My Greenstack

A start to the year...in November

So, it’s been a bit of a weird year so far. Endings and beginnings all over the place, finding myself with more free time to do what I want to do and then dedicated time with my boy every other week, leaves me with periods of calm, peace and time for reflection, interspersed with 5 days of mad house, skateboarding, gaming, cooking and watching funny animal videos on the tv. High intensity parenting and a laid back single life rolled into one.

So I decided to celebrate the life where I live. I’m lucky in many ways, settled in between the North Wiltshire downs and the Cotswolds, plenty of open space to explore, ably accompanied by Bobbie, my female black labrador, even Swindon has plenty of green space and living on the outskirts allows me to wander further afield easily.

How to start though? Well, I’ve had a deep connection with nature for most of my life, I’ve been a birder since the age of 5 when I spotted a ‘parrot’ in the back garden, after dragging Dad out of bed he identified it as a Green Woodpecker and later that day I was able to find the half eaten slow worm that had attracted it to our patch of lawn. Through years of childhood I loved watching birds, looking for fossils, building dens, all the things small boys do until they find other things much ‘cooler’. Football and athletics replaced the less active pursuits until many years later, after I had joined the military, I realised that I had always kept a weather eye on birds around the world, Hoopoes in Cyprus, Eagle Owls in Afghanistan, Frigate birds on Ascension Island, there was always something to attract my attention.

Once I left the military, and became a teacher, my interest in wildlife only widened. I started to think in terms of the whole ecosystem, plants and animals, whether that was birding with a year 5 class as part of a science lesson, or dedicating my lunchtimes to cataloguing all flora and fauna at a military site where I was employed to teach soldiers maths and physics. It’s taken me until my 50s to realise that I do love a list, and once I noticed, I realised that I make lists for everything, shopping, birding, insurance policy numbers, jobs to do around the house, books I’ve read, the list is endless, or should that be the lists are endless!

But I don’t intend this blog to just be an endless list of species, in fact I’m not entirely sure I know what I want this blog to be, but I think we shall just start with my efforts to highlight what can be found in a small suburb on the outskirts of Swindon.

Sunday 17 Nov 2025

I had decided, a couple of months ago, that I would compile a list of species in North Swindon, or my part of it at least, starting in the New Year, heading in to autumn is probably not the best time of year to identify wild flowers and with the migration already started I could not expect to see some species of bird until next year, species such as cuckoos and swifts would already be back in Africa by the end of Sept, if not earlier. Luckily I have already been compiling a total bird list for the year and it was just a matter of looking down this and trying to remember where I had spotted each species. Mammals would be easy, other than the local cows and sheep that have a habit of escaping the farmers field, I could count on one hand the species I had seen this year, and as far as reptiles and amphibeans went, well, nothing seen so far and nothing expected between now and new year. Invertebrates would pose a greater problem, numerous species, but no idea what or where, so I am going to have to leave that until I see them from now on, and rely on a couple of very good apps to help with identity.

The thing that changed my mind was the weather. In line with expectations these days, it appears that we should not see temperatures drop below 10C until deep into November, and this is precisely what happened, unfortunate for the plants, as this affects germination for many, something I had noticed in recent weeks, the edges between scrubby trees and lawns was starting to sprout, so I decided that this would be a good chance to start with the lists.

I probably went a little further than I expected, alongside the 31 species of birds seen this year, including a surprising Lesser Whitethroat that spent a week singing to the local children in the park from a nearby hawthorn bush, Sunday saw me identify over 60 species of grass, trees and herbaceous plants, including masses of Cleavers, nipplewort and common chickweed, alongside the ever present dandelions and groundsel, and a random patch of wild mustard growing vigorously on a patch recently cleared of cultivated shrubs. My plan in the next year is to also try and sample some of the wild food, I’ve set myself a goal of one foraged species every week starting in January, so now is a good time to be scoping out the garlic mustard and nettle patches.

True to form though, the weather forecast is for a cold snap over the coming week, down to -1C on Thursday possibly, so lets see how the newly germinated plants overcome this, on a positive note this might drive some rare bird species into the suburbs and up my bird count.