The last 10 days of September were a disaster – cool temperatures, no sun and far too much rain. It has also been cooler than average with less sunshine, and twice as much rain, than usual. Our average rainfall is 42mm and we have had 95mm, far less than most areas.
Harvesting continues when conditions allow; we have completed the canary seed, some of the millet and the rest of it will be harvested when it’s dry enough. It is now all ripe but the strong winds we’ve had will be making it drop. Two or three days of strong winds can blow out half of the ripe millet onto the ground. Millet is very different to the canary seed, as canary seed will not blow out, as it has a different seed head.
We have invested in a new dryer this year which will help us dry our seed crops more quickly, which is especially an advantage to dry our later harvested bird seed crops.
Sunflowers are not yet ready to harvest, but they are ripe enough for the Wood pigeons to eat. Pigeon numbers are building up, but how many will depend on how favourable the winds are in Scandinavia, for pigeons to fly across the North Sea. If the winds are not favourable, they’ll go south to Denmark and Holland.
We have started to harvest potatoes but, as I write this, harvesting has come to a stop because of the rain. As usual, we are being very careful not to bruise the potatoes. A sample of what we are lifting goes away each day to be warmed up, to show bruises and any other damage. If there is too much damage, we’ll inspect our lifter and grader, to see if there is any point where this damage is occurring. We were very lucky not to get the heavy rain on September 22nd that fell in Bedfordshire and Northamptonshire, but we have now received plenty of rain and are hoping the weather will improve, so we can get some more potatoes lifted and more millet harvested.
In the middle of September, my wife Anne and I went by train to Barcelona. We hired a car and travelled further south to the Ebro delta, to watch the rice harvest and to see all the birds that were feeding in the fields afterwards – we were not disappointed! There were thousands, including: Glossy Ibis, various gulls, Little, Cattle and Great White egrets, Herons and several species of waders.
The combines and tractors were working in tracks and sloshing about in the water, as every field or paddy had a few inches of water. The machinery doesn’t get bogged down as the farmers make the fields very solid when they are preparing the land in the spring, when it is dry. Every field in the delta is rice and has been for maybe 100 years. It is the only holiday where I haven’t been able to enter a field, as this time I didn’t take my wellingtons! The fields are mostly quite small, five to ten acres; the combines are moved on a low loader trailer from field to field. So interesting to see it all going on.
September and October are the months when we have the least number of birds on the farm. Our summer visitors have left and the winter visitors are only trickling in. I was seeing Swallows nearly every day in September, but they weren’t our Swallows – they had come from further North or even from Scandinavia. Our Swallows had all departed by the end of the first week in September.
Cuthbert, the Cuckoo Vine House Farm has sponsored with the BTO is now in Senegal. He was caught in Surlingham, east Norfolk in June and departed England on July 12th for Spain and spent the next six weeks in Spain and Portugal. During the last week in August, he left Spain and six days later he was in Senegal, where he currently still is. We are expecting him to make his way East and South to arrive in the Congo by early November, where he will spend the winter. The Cuckoos that come to Eastern England generally go south via Spain, while the Cuckoos in the northwest of England and Scotland generally go south via Italy, usually resulting in less failures.
As many of you are aware, I am involved in the Turtle Dove Trust. Our man in Suffolk, Trevor Lay, has had a good year rearing over 700 Turtle Doves. These are being dispatched to wildlife friendly farms to be overwintered and will be released during summer 2025. We do know that they are returning to England, as Trevor has caught seven birds this year that he reared in 2022. We have not had any reports of birds seen in the winter, so we believe that they are all migrating.
We have invested quite a lot of money in trackers, similar to those that are used on the Cuckoos. Ten trackers have been fitted, but only four are currently working. Three of those birds have not yet started to migrate and one is now in Kent.
The captive Turtle Doves lay eggs which are taken from them and placed under broody Java Doves. Meanwhile, the Turtle Doves keep laying eggs and the same process is repeated. It is quite time consuming, keeping track of both species of Doves removing eggs and placing them under a suitable pair of Java Doves. We are constantly looking for funds so if anyone would like to help with the project they can send a cheque to me, made out to the Turtle Dove Trust or donate online to the Turtle Dove Trust.
This year as you are probably aware has seen a huge reduction in butterflies. We too have seen this reduction in our Wildlife Garden and on the farm. We grew some broccoli in our poly-tunnel which was attacked by large whites, after we had harvested the crop. In order to help, we didn’t pull up these stalks and we left them in place for the caterpillars grow on; they have turned from chrysalis into butterflies. The butterflies have laid more eggs, more caterpillars have grown, turned into chrysalis and so it goes on. Our Wildlife Garden visitors are commenting on how many white butterflies they are seeing. It just shows that with a bit of care some of our declining wildlife can be increased.