The salamandridae family.

Part one the common newt.

Although common newts live in their breeding pools for most of the spring, they will spend most of the summer and autumn on land. The smooth newt is another name for the common newt as well. Most common newts will hibernate on land during late autumn and winter. They won`t go far from their breeding pools so lush pasture, open woodland or scrub land are good places to find newts. It is hard to tell the males and females apart outside of the breeding season, but the males have a bright orange underside with dark spots on their throats and bellies during the breeding season. Whereas the females will have quite a pale underside. The male also has a wavy crest along its back and tail. The common newt is Britain's most widespread of all of our newts. Like all newts it has smooth, soft skin with a tail flattened at the sides. Their colour on land is yellow olive with the female being duller. They are about four inches long, from head to tail. The male will do a courtship ritual to attract the female, it will vibrate its tail in front of the female in distinctive fashion. The male will then deposit a sperm containing capsule called a spermatophore, this will be left in front of his mate who then manoeuvres herself so she can pick the capsule up with her cloaca. Fertilization then occurs inside the females body. The female will then after a few days start to lay her eggs individually. She will lay up to twelve per day in aquatic leaves, although she may lay a total of four hundred eggs. After about two to three weeks, depending on the water temperature the eggs hatch to become tadpoles, this is their larval stage. For the first few days the tadpoles live off any food left in their yolk sacks. After this the tadpoles start to eat freshwater plankton. Unlike frog tadpoles, newt tadpoles are carnivorous so they will live off mollusc's, insect larvae and similar foods. At first the tadpoles look like small fry, but later look more like the adults. But they have feathery external gills emerging from the head on either side. As the tadpoles grow, firstly they develop front legs then their back legs grow, then with growth in their lungs their gills eventually shrink. The tadpoles shifts from being  fully aquatic to possessing a body for a mostly terrestrial existence. A baby newt is called a eft. They leave the water after about ten weeks. Some tadpoles may over winter in the larval state and emerge the following spring. The newts then take about three years to become sexually mature. They will then return to the same breeding pools to start the process all over again. During the day common newts will hide under stones or logs, emerging on damp night to hunt slugs, insects and worms. Common newts are greedy hunters, using their sticky tongues to catch their prey. They swallow their prey whole, they track their prey with both  their sight and scent. Unlike lizards (which they look like) newts have no scales, they also move very slowly. Also newts will never bask in the sun unlike newts. Hedgehogs, rats and grass snakes are their biggest predators. All newts are protected bylaw in Europe, but in Britain it is only illegal to sell common newts under section five of the wildlife and countryside acts of 1981 with respect of sale only. Therefore their destruction or capture is still permitted, in my opinion though this should be changed as the greater crested and palmate newts are struggerling.

Spring equinox

Happy equinox to everyone. This is a time when day and night are of equal length across the whole world, in the northern hemisphere we celebrate spring.From now on the days are getting longer, and nights are getting shorter. This is the festival of balance, the balance of light and dark, the balance of the suns active energy and the moons receptive energy, the balance of the outer and inner worlds, and the balance of the conscious fire energy with the forces of the watery unconscious. At the spring equinox we can look forward towards the balance within ourselves. Everything in nature is coming alive and awakening. The sun is gaining strength, the days are getting longer and warmer. Blossom and catkins are erupting on the trees, buds are bursting, seeds are germinating, spring flowers appear everywhere and eggs are hatching and all of the animals are preparing to have their young. Everywhere their is evidence of life's ability to regenerate. The energy is turning from within the dark depths of winter and the inner world, to an outward manifestation of the conscious world. It is to throw off the restraints of winter and the cold months, and now reach out for what it is we want for the world and ourselves. It is a time of rain and sunshine, the elements all mingle together, fire and water, spring gales, high tides, feelings of wildness and chaos as the high winds blow into our faces. Run wild with emotions in that wind and celebrate life's fertility. We are breaking out and moving forwards, as we feel empowered to take risks, strike out on our own and make things happen. The balancing of the earths energy is now balanced, light and dark, conscious and un-conscious, fire and water. Here there is the union of power which  balance fertility and manifestation. This is the spark of the life force.

