My Own Nature Log Book - With Descriptive Notes, and Ideas for Novel Methods of Recording Nature's Progress Through the Year

By Marcus Woodward

“My Own Nature Log Book” is a book for keeping records and notes relating to nature. It contains a series of decorated calendars forming a unique style of log book for a whole year, suggesting what is to be looked for and what is to be heard week by week. Also included is a key to the main constellations, notes and information on other aspects of nature, outlined illustrations waiting to be coloured or painted, and much more. Perfect for lovers of nature and the Great Outdoors. Contents include: “The New Year”, “The February Calendar”, “March Manyweather”, “Proud, Pied April”, “The Merry Month”, “Flaming June”, “Hot July”, “AN August Log”, “The Ninth Moon”, “Fiery October”, “Red November”, and “Christmas-Time”. Many vintage books such as this are increasingly scarce and expensive. It is with this in mind that we are republishing this volume now in an affordable, modern, high-quality edition complete with the original text and artwork.

• Language: English
• Publisher: A Thousand Fields
• Release date: Feb 7, 2018
• ISBN: 9781528784283

Book preview

MY OWN NATURE LOG BOOK

CHAPTER I

THE NEW YEAR

THE first of our decorated calendars suggests that we make note of the last sound—the last wild life sound—heard as one year passes, and note the first sound heard—or thing seen—as a new year is born.

The last sound of a dying year I heard at midnight on New Year’s Eve was the curious croaking of a moor-hen.

Then the village clock began to chime. As the last note fell I heard the challenging crow of a pheasant, as if he were demanding, Who goes there? And instantly that vainglorious crowing was answered by the bark of a fox. He might have been calling to the pheasant: I hear you, my beautiful long-tail, and I come!

And then, as the bell-ringers were about to make their merry music, there rang out the blood-curdling screech of a white owl, and its ghostly form drifted away from the church tower, like the departing spirit of the dead year.

OUR first note made of a new green thing seen in a new year may well be: Honeysuckle leaves unfolding. The honeysuckle may claim to be the first of all plants to bourgeon.

IF we unearth the sleeping-place of a hedgehog we shall doubtless find that dead leaves are sticking to its spines, as shown by our sketch. If the hedgehog were wise it would sleep till spring, but it does not always do so, and will often come abroad in mid-winter. Its favourite winter sleeping-places are rabbit-burrows or holes in the roots of old trees, and it makes a snug bed by collecting dry leaves, grass, sheep’s wool, and other warm materials. It presents an odd appearance if its spines have chanced to pierce a fallen apple. A wise old beast, it blocks the entrance to its lair.

SAW pied wagtails is a somewhat bald record, but in viewing these birds in winter we shall find matter for a fuller note. While they are renowned travellers, some pairs elect to settle for a great part of the year in one garden, one cattle-haunted field, or one court-yard—we usually see a pair about a farm-yard or a stable-yard, and the birds become very familiar objects, since few small birds are more conspicuous when set against a plain background. Their black and white colour-scheme is as bold as a magpie’s.

When we see wagtails at this time of year we shall observe that their plumage is different from that of summer. They have lost the black gorget which adorns the throat in summer, and in winter the upper parts change to grey, or greyish-black. The bird with the distinctly grey back marked with dark feathers is the hen.

IF January prove mild we may observe the breaking up of the partridge coveys into pairs, and it makes a valuable note for the future to record when the birds of these and other flocks first pair. The courting of a pair of partridges is one of the most beautiful of all the idylls of the fields in the early days of the new year. The birds of a pair live as one. From courting days now setting in until the eggs hatch in June, and thence onwards until the family party is perhaps scattered in autumn, but possibly until courting days come again, the devoted cock will stay by his mate, and will keep faithful guard over his family. He will rear the brood if any fatal mischance befalls the hen.

They are pleasant and lovely in their lives.

JANUARY proving a month of snow and frost we may find evidence that rabbits have been driven by shortage of food to nibble at the bark of trees, and perhaps we catch them in the act. By barking underwood they cause a price to be set on their heads. Where it is wished to preserve the rabbits, and preserve the underwood too, landowners, or their gamekeepers or woodmen, supply them with swedes or mangold and bunches of hay to draw their attention from the bark of trees. To those who keep pheasants, rabbits have a peculiar value—they distract the foxes’ attention from the long-tails.

AMONG the minor heralds of a new year are certain lowly moths.

The first is the moth named Early, a lover of hawthorn hedges, where it is disguised by its sooty-brown aspect. The female is wingless and looks more like a spider than a moth.

In oak-woods may be found the moths pleasantly named, Spring ushers. The females have scarcely a trace of wings, but the males fly in sunny spells on wings having a white ground marbled with dark brown. They sit on the barks of trees through most of the day, but take short flights in sunshine. The caterpillar, in pale green with light markings, has as bad a character as its name is charming, for it works havoc with the leaves of oak and sycamore.

We see so little of insect life in winter that we might suppose all the world of insects to be as snug as bees in their hives, queen wasps in their mouse-holes, spiders in their secret lurking-places, well chosen, or ants in the depths of their citadels, and perhaps this is why many overlook the moths which fly in winter, some of them flying at no other time.

Some are of the tribe we call the loopers from the way the caterpillars make loops of their bodies as they crawl. When at rest they are rarely seen, since the pose they adopt on a tree exactly gives the appearance of a twig and bud. The sharpest eye may be deceived, as with their hind claspers they grip a twig, and hold out the body, stiff, rigid and motionless.

Caterpillars of the moth named winter are as dangerous in gardens and orchards as locusts. The wingless female climbs tree-trunks when about to lay her eggs. To defeat her plan, orchard-owners girdle their trees with sticky bands. But love finds a way over the difficulty. The males actually carry their mates across the zone of danger. The caterpillars in due time will then proceed to strip the trees of leaf and blossom.

For a brighter herald than these lowly moths we look for the first brimstone butterfly to adorn the new year.

COLT’SFOOT doubtless will be among the first flowers we find in the new year. It is named from the shape of the great leaves which emerge after the flowers. An infusion of the dandelion-like flowers is an old remedy for a cough, and the botanical name of the plant—Tussis—is from the Latin word for cough.

MANY lovely things, for to see and for to admire, are suggested by our decorated calendars for the new year, and things not so lovely, as witness the portrait of a slug. Yet every slug that crawls leaves a trace of silver.

Slugs do useful work in the world, besides making nourishing fare for birds, in ways