I’ve just been out for a stroll on the beach to check the surf. There wasn’t much surf but it was a gorgeous autumnal morning. Cold with a light easterly wind and clear blue skies. I couldn’t resist taking some photos of the patterns in the sand.

Our forgaing for food is going well. Anna and Morgan got some more blueberries yesterday and the blackberries are almost ready. We even had a little expedition on the beach earlier in the week looking out for Razor Clams.

We went armed with a bucket and a pot of salt. Apparently once you’ve found a hole that a Razor Clam lives in you can coax it out by pouring sand into the hole and then grab it and ease it out of its hole ready for cooking and eating! We haven’t eaten them before so we’re not sure if they are nice or not, but if we can catch some for free then we may as well try them.

Fortunately for the razor clams we didn’t see any holes and therefore didn’t manage to catch or eat any. Not particularly successful as foraging expeditions go but it was a nice evening walk along the beach all the same.

Our new garden water feature has worked a treat.

Not only does it look and sound good but part of the intention was to provide some water for garden wildlife. Whilst sat out in the sunshine late on Sunday afternoon we saw first a Willow Warbler take a bath in it followed by a Great Tit having a drink.

It’s great when these things work out just the way you wanted them to.

Have you run out of things to do with the children during the school holidays yet? The weather might not be great, but that shouldn’t stop you getting out into the great outdoors and doing things with them.

Blueberry Picking

How about heading to the hills for some blueberry picking – You can then spend some time in the kitchen cooking blueberry muffins with them. It’s getting a little late for blueberries now, but there were plenty there last weekend.

Blackberry Picking

Blackberry season is just about upon us as well. There are pockets of ripe blackberries all over the place and there should be more on their way over the next few weeks, so whatever the weather put on some suitable clothing (long sleeves and legs to protect you from the thorns and nettles and things you don’t mind getting stained), grab some pots and get foraging.

Wildlife Exploring

Fancy something a little more organised? RSPB Ynyshir have a ‘Wildlife Explorers Go Wild‘ day next Wednesday (Aug 25th) with activities for children of all ages – pond dipping and bug hunting with the wardens to see what you can find and learn about the smaller wildlife on the reserve. We’ve been to a few such events and they are always well organised and the kids love them.

You can of course do this one your own in the garden or a nearby park.

You can even do you own big garden birdwatch or butterfly count. Just because you can’t submit the results to the RSPB or Butterfly Conservation any more doesn’t stop you downloading an identification and recording sheet and doing your own version.

Den Building

The Forestry Commission at Nant yr Arian have a Den Building course for children 5 yrs+ on Wednesday 25th. Their woodland is the perfect place to try out your den building skills. Join one of the rangers who will show you how to make one.

Photo Walks

Kids love taking photos and with modern digital cameras it is cheap and easy. Give them your compact camera set it onto auto and head off on a photo assignment. You may be surprised at the results and more often than not their perspective on the world around them will give you some photo inspiration too.

There’s no need to spend loads of money on expensive attractions, kids love the great outdoors and with a bit of imagination and a reason for being out there you can too. There’s loads to do out there and not only is it fun but it’s healthy and educational too.

The Big Butterfly Count starts today.

It’s a nationwide survey aimed at helping to assess the health of our environment. in much the same way as the Big Garden Bird Watch organised by the RSPB, Butterfly Conservation in conjunction with M&S have orgainsed the Big Butterfly Count to run between July 24th and August 1st 2010 and you can join in.

All you have to do is spend 15 minutes in a suitable location – which could be your garden or a local park – noting down all of the butterflies and moths that you see and then report back with your findings. They have a handy butterfly ID chart of the most likely species that you will see and a website explaining all about the Big Butterfly Count.

Hopefully we’ll get some nice sunny days this week in which case Morgan and I will do a count in the garden and a count in the dunes. Le us know what you find in your garden.

Thought I’d put the moth trap out again last night as it looked set to be dry and we all had the day off today so would have plenty of time to go through it.

I sat with it for a little while at dusk, but then got up again at 4am before it was light and went out to investigate. I was lovely being out in the garden at that time in the morning with nothing but the bats, moths and other creatures of the night as company. It was a lovely still morning, perfect for sitting there watching and listening to the dawn.

• 2 x Cabbage Moth
• 2 x Heart and Dart
• 9 x Garden Tiger
• 2 x Rosy Minor
• 4 x White-line Dart
• 2 x July Highflyer
• 1 x Poplar Hawkmoth
• 36 x Large Yellow Underwing
• 9 x Dark Arches
• 3 x Scarce Footman
• 1 x Smoky Wainscot
• 18 x Common Rustic / Lesser Common Rustic agg.
• 1 x Rustic
• 3 x Lackey
• 1 x Pebble Prominent
• 2 x Antler Moth
• 1 x Drinker
• 1 x Foxglove Pug
• 1 x Common Carpet
• 2 x Shuttle-shaped Dart
• 1 x Flame Shoulder
• 1x Double Square spot*

Not that exciting but still quite a few moths and lots of lovely Garden Tigers

Just before bed time the rain eased, so seeing as I was due to be looking after Morgan all day I thought I’d put the moth trap out so that we could go through them this morning.

It wasn’t a huge catch, but there was enough to keep us busy and a few new ones as well.

