Another week with lots of excuses for getting out in nature.  Our plans at the start of the week for our regular walk along the River Tees up to Cow Green reservoir to see the Spring Gentians and Birds-eye Primroses were foiled by inclement weather, so we head for the coast near Hawthorn Dene instead. I played with the Merlin app on my phone as we walked and identified Linnets and Whitethroats among the many, many Skylarks pouring their hearts out high above us. It did make me wonder about the energetics of life as a Lark – why do they spend so much time and energy singing so loudly and flying so high?  Marking a territory like this is very costly behaviour for a small bird but must be worth it in terms of securing the best mates!  There were insects too; Small white butterflies, my first Tortoiseshell and Peacocks of the year and lots of bees foraging amongst the Cowslips. And of course there were flowers, including Goldilocks Buttercups, my first Early Purple Orchids of the year and so much Wild Garlic in flower in Hawthorn Dene itself.

I was wondering what the evolutionary advantage might be to Goldilocks Buttercups, Ranunculus auricomus, of having such frankly manky looking flowers, with petals missing or misshapen – it doesn’t seem the best way of attracting pollinators.  However it turns out that these buttercups, atypically for the genus, are apomictic; that is, the seeds develop from unfertilized eggs, so the flowers don’t need to be pollinated. It also turns out that calling this a species of buttercup is far too simplistic.  Because reproduction takes place without the usual mixing of genetic material, every descendent is like its parent and every mutation in the parent plant is passed on, giving rise to hundreds of very similar microspecies where the differences are fixed in place. 

I’ve had my moth trap out a couple of nights this week but with worryingly small hauls compared to what I’ve found the last couple of years – no more than six or seven moths at a time.  A Brindled pug, Eupithecia abbreviata, was the only new one to add to my garden list.

In better news, there were also three more trips to the Botanic gardens this week, two with students and a third with the university International Women’s Group. A keen-eyed toddler with us on that trip spotted that the pond which the student volunteers started digging out this spring, and which looks devoid of life at first glance, is actually full of newts!

My bike was out of action all week with a puncture which needed a new inner tube, so I’ve walked more than usual, noticing clouds of Forget-me-nots and Cow Parsley and the first Sow thistles in flower by the roadside.  ‘No mow May’ is in full swing now and I realised, getting off the bus on my way home, that what I’d thought were Dandelion clocks on the grass in front Mary Terrace were actually lots of Cuckoo flowers! 

There was also time for a last walk in the Bluebell woods for this year with Sue – the flowers were still gorgeous but the leaf canopy is filling out fast and they’ll soon be gone.  Because we’re geeky botanists we enjoyed taking a close look at the less obvious Wood speedwell and Three-nerved Sandwort too. 

The swallows are also back in force. When I ran up to Crowtrees on Saturday morning they were enjoying an such a bonanza of insects over the ponds that it sounded like the crackle of an overhead electric power line!

The highlight of the week, though, was a natural phenomenon rather than a living organism, for once.  Like many other parts of the UK we were treated to a spectacular display of the Northern lights on Friday night, in my case accompanied by the haunting call of a confused-sounding Barn Owl. The lights started off as just the faintest of cloud-like green whisps but we were soon treated to purple, pink and scarlet rays streaming down from above our heads, as ethereal as the openings between worlds in Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy.

In the garden the firstWood Cranesbill is in flower under one of our apple trees. One of my favourite plants and a Geranium which makes me wonder why anyone bothered to breed garden varieties! I’ve also, finally, made time to pot on the Helichrysums I’ve grown from seed and do a little selective weeding.  I’m reluctant to have the whole thing taken over by Cleavers!