What to Look For

Winter is for valuing the form of our many trees, with their branches laid bare, silhouetted against the sky. It is only in this season that we can really sense the size of the massive boughs of the veteran oak at Croft Close Set-aside or even those of the youthful willows along Willow Walk.

As the season progresses, tree buds become ever more prominent, look out for the hard, black points giving arrowheads to the end of ash branches. The horse chestnut’s golden sticky buds will be starting to expand before February is out.

Now is a good time to study the lichens on the bare branches. Seen from afar some seem little more than a stain but up-close reveal intricate shapes. Others have a very visible skeletal, sometimes feathery or scaly appearance. Interestingly these organisms are two life forms combining together: part fungus and either a bacterium or an algae.

Winter is also an excellent time to look at mosses. These together with liverworts and hornworts are a group of plants known as bryophytes. Identifying individual species is challenging, often requiring examination under a microscope. However, fascinating detail can be readily appreciated from close up photos taken with your phone. There are 1098 species in Britain and Ireland so there is plenty of variation to see; some of the more common are shown here.

Some nights, around sunset, we can witness rooks and jackdaws doing a slowed-down version of a startling’s murmuration before bedding down for the night high in the trees at Histon Manor. During the day large flocks of fieldfares and redwings can be seen; often the redwings can be found foraging among leaf litter where there is an open woodland floor at the Set-aside. In the trees above, mixed parties of blue, great and long-tailed tits hang out together ahead of pairing up as spring approaches.

Winter is when young foxes roam to find new territories and are more often to be seen in daylight. There is less cover for deer, so they too become more obvious. Some of our smaller mammals are also active during winter, the wood mouse for example may even breed if the food supply is abundant enough. And just to recall how everything is related, tawny owls may defer breeding if the numbers of wood mice are low in winter.

And look out for early signs that winter is ending – the first white blooms of the cherry plum – easily mistaken for blackthorn – and hazel catkins.