Please refer to the Introduction Page to understand the context behind the monthly photographs.
Birds
Animals
Spiders
The spider below Eratigena duellica (taken with a digital microscope) is one of the five common house spiders. Probably a male with a head to abdomen length of approximately 13mm. Tip of the legs being over double this at 30mm.
Fungi
Hazel Woodwart (Hypoxylon fuscum) appears throughout the year but actively distributes its spores during autumn and early winter. This wood-rotting fungus is one of the pyromycetes or flask fungi.
Yellow Brain Fungus which has now aged, dried out and become more wrinkled and turning dark orange. (compare with last month)
Moss
The Common Feather Moss below taken on an obviously early freezing morning.
Grey Cushion Moss is prolific on our Roof Tiles. The green pods contain the spores and are bent down into the plant where the spores are released. The empty pods turn brown. The greyness is due to the long hairs which extend from the leaf tips.
The Moss below is from my garden lawn and is regularly raked out but persists. So time for a close up with the digital microscope and rather nice looking so maybe not to rake out this year.
The Mosses below are from one of the many local woods. The (Pottiaceae) form the most numerous moss family known, containing nearly 1500 species or more than 10% of the 10,000 to 15,000 moss species known.
Liverworts
The liverworts are a group of simple small plants with flattened bodies, or with flattened stems bearing overlapping scales.. Scientists believe from DNA that liverworts were the first bryophyte to evolve. They believe that mosses, hornworts and more complex plants then evolved from liverworts.
Frullania dilatata
Common throughout most of Britain and Ireland on trees and shrubs, also found on rocks and among coastal turf. This photograph taken on tree bark is fruiting abundantly. The ‘orange flowers’ are mature fruits that have ruptured to release the spores.
Trees
Hazel is monecious. This means the male and female parts are found on the same tree. The yellow male catkins appear in February. The female part takes the form of a tiny bud with red protrusions which require to be fertilised by the male pollen from another tree. The fertilised female buds grow into nuts with each nut encased in a sheath of papery or modified leaves. The nuts ripen to brown during September/October.
Lichen
Lichen are only recorded at each new OS Grid location (hover for Grid Ref). They are then entered on the British Lichen Society spreadsheet and submitted for their Warwickshire VC38 Lichen database and Lichen mapping.
Non-Churchyard lichens
Ones that escaped the camera lens this month
a) A Jay once again - quick to take flight.
b) Roe Deer Stag and Hind