The Naturalists' Notebook

Arrowe Park was once a farm owned by a wealthy Liverpool ship-owner and slave trader called John Shaw. His nephew John Ralph Nicholson Shaw inherited the land in 1829 and set about building Arrowe Hall and a country estate. Arrowe Hall (now a Grade II listed mansion) and its park were acquired by Lord Leverhulme in 1908, who subsequently sold the estate to Birkenhead Corporation in 1926. On 1 April 1974, ownership was transferred from Birkenhead Corporation to the Metropolitan Borough of Wirral and is now a public park. The Hall is now a private care centre.

We went in by the main entrance and lodge and headed southwards. It was damp, overcast and blowy, but happily the promised rain never came. As the woods opened out towards the tennis courts we found two less-common oaks next to each other, a Red Oak Quercus rubra (left leaf below) and a Pin Oak Quercus palustris (right leaf below).

Underneath them were these lovely acorns, which I think belonged to the Pin Oak.

The old clay tennis courts are now neglected, and overgrown with Ragwort and Yarrow, but a few of the grass courts are still in use. Between the clay and grass courts was a line of molehills, and at the end a pair of interesting trees. I think they are some kind of uncommon Elm. The leaves appeared to be long compound leaves like Ash, but there were dark brown buds in every axil, so all the “leaflets” were separate leaves, arranged alternately. The leaves themselves were shiny dark green with serrated edges and twisted irregular bases, which is a characteristic of Elm leaves. They weren’t rough like Wych Elm and there were no seeds underneath to give us a clue. They were mature trees, not young ones planted since the English Elms all died in the 1980s. It’s hard to identify unfamiliar trees on first sight but my favourite candidate is Smooth-leaved Elm Ulmus carpinifolia, but I can’t rule out Siberian or Chinese Elms.

As we crossed the open field towards the Arrowe Brook two Mute Swans flew over, followed by about 20 Canada Geese. The field was streaked with carpets of bright yellow flowers, giving a buttercups-in-spring effect, but they were one of the dandelion-ish flowers, perhaps Common Hawkweed.  Maybe they have all flowered together, refreshed by last week’s rain after the drought.

The brook and lake had Canada Geese, moulting Mallards and one young Moorhen. We hoped for Mandarins but there was no sign of any, and we are always alert to the possibility of a Kingfisher along the Arrowe Brook too, but there were too many people about. There was a Robin on the bridge where the birdseed is always scattered.  Is that a one-legged Robin?

Back in the woods we heard some noisy screeching and wondered if Ring-necked Parakeets had colonised the park, but it was coming from a pair of Jays having an argument over something. Blackberries are ripening everywhere and we saw our first red Hawthorn berries.

We were on the look-out for the Cedar of Lebanon said to be near Arrowe Hall. One promising-looking level-branched tree on the far side of the lawn turned out to be a Deodar Cedar, identified by its long and uneven needles.

There was another candidate tree just past the hall, and yes! the needles were darker green and they were all of the same shorter length. Hooray!  It’s the only mature example of a Cedar of Lebanon I know on Merseyside, now that the one in Calderstones has died. People don’t seem to have planted them in the last 50 or more years, preferring Deodars. (And as a bonus, right next to it was a Blue Atlas Cedar, so if you want to compare and contrast a set of three true cedar species, this is the place!)

We returned via the derelict Ranger’s Office, now overgrown with Ivy and Buddleia, vandalised and starting to fall apart.

Its garden is being swamped by Bramble and Himalayan Balsam.

Towards the main gate we spotted a young Indian Bean tree, with a few hanging bean pods. So Wirral have been planting some trees since they took over the estate.

Public transport details: Bus 472 from Sir Thomas Street at 10.13, arriving Woodchurch Road / Arrowe Park Road at 10.40. Returned on the 472 bus from Woodchurch Road / Church Lane at 2.13, arriving Liverpool at 2.36.

Sunday was a national day of protest to mark the opening of the grouse-shooting season and the associated illegal killings of Hen Harriers. Our nearest event was at Parkgate. The tide was out, but the marsh was surprisingly green despite the recent drought. We spotted Swallows chirping overhead, a pair of Herons, and there was a report of over a dozen Greenshank, but we weren’t looking that hard. We did see this Little Egret, though.

