|
|
|
Wasperton > Wildlife |
ARCHIVE
January |
ST JOHN THE BAPTIST CHURCH, WASPERTON Updated September 2025 If dry be the buck's horn This adage comes from Yorkshire, my book says it reads well but has a very disagreeable result. The first test for dry gave 34% and for wet gave 32%. I don't think a one in three chance is too bad. "Holyrood" refers to the 14th September, Holycross or Holyrood Day. Hopefully most of the harvest will be in the barn this year after our summer, now well before the 14th. The usual weather pattern associated with September is the three dry periods known as "The Old-Wives summer" which in turn are followed by wet stormy days. The dry spells normally occur 7th to 10th, 16th to the 21st and 30th as travelling anti-cyclones move east across the UK into the Continent. The most common time for gales and depressions is around the 24th. Again we must wait and see. Referring to harvesting above we have to do the long growth around the perimeter of the Churchyard. Not really a harvest but it does release most of the wild flower seeds during raking. It is important to rake the cuttings. Two reasons, first to remove the cuttings so that the soil gets no nutrients. Wild flowers do best in poor soils, second to spread the seeds which fall out of their husks for next year. We also collect some seed before mowing to sow where we want to spread flowers to new areas. Very complicated.. Our pipistrelle bats are still with us but not using our bat boxes. They much prefer being under the Church roof tiles. Funny little things. I suppose the Churchyard area is a very good feeding space for the bats, so many flying insects after dark. I would like to know how many bats we have. Perhaps I should ask the bat society in Coventry if they can help with a census. Anyway thanks for your support, keeping walking through the Churchyard when you are near us, so good to see you. Mike Porter
|
||||||||||