• 1 x Bright-line Brown-eye
• 1 x Single-dotted Wave
• 4 x Heart and Dart
• 1 x Lime-speck Pug
• 6 x Garden Tiger
• 4 x Rosy Minor
• 2 x White-line Dart
• 2 x Chinese Character
• 3 x July Highflyer
• 1 x Dingy Footman
• 1 x Riband Wave
• 1 x Poplar Hawkmoth
• 1 x Flame
• 18 x Large Yellow Underwing
• 11 x Dark Arches
• 3 x Scarce Footman
• 1 x Red Twin-spot Carpet
• 2 x Smoky Wainscot
• 6 x Common Rustic / Lesser Common Rustic agg.
• 2 x Uncertain
• 1 x Common Wainscot
• 3 x Scalloped Oak
• 1 x Rustic
• 1 x Broom Moth

I haven’t had the moth trap out this week as it has been too wet and windy. We did trap on Friday night in the hills above Talybont, and as I don’t want to miss too much I put the trap out last night despite the forecast of rain.

I went out to the trap after dark. The wind had dropped and there was loads of activity so it was looking good for a decent catch in the morning. However, the forecast was for more wind and then rain from about 3am onwards. The forecast was spot on at 3am the wind filled in from the SW and was soon up to 20 knots, The rain started in earnest too so I got out of bed and put the trap under a chair to shelter it a bit.

I was back up at 6.30am when the rain was really heavy and brought the trap in. I then had to wait for Morgan to wake up before I could investigate its contents, which we did together. Once again it was a fairly good catch with 94 moths and over 30 species.

Here’s the list.

• 2 x Swallow-tailed Moth
• 2 x Lackey
• 20 x Dark Arches
• 1 x Least Yellow Underwing*
• 2 x Willow Beauty
• 2 x Flame Shoulder
• 3 x Shuttle-shaped Dart
• 4 x Flame
• 2 x Elephant Hawkmoth
• 5 x Garden Tiger
• 2 x Middle-barred Minor
• 6 x Common Rustic / Lesser Common Rustic agg.
• 1 x Clouded Border*
• 10 x Large Yellow Underwing
• 2 x Bright-line Brown-eye
• 4 x Smoky Wainscot
• 2 x Buff Ermine
• 3 x Riband Wave
• 1 x Heart and Dart
• 1 x Drinker
• 1 x Yellow Shell
• 1 x Oligia sp.
• 2 x True Lover’s Knot
• 1 x Peppered Moth*
• 1 x Common Wainscot
• 1 x Clay
• 3 x July Highflyer
• 2 x Rustic
• 1 x Antler Moth
• 1 x Uncertain
• 1 x Dark / Grey Dagger agg.
• 1 x Fan-foot*
• 1 x Yellow-tail*
• 1x Coast Dart*

I haven’t got photos of all of the new ones yet. The Fan-foot escaped before I could get a photo and I’m still waiting to calm the Yellow-tail and Clouded Border before getting a shot. Here are some of the other new ones though and I’ll post the other later when / if I get a decent shot of them.

After our meeting of the Ceredigion Moth Group on Saturday morning Morgan and I headed back down to sea level and collected Anna and a friend of Morgan’s called Lotti and we all headed off to the RSPB reserve at Ynyshir where we were booked in for a Teddy Bears Picnic – or as it should have been called a ‘Tardy Bears Picnic’ – D’you see what I’ve done there!

We got there about 10 minutes early as usual as the picnic was due to start at 11.30am There was no one else with teddy bears there so it looked as though it was going to be a quiet picnic, perhaps people had been put off by the grey weather. We had a chat with the wardens whilst Morgan and Lotti did some colouring and they said that 3 other groups of people had phoned that morning and booked so they should be there and they knew what the weather was like when they phone so we shouldn’t be on our own.

These other people did turn up in the and, but not until 11:50am, 20 minutes after we were supposed to have set off on the picnic, so in the end we didn’t get going until midday. Not a huge problem but the picnic was due to finish at 1pm and that’s what time we had planned to leave as Lotti had to get back to go horse-riding. So, in the end, everything was running late thanks to the late people and we had to leave at 1pm whilst the picnic was still ongoing. We missed out on the scavenger hunt on the way back through the woods despite being the only people who got there on time.

What is wrong with people, why can’t they be on time, and why when they are late do they not even acknowledge it. It’s just rude, but seems standard practise for many people these days. It annoys me and invariably it is those that are on time that end up missing out.

Anyway, apart from that we had fun. The children found bears on their way to the hide and stuck colourful things they found in the woods onto a sticky rainbow. Once at the hide they did colouring and dot-to-dots before having a story and a picnic. Morgan spotted a Buff-Tip moth on the way there too which was pretty good and I think he impressed the warden by seeing it and by knowing what it was!

There was supposed to be a scavenger hunt on the way back to the visitor centre but we missed out on that – We do have the sheets though so can do it some other time on our own.

I forgot to take any photos though.

We had a Ceredigion Moth Group Meeting this weekend. In total we set up 7 traps in the hills above Talybont and then went through them on Saturday morning. Morgan and couldn’t stay long but we had time to go through the contents of our trap which contained about 23 different species, a few of which were new to us.

Not surprising that we’d get different moths inland surrounded by forestry which is quite a contrast to the open spaces and coastal dunes around us.

The moths in our trap were:

• 1x Light Emerald
• 1x Rustic
• 1x Barred Red*
• 2x Buff Tip
• 13x Large Yellow Underwing
• 2x Scarce Footman
• 1x Clay
• 3x Common Rustic agg.
• 1x Peppered Moth*
• 1x Brimstone Moth
• 1x Buff Arches
• 1x Antler Moth
• 1x Ingrailed Clay*
• 4x Dark Arches
• 2x Straw Dot*
• 1x Green Pug*
• 1x Riband Wave
• 2x Fan Foot*
• 1x July Highflyer
• 1x Mottled Rustic
• 1x Poplar Hawkmoth

I’ve yet to hear what was in the other traps or whether there was anything rare or exciting, but it was good to meet up with everyone and most people seemed impressed with Morgan’s knowledge of moths!