Martello Fields Wildife Diary

You might be surprised how much wildife our volunteers have found in the heart of Seaford. The Martello Champions meet once a month – check the noticeboard for upcoming dates and come and join our friendly group or email via the contact page. All welcome!

January

A bright and sunny day, and even a few flowers around, including groundsel and common chickweed. A few red fungi and shells, presumably dropped by gulls. Two gulls were courting each other, and watching us from the fence! We noticed the poor state of some of the steps and reported these to the town council. Very pleased to see new fencing along the seafront side of the fields, where the cars parked.

By March the grass was growing again and daisies were popping their heads up. Glorious yellow blooms of lesser celandine showed that Spring was here. We spotted lush green growth from ribwort plantain leaves, cow parsley, mallow, docks, bristly oxtongue, spotted medic, nettles and dandelions. In the eastern field, alexanders appeared, which had presumably spread from the banks under Corsica Hall. There were even a few daffodils on the banks!

A few coastal specific plants flourish including the sea beet (an edible waxy thick stemmed plant) and Danish scurvygrass (which is also common at the side of roads treated with salt!)

In April the grass was a carpet of daisies! In May (when the mowers were staying away!) ground ivy and the first buttercups were popping out. The first were bulbous buttercups, distinguished by the sepals at the base being reflexed downwards rather than upwards round the petals. Again these are common by the sea, as is the hoary cress which seems to appear on roadsides and verges everywhere! Along the middle banks, cow parsley started to raise its glorious lacy heads to the sun, and in the west field, the star of the show was the beautiful wild clary raising resplendent purple heads above the grass, all along the sides of the field and verges of College road. Small pink geraniums flourished underfoot. A few hybrid bluebells and white campion appeared on the banks. Bees were appreciating the clover and bird’s foot trefoil in the main field, and we spotted some good patches of thrift (often known as sea pinks)

In June the main colour was pink.. Mallow of all sizes, common restharrow and field bindweed covering huge areas/ though the mowers had been in to the fields, the glorious north east corner was a wonderful swathe of meadow, with butterflies fluttering among grasses, knapweed and yarrow, and good sized clumps of black horehound.

July was dry, very dry and the fields became bare and dry. It’s noticeable though how the longer grasses survive the drought better. Common blue and gatekeeper butterflies were still hunting for flowers in the pockets of flowers, and field bindweed seemed to be smothering the whole field! The burdock is another plant popular with the bees, as is the magnificent (if prickly!) spear thistle. Also in the southern banks, hogweed was rising its stocky umbrella like flower heads.

The drought continued into August, and with no sign of rain, a lot of the plants were setting seed, and looking worse for wear. As fires started to break out on the nature reserve, the council took the inevitable decision to bring forward the mowing of areas of dry grassland.

By October there had been plenty of rain, and the fields were fresh and green with a lot of grass and other vegetation growth. We admired the new sturdy fencing that had been completed on all sides of the Martello fields and Pump field! The rain had brought out lots of fungi! Fresh blooms of wild clary too! The seagulls and sparrows were having a fantastic time splashing at the puddles by the unmade road!

This a subgroup of On the Verge. We hope to set up similar monitoring groups in other green spaces in 2023.