To Explore, Enjoy and Enhance

Friends of Studham Common

The highlight for July was Carole Corrigan’s finding of a single Pyramidal Orchid by the concrete road to the sewage works, the first we have heard of on the Common. This was where blackthorn had been cleared last winter. When we walked round the Common on 4th August the hay on East Common had not been cut.  Despite the rather dull weather we saw good numbers of Common Blue butterfly; there were at least 20 along the Kensworth Road edge of Middle Common. Bumblebees were feeding from the purple flowers of Common Knapweed along with orange and black hoverflies which were especially common on the white Hogweed flowers. Although the flowers of Rosebay Willowherb were going over, the ripening seed pods made a colourful display. The leaves of one of the Horse Chestnut trees were heavily mined by the caterpillars of the Horse Chestnut Leafminer moth. A black rabbit was grazing beside the East Common car park.  It allowed us to approach much closer than a wild melanic rabbit would so it was more likely to have been a tame one that had either escaped or been dumped by its owners. Its chances of survival there would not be good.

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See July’s Nature Notes

Rosebay Willowherb

Young black rabbit

Common Blue Butterfly

Common Knapweed

Horse Chestnut Leafminer

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