Habitats

Part one the woodland floor at night.

Many kinds of mammals, large and small, make their homes in deciduous woodland. Not only do the trees and shrubs provide more shelter from winds, rain and the cold open country, but for mammals that can climb they give extra living and foraging space among their branches. Above all, the different kinds of trees,shrubs and flowers offer a wide assortment of food for the mammals and also a huge number of insects, which are in turn another source of food for the mammals.  A wood covering about half a square mile, can support more than five thousand mice and voles aswell as many shrews, moles, squirrels,  badger and deer. Predators such as tawny owls and weasels and stoats are attracted to these woodlands by the abudance of small mammals. The night flying tawny owl, espeically, depends for food on the mice and voles that forage on the woodland floor. In summer when the undergrowth is dense and small mammals are well hidden it will often hunt over open fields and hedgerows. But when the vegetation dies back again in late autumn and winter, woodland mammals are easier prey. The owl claims a woodland territory  ready for breeding in march. The size of their territory depends on the amount of mice and voles that are available to them. The tawny owl will sometimes eat worms if numbers ger really low. Wood mice feed on more open parts of the woodland floor than bank voles. Several mice will share a space, showing little aggression over nuts, fruits,seedlings and insects it offers, except during the breeding season when they will defend their territory. Woodmice, voles and squirrels will nibble on tops of fungi aswell, boletus is one of their favourites to share. The tawny owl will prey on all of the small mammals that occupy the woodland floor. Below the tawny owls roost you will find its regurgitated pellets, this is all of the indigestable material such as bones and fur. The hazel dormice only ventures out at night to forage mainly among the tree branches. They feed mainly on hazel nuts. They will eat lots of food in late autumn as they are getting ready for hibernation. Bank voles will forage amongst thick cover by day or night. The woodland floor will also be alive with slugs, millipedes,centipedes and woodlice foraging through all of the decaying leaf litter.

House sparrows.

There used to be thousands of house sparrows in our inner cities, including London which was once a house sparrow stronghold. But today there are very few in and around the capital and their numbers are down. House sparrows have lived alongside man for thousands of years. In the early twentieth century they were so common that people trapped, shot and even ate house sparrows. Then in the 1990`s there was a serious crash in sparrow numbers. In only a few years over half of London's population of sparrows had disappeared. They declined faster in London that anywhere else. They were put on the red list of species, which is the endangered list. So why was this happening? It is thought that insects may have something to do with it, and cars and cats were not to blame for the massive population decrease. Because of industry, green spaces have declined and air pollution has increased, causing insect numbers to decline. This has had a knock on effect on house sparrows feeding themselves and especially their chicks, which when first born feed mainly on insects.These insects are vital for the chicks when they are first born. They have also lost numerous nesting sites because they rely on our houses to nest in. We have had a major impact on them as well, by removing shrubs from our gardens and then paving over them we have reduced the amount of insects in our gardens. It has become popular to keep our gardens really tidy as well, whereas years ago we would of had compost heaps and leaf piles for hundreds of insects to hide in. We have also filled in all of the little nooks and crannies with p.v.c cladding around the outside of our houses. This has had a huge impact on the nesting sites of the house sparrow. A row of houses with a few cracks and crevices are ideal for the house sparrow so they can get into our lofts to enable them to nest. We also need to think about having thick shrubs and hedges back in our gardens.Reservoirs are important for sparrows to get aphids and insects, essential protein for them and their chicks. House sparrows are colonial nesters so they like to nest together. They can also find nesting material and socialise around the reservoirs . They are an iconic bird for us to live along side . Healthy wildlife in our cities is a great indication for us. It can show us how healthy or polluted our wildlife is in our cities. healthy sparrows are a great indicater that we are going to be healthy aswell.