We had an early lunch in the garden of St Thomas’s church, then set off to the Old Baths area for the event. The RSPB, Cheshire Wildlife Trust and Birders Against Wildlife Crime (BAWC) had small tents set up and there were about 200 people, including several MNA members, milling about, buying raffle tickets and waiting for the speakers.

They included Iolo Williams, Mark Avery (blogger and former RSPB  conservation director), Jeff Clarke, someone from Burton Mere reserve, whose name I didn’t catch, and several others.  Mark Avery’s blog has a photo, and claims attendance of 300, making it one of the best-attended events in the country.

There were also a couple of non-wildlife distractions today. One was the Lost Castles Project – six cardboard-box castles dotted around Merseyside, designed by the French artist Olivier Grossetête. I spotted the one in Bootle North Park on my way in, and here’s the one in Williamson Square. Apparently two others had already collapsed after being weakened by the rain – the ones in Ashton Park West Kirby and in Knowsley Safari Park. By the end of the day, this one in town had also collapsed.

Some chartered vintage buses were coming in and out of Parkgate Mostyn Square, an orange and green Crosville and this lovely old Wirral blue-and-cream double-decker, which is the livery I remember from my childhood days out.

Public transport details: Bus 487 from Sir Thomas Street at 10.29, arriving at Parkgate Mostyn Square at 11.25.  Most of us returned on the 487 at 1.30, but the keenest ones looked set to stay until the 3.30 bus.

Yet another hot and sunny day, so we ambled slowly down Woolton Hill Road and Church Road, past the water tower on Reservoir Road. That’s the highest point in Liverpool at 292 feet (89 m).

On that corner is a pair of old township boundary markers or “mere stones”. They are of unknown date, but probably ancient, and are now very hard to read. They show Much Woolton on the left and Little Woolton on the right.

Reynolds Park in Woolton in south Liverpool was once the private 14-acre garden of the wealthy Liverpool cotton traders, the Reynolds family. The last owner gave it to the city in 1929 and it is now a very well-manicured little public park. There is a published tree trail, and we spotted many of their signposted trees as we went around – Common Walnut with lots of seeds, an elegant Black Walnut, some oaks and an Italian Alder. At the eastern end they have planted a wildflower meadow, and we noted Cornflower, Toadflax, Teasel, Ragwort, Corn Marigold, Bird’s Foot Trefoil, Ragwort, Wild Carrot and a new one on me, Sneezewort, also known as Bachelor’s Buttons.

Cornflower

Sneezewort

Several butterflies were flitting about over the meadow, including some whites, a probable Common Blue and this lovely Small Copper on a Ragwort.

At the far eastern end are the splendid Queen’s Jubilee gates, installed in 2012 to commemorate the 60th anniversary of her reign.

Overhanging the Jubilee gates is a big old Poplar tree. Is that a rare native Black Poplar, or the more common hybrid?  In 18th century France the Black Poplar met the American Eastern Cottonwood, and now there are very few pure Black Poplars left. The hybrid is said to be taller and straighter than the native, and this tree was definitely low and spreading, suggesting a native. The other distinguishing feature is that the hybrid has no burrs on its trunk. Sadly, we didn’t look that closely, so we can’t be sure which it is.

We lunched in the magnificent Walled Garden, a sun-trap of roses, dahlias and a colourful herbaceous border. There are several notable trees here, including a Tulip Tree, a Chinese Dogwood, a huge Judas Tree by one of the gateways and a young Indian Bean. Outside, on the sunken lawn below the ha-ha there is a collection of specimen trees, including several Sweetgum Liquidambar styraciflua and a wilting Persian Ironwood Persica parrotia. It is known for its magnificent bronze autumn colour, but it’s hard to tell if this one is just suffering from the drought or starting to turn for the autumn.

There was a young Pin Oak Quercus palustris in an upright cage. The leaf is obviously oak-like, but deeply indented with points or pins at the ends of the lobes. I’ve never seen or heard of an upright or “fastigiate” variety, as this one appeared to be, and there are none mentioned in my tree books, so maybe this one will grow outwards as it matures.

