Whaplode Drove Country Fayre

Vintage tractors complete with the characters that own them.
Convoys of these often pass the farm on the way to and from weekend shows.

Yesterday was the Whaplode Drove (once featured on Escape To The Country or some such show) Country Fayre. And fair play to the organisers. The show only started two years ago and is already an event to look forward to each year. What's more, it's free. You don't get much for free these days.

Sue and I had volunteered to help with the Smallholders Club stall, but first thing in the morning we had another job to do, for two rather big piglets had slept in the trailer and were due in at the abattoir between 8 and 9am. There was the small matter of putting in their ear tags first. This is usually no problem at all and, with the distraction of a little food, they never even seem to notice.

But not today! I don't know why, but these two pigs were just not having it. Every time I even lightly touched their ears, my action was greeted with a loud bark and a snap. I'm guessing the piglet's ears may well have been a little sore with sunburn.

Anyway, eventually each piglet had a metal ear tag just about hanging on to its ear and we were off. The abattoir was nice and quiet this morning, just one small trailer ahead of us with one sheep. That was good news, for reversing the trailer in front of a queue of experienced trailer towers is always a little daunting. Follow this with the stress of trying to get two stubborn pigs out of the trailer which they so steadfastly refused to enter the night before and the whole thing becomes something which fills me with anxiety.

Fortunately my favourite stockman was on hand to help. He gave me enough respect to let me have a go, but when my best efforts were met with total immovability, he stepped in and expertly lifted them by the back end so they had no choice but to virtually fall forwards. He then gently ushered them into the pen where they would spend their last day.

We waved goodbye and headed to the Country Fayre. This sounds a bit casual, but we are very conscious that we are taking an animal's life for its meat. Many people ask us how we can do this, which I find rather irritating. For most of these people would prefer to stick their head in the sand and not think about how their meat was reared, though they have all the information they need to suspect that mass produced cheap meat has some rather unsavoury hidden costs. And for the most part they have been conditioned to accept a very poor substitute for properly reared meat. Rant over!

We helped out as best we could as the stall, complete with goats, goslings and chickens and chicks, was set up. The club is still officially known as the Fenland Goatkeepers and Smallholders Club, but the Goatkeepers bit is somewhat a relic of the past. Don't get me wrong, several members still keep goats, but far fewer than keep pigs, chickens, ducks or even sheep.

The club stand was busy all day.

Most of the interest in our stall was from young families with children enthralled by the animals. Some were more wary than others, with one particular toddler most insistent on climbing in the cage with the goslings!



The animals were most popular with the kids.



It was good to see quite a few faces who we knew: our bee buddy, Elaine; our local swarm collector, who had a stall which we managed to completely miss; people from Sue's school; our neighbours; people who had bought pigs from us in the past.

In fact, we seem to know more people up here, with Fenland's rather thinly scattered population, than we did in London with its masses of people crammed in.

A most informative and interesting chat
with an old timer.

The show had everything you'd expect. Vintage vehicles, rides, music, craft stalls and hog roast.

Sadly, I missed the jelly throwing competition.

Skiffle band performing 'House of the Rising Sun'

Roll on next year. Maybe see you there.

A Swarm Captured

Any guesses how many bees in this cluster?

Somehow every swarm event seems to happen when Sue is unavailable. Last time it was when I witnessed a cloud of our bees heading off over the veg patch, over the road and spooking a herd of cows as they disappeared over the fields.

And so it was that, late afternoon a couple of weeks ago, I found myself stalking the Little Owls. For an adult was sitting right out in the open and I could clearly hear its young calling from somewhere round the old, hollow ash tree. I kept moving around the base of the tree, trying to work out precisely where the begging calls were emanating from, when something else caught my eye.

There, on the fence, was a beard! A beard of bees. Not a huge swarm, but still an impressive cluster of bees loyally surrounding and protecting their queen.

I rushed inside to get the camera, the bee suit, the bee brush and the key to the garage where, somewhere, there was stored an old nucleus box in which our first ever bees had been delivered. ( A nucleus is five frames of bees, including a young queen and new brood. This is how you buy bees if you can't find a nice bee-keeper to give you a swarm. But it doesn't come cheap, running in at up to £240!)

