white, paper looking cocoons looking like they were tied to the grass stems.

Some cocoons were empty and some had obviously only just been vacated by the moth.

Some cocoons still had residents in.

The amazing thing was that there were moths absolutely everywhere you looked. I’ve never seen so many…

… and it was difficult to avoid treading on them.

There are various versions of the Burnet moth, which is a day flying moth. The 5 spot is exactly the same colour and easily confused. The red and black colours are a warning to predators because the moth contains hydrogen cyanide.

After doing a bit of research I realised that there is another Burnet moth called a New Forest Burnet which is sadly now extinct in the Forest although it is still found in Western Argyle, Scotland.

Just for good measure, I also spotted this Blue-tailed dragonfly later in the evening. It’s quite common but I’ve never seen one before.

By the way part two of the Kukuri video is up on my YouTube Channel.

I’m off to Devon to mentor and help instruct a Shadowhawk Tracking course this weekend so I’ll see you next week.

Thanks for the visit.

Pablo.