The final tree tick for the day was an Antarctic Beech Nothofagus antarctica, with tiny leaves about an inch (2.5 cm) long and seed cases only a quarter of an inch (7 mm) across. It appears to have fruited well in this hot summer.

Then we walked down Church Road to Woolton Village for the bus. We often see hordes of “Beatle” tourists about in Woolton, but there were none today.

Public transport details: Bus 75 from Great Charlotte Street at 10.06, arriving Woolton Road / Rockbourne Road at 10.30. Returned from Woolton Village on the 75 at 2.05, arriving City Centre at 2.25.

Well, that’s the heatwave broken, and it was pouring with rain. We had planned to go to Freshfield  but we stayed on the train to Southport, where there was a least some chance of shelter. The rain had reduced to a drizzle by the time we arrived at the southern arm of the Marine Lake. No exciting birds, just lots of fed-up-looking ones loafing on the edge – Mallards (including two tall black ones), Canada Geese, Herring Gulls, Black-backed gulls and Black-headed Gulls – and a large flotilla of Coots out in the middle. Over 50 Mute Swans were clustered and preening, so we recorded all the Darvic ring numbers we could see, all blue on the right leg: 4BUA, 4CHU, 4CSF, 4CLH, 4CSJ, 4CLI. They have been reported to the North West Swan Study.

We greeted a large party of Asian mothers (many in saris) who had brought their children on a day out from Birmingham. Not a good day for the seaside!  The Swan and Flamingo pleasure boats and the water bikes were moored and unwanted on the other side of the lake.

It started raining heavily again so we huddled in a shelter to eat our lunch. A Heron and two Swifts flew over. As the clouds started clearing from the south we crossed the Venetian Bridge and noted that one of the supporting islands had a few Greylag geese which were sitting amongst Ragwort and Burdock. One Moorhen bobbed about and a Swallow flew past. There were more Greylags around the Ocean Plaza retail park, a Dunnock, flocks of Starlings and one chirpy Pied Wagtail.

To our surprise, the tide was in. You don’t often see the sea at Southport!  The Spartina grass is spreading, and the beach might be a salt marsh soon.

The best birds were a small whirring flock of Dunlin. Then it started raining again, so we called it a day.

By the way, some of us had heard an item on Radio Merseyside in the week about the planting of a rare tree in Speke Hall, that the report called only “the dinosaur tree”, saying there were only 12 of them left in the world. I looked the news up, and it was about the Wollemi Pine. There are only 12 in the wild, but since they were discovered in Australia in 1994 they have been widely propagated world-wide. It’s still a pretty rare tree, though. Speke Hall’s website says it is in the “secret garden” through a tunnel off the North Lawn.

Public transport details: Train from Central at 10.23, arriving Southport 11.15. Some returned to Liverpool on the train but three of us got the X2 bus from Lord Street at 1.44, which got me home at about 2.45.

Our bus took us past the Cammell Laird’s shipyard and from the top deck we got a good view of the new polar research vessel Sir David Attenborough being fitted out in the dry dock.  Eastham is on the west bank of the river Mersey, opposite Liverpool John Lennon airport. It was the site of the ancient first ferry, which ran until 1928. My mother remembered going to the pleasure gardens there. Since 1973 it has been a Country Park, with 100 acres of broadleaf woodland containing some of the largest mature trees in Merseyside, especially Oak, Beech and Sweet Chestnut. It also provides spectacular views across to Liverpool.

We walked alongside the Leverhulme Sports Ground but at the junction we didn’t go straight ahead to the Visitors’ Centre, as we usually do, but cut diagonally into the open field. We stopped to inspect the piles of wood chippings on the corner, hoping for fungi. There was a large ring of slim white gilled mushrooms on the top of one of the piles – they smelled like edible mushrooms but I bet they weren’t!  Our route then took us into the southern part of the woods, following a path which looped northwards alongside Ferry Road. Considering it’s only July, there were many interesting fungi popping out all through the woods, which I’d usually expect to see in more autumnnal months. The bracket fungus with the chestnut top and white underside is Artist’s Bracket Ganoderma applanatum, I think, and we also saw Chicken of the Woods Laetiporus sulphureus and what appeared to be a Stinkhorn Phallus impudicus, which a previous forager had pulled up and carefully laid on a stump.