I didn't know what to do first. If these were our bees, they have a habit of moving on very quickly indeed.
But they just might be a swarm from elsewhere. Whatever the case, they would be sending out scouts to find a suitable new home.

Now, theory goes that when the bees are swarming they are at their most peaceful, having gorged on honey to prepare for their journey and intent on protecting their queen, without whom their attempt at colonisation would be futile.

The "nuke (nucleus) box" - a suitable temporary home for the swarm.

So, suited up in my spaceman gear, I approached the beard. First I trimmed some of the long grass to clear the way. Some of the bees dripped off the cluster as I did so.
I eased the box into position underneath them, then took the plunge, sweeping them decisively off the fence. It worked!
Almost all the bees were now in the box.

But a few were left on the fence. Those which had fallen off the bottom of the cluster plus others appearing from nowhere - maybe scouts returning. They were clearly attracted back to the same place on the fence, presumably by the queen pheromones. I scooped as many as I could into the box, keen to collect as many bees as possible, not just to make the new colony stronger but also to make absolutely sure I'd not somehow missed the queen. She should have been in the middle of that cluster and was hopefully now exploring the frames of foundation wax I'd placed in the collection box.

The stragglers were attracted back to the very same spot on the fence.

But my lack of knowledge was making me worry. What if the returning scouts came back and led the swarm elsewhere? Anyway, I'd done all I could. I sealed the bees in until Sue got home from her evening meeting at school.  

While I had the bee suit on and the camera to hand,  I took the chance to take a few more piccies.

I quickly looked in the existing two hives but wasn't sure whether this new swarm had come from either of them. For both hives had been closed down for a couple of weeks since the first swarm. I studied the pictures on the camera and the new swarm looked very similar to those in the other hives. My guess was that this could be a cast swarm, a secondary swarm following a main swarm, during which a virgin queen splits the already depleted hive.

I had done all I could. Sue arrived home much later and gave the hives a quick inspection but was unable to come to any more solid conclusions than I.

Sue inspects the hives.

It didn't seem that the swarm had come from this hive... probably

So, from one very strong colony of bees not long ago, we now had possibly three hives, not forgetting that large cloud of bees which had deserted. This meant that our bees may well be very thinly spread, if we even had any queens in  the hives.

That evening we opened up the small entrance to the nucleus box so that the new bees could go out and explore first thing in the morning. Hopefully they would take to their new home and stay, but it was very possible that they would all debunk.

This sudden escalation to three hives made an emergency trip to Thorne's necessary as we would need another hive, plus a spare in case of another swarm. I got home and set about assembling the hives and building the frames. For any beekeepers reading, we have opted for a 14 x 12 brood box. This is extra deep and gives more room for the brood, rather than using brood and a half. We'll give it a try and see how it goes.

 

These are extra deep 14 x 12" frames for the brood box.

Assembling new hives and all the frames to go inside is a job I love doing, but it's very time consuming. I don't usually mind as I become absorbed in the task. I couldn't finish everything that first night, despite working till very late, but the bees could stay in their temporary home for one more day to get used to their surroundings.

So, after work the next day, I would finish the job and we would transfer the bees to their shiny new cedar home.

Well, that was the plan... until the mega went off.

ASCENSION FRIGATEBIRD, Islay.

The only previous record of this bird species in the UK was in 1953, a moribund bird which ended up in a museum. And it wasn't correctly identified as such until about 50 years after it was collected.

Now, 60 years later, there was another, photographed by tourists that morning sitting on the wall of the small harbour.

This was more than MEGA. It was MONSTER RARE.

All other plans paled into insignificance as my admittedly occasionally odd priorities suddenly changed.

By late evening I was heading towards Carlisle, racing to meet up with a team from the south who were heading up the M6. We had a ferry to catch in the morning.

My second trip to the Hebrides in as many weekends, with a short jaunt to the Farne Islands sandwiched in between during the week.

As if there weren't enough to keep me busy on the farm, late June and July were not keeping to their normal reputation as being the quiet time of the year for rare bird arrivals.

An eventful birthday

Happy birthday to me, happy birthday to me...

