We begin June with lots of new greenery. The recent spell of warm weather has kickstarted new growth in both the trees and undergrowth. Much of the understory across the farm is now dominated by the white flowers of cow parsley and a wide variety of wildflowers can be spotted all across Mudchute including buttercups, ribwort plantain, cutleaf cranesbill, red campion and many more.

Warm weather and developing flora have also coaxed invertebrates of all sorts out of hibernation. The leafy understory is full of tiny beetles, flies, bugs and other invertebrates. Overhead, tender young tree leaves provide food for caterpillars, which will in turn, feed baby birds.

All across the farm, birds will be hurriedly carrying invertebrate prey to their nestlings. Those who began nesting early will already have youngsters beginning to fledge. You may come across young birds who are in the process of leaving the nest. If you do encounter a baby bird without its parents, keep a watchful eye, but this is likely part of the normal fledging process and the young birds should be left alone as its parents are likely searching for food and continuing to feed them. For more information, please read the following advice pages from the RSPB.

Down on the ponds, damselflies and dragonflies will also be appearing, emerging as larvae from the waters where they have overwintered to moult into winged adults. Within the ponds, tadpoles and newt larvae are growing rapidly on algae and vegetation underwater. These incredible creatures were the focus of a recent identification workshop held here at Mudchute and run by FrogLife (read more about the course here from Tower Habitats).

See more of just some of the creatures we’ve encountered and don’t forget that you can share your own finds with us via twitter, facebook or flickr!

As summer approaches, it was time for our flock to get their summer trim! Heavy fleeces can cause health problems in warm weather as well as hide flystrike. Shearer Derek Knowles came to shear the flock. He set up his electric shearing station in the Princes Trust building and the day was filled with the buzz of the clippers as the wool came rolling off.

The fleeces of our sheep breeds weight between 2-4.5kg, so the sheep will definitely be feeling lighter and brighter after having a trim. Their fleeces will go on to be spun into yarn and turned into all sorts of garments. Wool fibres are characterised by two metrics, their Bradford count (which is a measure of how fine the wool is) and their stable length (the length of the individual fibres). The finest wool of our flock is that of the Oxford Down with a Bradford count of 54.56. While the Whitefaced Woodlands have the longest staple length at about 15cm. Oxfords also have the heaviest fleeces, measuring up to 4.5kg for our rams.