Chicken of the Woods

Stinkhorn

We also noted an unusual rounded red one growing out of the roots of an oak tree. It didn’t have gills, but felt spongy underneath. I think it’s the Beefsteak or Ox Tongue fungus Fistulina hepatica, which is said to infect oak.

Other signs of autumn included the first red berries of Rowan trees on sunny roadsides, conkers growing on Horse Chestnut trees and ripening blackberries.

Although the heatwave goes on, today started cooler. It was shady in the woods, but when we came out into the open area to have lunch on the picnic tables, we felt the strength of the sunshine. On the river side of the car park there is a notable tree, a Western Hemlock Tsuga heterophylla. The leaves are rather Yew-like, but scattered randomly along the twigs and it has little woody cones rather like Alder. The new green cones of this year were also amongst them.

We popped into the Visitor’s Centre to check out the birds. They come to feeders, set out behind a big picture window in the back room. Today’s visitors were nearly all Great Tits, Blue Tits and a few Coal Tits, either fledglings or scruffy-looking adults. I was told there had been a Siskin but I missed it!  But if the birds were disappointing, we made up for it in butterflies. On the young oak scrub by a  dead tree stump overlooking the river we spotted two or three Purple Hairstreaks. This one sat obligingly to be photographed, but wouldn’t open its wings to show the dark purple upperwings.

We have talked about Purple Hairstreaks before, and sometimes gone to where they were reputed to be, but this is the first time most of us have ever seen one. A lifer! They seem to be increasing locally – just in the last few days I have seen reports of them newly colonising Ainsdale Dune Heath and the footpath between Little Crosby and Ince woods. Other butterflies seen today included Small White, Speckled Wood and a Comma by the gate into the industrial estate. When I arrived home my Buddleia was hosting a shy Gatekeeper and a magnificent “in-your-face” Peacock.

Public transport details: Bus X8 from Sir Thomas Street at 10.20, arriving New Chester Road / opp Woodyear Road at 10.50. Returned from New Chester Road / Allport Road (outside Christ the King RC church) at 2.35, arriving Liverpool 3.10.

Another hot and sunny day, no surprises there! The main fishing lake in Newsham Park was clogged with an algal bloom, which uses up the oxygen available for other life. There were two dead birds in the water, one was probably a Coot, the other a young Mallard. There weren’t many live birds on the water, no Mallards, just a few Coots and Moorhen, and a small family of Canada Geese which appeared to be munching on the algae.

Otherwise there were only the ubiquitous Feral Pigeons, Wood Pigeons and several Grey Squirrels. A Speckled Wood butterfly flitted past and a large, fast Dragonfly might have been an Emperor. On the other side of the bridge we had more bird variety with a Mute Swan and we were surprised to see a Heron above it, perched on a Weeping Willow.

One Horse Chestnut tree was showing an early infestation of the leaf miner, but another tree further on was almost free of it.

Swifts were flying over the model boating lake, which is much more wildlife-friendly than it used to be, with patches of reed on the eastern side, interspersed with Great Willowherb and Purple Loosestrife. There was a Common Blue Damselfly poised on a dead reed.

A tree next to the fence had a dead trunk and crown, but new growth was sprouting from the base, and it looked like Wych Elm. There was a Jay on the parched grass at the junction of Lister Drive and Orphan Drive.

By the entrance to the boating lake, opposite the café, is a small flower garden. There was a huge numbers of bees on the Lavender and one of many Large White butterflies on the Lace-cap Hydrangea.

Last week in my garden I saw one each of Red Admiral, Peacock and Painted Lady, but there have been dozens of Large Whites. It’s a good year for them. After lunch we walked through the streets of Fairfield, impressed by the superb avenue of mature Common Lime trees lining Elm Vale.

We finished the day at St Sebastian’s church barbeque and garden party in Lilley Road, where a friend was manning the plant stall.