Another computer gave up on me!

But I've got it back now.

Problem is, I go a couple of weeks without blogging and there's just so, so much to catch up on.

Let's start at the end. Today. My 47th birthday.
Wild celebrations don't really happen any more, I'm just happy to have a quiet day with Sue.

It was someone else's birthday too, Thorne's Beekeeping Supplies. A full 53 years older than myself. They had a centenary celebration on today and we had pre-ordered some sale goodies. So we headed up to their rather grandiose home in the Lincolnshire Wolds .

Thorne's shop

Even the oil drums had a bee theme!



Can you believe this fool is now 47?



Inspiration for bee-friendly plants

The museum was fascinating, as was a look around the factory.
All the machines are made for purpose, some being 80 years old.

We returned to the farm late afternoon. I was severely tempted to divert to the North Norfolk coast where a most unusual arrival of several Two-Barred Crossbills from Scandinavia was occurring. But none stayed long enough to tempt me. So instead I spent an hour of my birthday picking the last of the red gooseberries. Prickly!

 

I nearly forgot not to feed the pigs. For this evening we had the job of cajoling two rather stubborn pigs into the livestock trailer ready to go on a little journey in the morning. We are quite well practised at this now, but it always has its stresses. The basic plan is to keep the pigs hungry so they follow the bucket of food down to the waiting trailer.

This works well for about a minute, until they discover the lush grass which grows outside their pen. But we know this will happen, so we bring Daisy with them. She knows the way and they will stick with her.

Today we managed the first part of the operation with incredible smoothness. One pig was left in the pen - this is the lucky one who gets to reach its first birthday before it goes off, in the winter, as a baconer. There was no selection process. Just the last pig to go through the gate.


A stay of execution for this girl.



These two follow Daisy and Sue toward their fate.



   

From there it was a race up the land to the stable area and into the (very) small yard, where the trailer was waiting, door open and ramp enticingly covered in straw. I strewed it with food, but to no avail. This was no surprise. Getting them to make the final climb into the trailer is always a stressful experience. 

The sticking point.
That ramp is a no go area.



We didn't really want Daisy in there too, so we led her back to join the other piglet.

Daisy heads back to her pen,

leaving two worried and

tetchy piglets behind.



But, as has happened in the past, this was the cue for the doomed couple to get a little tetchy. So  much so that they broke through a fence and headed back down toward their pen,

There followed fifteen minutes of fraught efforts to get back to where we had been already been (no photos, too fraught!)

The fence was reinforced (Well, I leaned a couple of sturdy pallets up against it) to prevent further breakouts and we patiently edged the piglets up the ramp and into the trailer.

I make this sound easier than it actually is!

So tomorrow morning we'll be off to the abattoir bright and early. You wouldn't believe how hard it is to get them to leave that trailer when we get there. Not that they know what's coming.

That just left enough time to top and tail those gooseberries ready for the freezer before sitting down to a late birthday dinner with Sue - lasagna made with our own lamb and vegetables, including the first of this year's courgettes - oh yes, the glut has already started.

Then a celebratory cake, topped with today's picking of raspberries and a rather OTT firework display thingy-me-jig from the pound shop, complete with sparklers, candles and a rather metallic version of happy birthday which repeated several dozen times until we finally managed to break the device!

So that was today. And after all that, I have to say I actually do feel a year older.

Over the next few days I'll be bringing you up to date with everything that's been happening - hot, hot weather, swarming bees, broody chickens, egg-straw-din-ary goings on with the guineafowl, the start of the harvest, the arrival of a most unexpected new member of the family and, as if I wasn't busy enough, another trip to the Hebrides chasing birds. It's all been happening.

 

Unbridled. Success!



Bridled Tern, courtesy of trip photographer, Josh Jones

Three days of sunshine and dry air meant there was only one thing for it. Make hay while the sun shines. Well, not quite. But mow all the lawns at least.

This is a gargantuan task made far easier when the grass is completely dry.

