Nature set to win fight for survival according to East Lancashire expert (From Burnley and Pendle Citizen)

Nature set to win fight for survival according to East Lancashire expert

8:00pm Thursday 21st March 2013 in News By Emma Cruces, Reporter

WILDLIFE and plants are set to survive one of the coldest springs in years according to a wildlife expert.

Temperatures across the UK were just above freezing on the first ‘official’ day of spring, yesterday.

Lancashire nature ex-pert Ron Freethy said many people will be worried about the increase in visitors to bird tables and lack of plant life, especially as this time last year the area was experiencing a mini-heatwave.

Concerns had also been expressed by experts at the National Trust about animals, such as hedge-hogs and squirrels, hibernating longer, and whether they have enough fat reserves.

However, he said birds will be able to cope even if we see further snow-fall.

The wildlife author also said the delay might also cause an unusual ‘burst of flowers’ across the county as winter and spring bulbs emerge together.

It is the opposite of last year, when a heatwave combined with a drought and resulted in wildfires, hosepipe bans and record sales of ice cream and garden plants.

In 2012, the daffodils were nearly over by mid-March, the bluebells were well out, and the birds had long been nesting.

Ron said: “I have many more visitors to my bird table as do others and this is an obvious worry for many people.

However it won’t impact on the breeding season, even if eggs are being laid when there is snow.

“The breeding season is dependent on daylight hours not temperatures. Plus nature is cyclical. If birds flourished every spring we would get to a point when we would be nine feet deep in them.

“Each year balances out previous years. Right now the snowdrops should be long gone but the unusual temp-eratures mean they are at their best.

“This means should the temperature warm up suddenly, we will see a burst of flowers as the spring and winter flowers will be out together.”