Public transport details: Bus 13 from Queen Square at 10.05, arriving West Derby Road / Windsor Road at 10.20. Returned from Prescot Road / Lilley Road on the 10A at 2.35, arriving Liverpool 2.50.

It’s been hot and sunny for several weeks, and we are apparently going through the longest dry spell since 1976. From the bus stop we walked through a shady woodland along King George’s Way. (King George V and Queen Mary opened the pathway to Bidston on Wednesday 25th March 1914, the same day they visited Port Sunlight.) The woods were oddly silent, with hardly any birds heard or seen. There was the odd cooing of Wood Pigeons, the distant cackle of a Magpie, the brief call of a Great Spotted Woodpecker and we found a blue barred Jay feather on the path. We saw only a pair of Dunnocks in a tree and a Gull flying lazily over a meadow. There were lots of Large White butterflies on the wing, though, and we have all seen plenty of them in our gardens. A large Dragonfly went past, possibly an Emperor. All the trees were looking droopy and parched, with the younger saplings shrivelling up to a premature autumn. The Brambles have set plentiful seed, but if there is no rain soon the blackberries won’t be able to swell.

Tam O’Shanter Urban Farm started life as an old cottage, thought to be about 300 years old, built by a heath squatter. It was destroyed by fire in 1954 and 1975, then restored. Its name comes from a carving set into the wall showing Tam O’Shanter (from the Robbie Burns poem) escaping a witch by crossing water.

The farm now has goats, pigs, guinea pigs, ducks, turkeys and geese.

There is also a model cow with fake udders and a piped water system, designed to show children where milk comes from.  Not from bottles in a supermarket!

We lunched at their convenient picnic tables, where a Robin was hanging around for crumbs. Another of the farm buildings is an old Nissen hut, with an amazing white blossomy dome over it. It’s some sort of Rose, apparently, and this hot weather is really suiting it.

Flaybrick Memorial Gardens started life as a prestigious High Victorian cemetery for the merchant classes of Birkenhead. It was designed by Edward Kemp, a leading designer of parks and gardens, who was also responsible for Castle Park in Frodsham, Anfield Cemetery, Grosvenor Park in Chester, Newsham Park, Stanley Park and Hesketh Park in Southport. It is Grade II listed.

It is now treated as a nature reserve and has an active Friends group who have been planting interesting trees in the last few decades, turning it into a mini-arboretum. The current Conservation Management Plan has a guide to the trees in “Volume 4 Appendices“. Go to Appendix C, which has a comprehensive tree survey from page 29 onwards, with a useful map. We walked a different way than we usually do, heading towards the north end. We had a fleeting glimpse of a Comma butterfly. One of their signature tree species is the Silver Pendent Lime Tilia tomentosa ‘Petiolaris’, with many examples around the chapel end. One is the County Champion for girth.

Other notable trees were several Pyramidal Hornbeams and the Pear tree which produces copious edible fruits later in the year. There were plenty of baby pears on the tree, but many had fallen and some were quite shrivelled up.

There is a rare Orange-berried Service Tree by a large war grave, a Champion Tibetan Cherry and a young Swamp Cypress. The pair of Cut-leaved Beeches at the main crossing have produced a bumper crop of small seed cases, but will the drought allow them to develop?

On the way home I had another look at the mystery tree in Queen Square next to New Look. I once  thought that it might be a Pagoda tree, but now I think it’s a Honey Locust Gleditsia triacanthos ‘Sunburst’. This week it was putting out stalks of small red flowers and some of them appeared to be developing into pods.

Liverpool buys new street trees from Barcham’s tree nursery, and I recently bought myself a copy of their catalogue, reasoning that any unidentified newly-planted tree in Liverpool ought to be shown in it. ‘Sunburst’ is a new variety of Honey Locust, with no spines, yellow young leaves and is said to do well in a hard-surfaced area with lots of glare. That sounds right, and we will be keeping an eye on the developing seed pods later in the year.

Public transport details: Bus 437 from Sir Thomas Street at 10.19, arriving Upton Road / Boundary Road at 10.41. Returned on the 437 from Upton Road / Boundary Road at 2.17, arriving Liverpool 2.40.