So there I was, chasing the geese up and down, not a care in the world, oblivious to all else, when I look up and see the postie on the back lawn waving a parcel in the air. I hoped he'd not been standing there too long.
Then I hear, from my inside pocket, beep, beep, beep.
Now there are many contraptions these days which bleep at you, but this triple beep meant only one thing. I'd failed to hear the mad wailing of my pager going into mega mode. I rummaged through my pockets for my pager, expecting it to reveal the presence of a bird I'd probably already seen. After all, I've already had five ticks this year, a ridiculous number, and to ask for another on the back of June's outrageous Swift double would be just greedy.
And there it was. The message:

MEGA N'berland BRIDLED TERN ad Farne Islands on Inner Farne at 2:45pm

If you've read my blog before, this may ring a bell, for at the end of my post about the magnificent Pacific Swift (see here) I wrote these prophetic words:

It's been a good year so far. Four (lifers) already and there's still the autumn to come. But before that I'm hoping for a Bridled Tern, preferably somewhere near.

It wasn't particularly close, but this had to be good, for Inner Farne is part of a small group of islets offshore between Bamburgh and Seahouses. I've visited Inner Farne twice before, many years ago, and well remember the throng of seabirds which line the cliffs, the puffins standing in serried ranks on the walls of old buildings, flying in with mouthfuls of sand eels, the arctic terns bouncing around and pecking at the heads of visitors to usher them away from their eggs or chicks which sat in the grass just beside the footpath. Last time I visited the islands I had seen my first ever Roseate Terns.
Fond memories indeed.

Back to the present, and that colony of Arctic Terns made this Bridled a likely sticker. There have been several Bridled Terns since I began twitching, but none has lingered long enough to be seen by many, not for over 20 years. Although it has always been a much more likely bird to catch up with, in modern times this bird has in fact been almost as difficult to connect with as the two monster swifts of recent weeks.

I looked at my phone. Four missed calls! I need a better mower, one where I can plug my gadgets into the dashboard!
Then it rings again. Josh Jones. "There's a Bridled Tern on The Farnes". ... "But it's flown off now."

As far as I knew it had been there for about a quarter of an hour before moving off. Was this enough to jump straight in the car and start the long journey North? I could probably be there around 7pm. But then would I be able to get a boat? Would it be a wasted journey?
A few years back there would have been no erring. I would have been straight in the car. But I am less impulsive now, more considered (slightly). I resolved to wait for further news. If the bird did return today, it would surely be very likely to be there tomorrow as well, particularly as a visitor to the island had reportedly seen "that bird" the day before.
I climbed back on the ride-on with renewed energy, glancing at my pager every few minutes.

3:32 No further sign by 3:18

4:53  Still no further sign by 4:30

5:12  a boat is planned from Seahouses at 6:30pm this evng in search of the Bridled Tern

Just imagine if I'd impulsively set off. I'd already have been driving for over two hours on negative news, only to receive the news that the boat would be leaving about half an hour before I'd be arriving. What a great decision to carry on mowing the lawns.

With that job done, I began moving the electric fence which pens in the lambs. Every week they get a new area of succulent grass to feast upon. Sue came home and helped me move the fence when...

6:25  BRIDLED TERN ad again 6:18pm Farne Islands on Inner Farne showing well.

If only I'd left on that first message. Who knows. I might have made that 6:30 boat!

My phone leapt into action, which rather complicated the task of moving the sheep fence. It wasn't long before I had a car full of passengers. At 10:30pm I was to drive to Wansford, just off the A1 to pick up Josh (trip photographer), another old friend who shall remain nameless and possibly another (turned out to be David Campbell aka Devilbirder). Then up to Doncaster to pick up Will Soar.

I hastily rearranged work, thanks to a very kind and understanding boss (thanks Sue) and made my preparations for an overnight journey.

Staying awake overnight is not as easy as it used to be, but the prospect of a lifer at the end of it keeps the energy levels up, as well as catching up with friends (as long as they don't all fall asleep on you! (David and Will!!))

So it was that at some time after 3am we pulled up in the car park at Seahouses and looked out longingly toward the line of low islets offshore. There was already plenty of light in the sky and the unnamed birder set up his telescope in the vague hope of picking up the Bridled Tern in flight at ridiculous distance. The rest of us put our heads down for a while.

It's been a while since I took a sunrise photo.

By 5am the car park was getting fuller and distant friends were busy regaling each other with stories of twitches from old times or idle twitter gossip from more recent times. By 5.30 the crowd was edging nervously toward the ticket booking kiosks. I was near the front and people kept putting money in my hand to buy them a ticket. Fortunately Will Soar was ahead of me (he is small and good at finding his way to the front!) so I passed the money forward and told him how many tickets to buy, trying to remember whose money it was. It wasn't long before Will emerged from the throng waving a green ticket aloft. Nine happy boat passengers.
It's a bit of a tired blur, but at some point during this early morning confusion we had received news from the island rangers that the bird was still present in the tern roost on the rocks by the jetty. A guarded excitement swept through the crowd.

We filed down the jetty and onto the boat for the short and perfectly flat crossing across to Inner Farne. As we chugged ever closer to the rocks the sea became full of auks, guillemots, razorbills and, everybody's favourite, puffins. They bobbed on the surface, diving for cover as the boat passed or scampering away across the surface of the water.

We rounded the tip of the island and binoculars were raised expectantly. As we approached the jetty, there stood the four rangers surrounded by a throng of Arctic Terns. They weren't all looking through their binoculars. They weren't jumping up and down excitedly. They weren't pointing. And nobody on board was able to pick out the bird, either wheeling around in the air or perched on the rocks.
It looked as if we would be in for a tense wait. One of the rangers came down to the boat and announced that the bird was still there, on the rocks. We patiently filed off the boat in an orderly fashion and ambled up the jetty (NOT!). I was near the front, perilously close to the edge. I raised my binoculars and was relieved to almost instantly set my eyes on the bird, nestled down on the rocks, partially obscured.

Not such a heart-pounding bird as the Pacific Swift or the White-throated Needletail, it has to be said, but a beautiful and elegant bird indeed.
It soon took to the air and circled round with the masses of Arctic Terns, settling back down every now and again before taking to the air. A couple of times it disappeared over the brow of the hill, only to reappear a minute or so later.
Now, I'm a bit rubbish at picking out bird calls, especially when the air is full of screeching Arctic Terns and Eiders oooo and aaargh from the sea. But the Bridled Tern had a surprisingly gull-like call which even my half deaf old ears could recognise.

A couple of times the Bridled Tern came right over the small crowd amassed on the jetty
before it disappeared over the hill for one last time.

We had been treated to ten minutes of rarity elegance. More time would have been nicer, and the photographers would have liked better light, but we were a very happy bunch of birders. For the second time in a week we had found ourselves enjoying excellent views of a very rare bird in a wonderful location.

A happy bunch of birders prepare to leave the island.

While we waited, hoping for a reappearance of the tern, everybody took advantage of the opportunity to watch the puffins and arctic terns at such close quarters. Unfortunately we weren't allowed up onto the main part of the island. Quite rightly access is strictly limited to keep a balance between allowing the public to see such a spectacle and protecting the breeding birds of the island.

Anyway, the rangers did a great job and I'm sure every birder who has made the journey over would like to thank them for making arrangements for us to land on the jetty and for keeping everybody so well informed as to the presence of the bird.

Their helpfulness and hospitality were refreshing. The rangers maintain an excellent photoblog. It's well worth a visit. I'm sure there'll be some mouthwatering photos of the Bridled Tern on it, as well as many pictures of the islands' other resident seabirds.

Thanks must also go to the boat operators. They went out of their way to get birders to the island and must have grown a little weary of their phones constantly on the go. I know that one of them, whose phone ran out of battery, was calling people back right up till midnight to help them out, even though he was getting up to take another boatload out early in the morning.

A celebratory drink and bun for one lucky birder.
The bridled tern was both more elegant and more good looking.

And so it was that, by way of a cooked breakfast in Seahouses (they were slightly overwhelmed by the sudden and unexpected rush in trade!) we headed back south. I rolled back onto the farm at half past two in the afternoon and in no time at all I was fast asleep on the sofa, dreaming of the next bird.

It's been a good year so far. Six (lifers) already and there's still the autumn to come. But before that I'm hoping for a Blue-cheeked Bee-eater, preferably somewhere near.