"Dirty sand"
When visiting Easington at the end of last year I was struck by a broad band of brown, dirty-looking, sand at the top of the beach. I collected a sample of this material which proved to be half as heavy again as normal beach sand.The above image shows ordinary quartz beach sand (left) compared with the dark sand (right). This demonstrated how effective the wave action had been at sorting the heavy garnet (pink and red grains) from the transparent quartz. The black grains were a mixture of magnetite (iron oxide) and ilmenite (iron-titanium oxide), the former of which is highly magnetic. With a fridge-magnet I was able to extract 10% by weight of the grains.
Moral - don't rely on your compass at Easington!
Richard Middleton, 8 April 2021
As the lockdown was announced, a strong sense of déjà vu, what to do? how to fill the quota of wildlife I need to stay afloat from the madness of this world. I need a local patch, within walking distance, and diverse enough in habitats that it will keep me busy recording in it. So I decided onto Sculcoates square (TA0930), with a river, a drain, lots of scrubby, brownfield places and three cemeteries. I have planned to visit at least weekly year round and if you want to follow my patch adventures, check my 
On the 30th of December I headed to Withernsea to see the stranded Sperm Whales. I've never seen a stranded whale before and I was saddened by their misfortune, but incredibly curious to see these animals up close. Five whales were stranded and a team was carrying out the necropsies. The individual closest to Withernsea is pictured in the photo.
As I walked by the Oak Road playing fields yesterday I noticed an odd bird feeding on the grass. I couldn't believe my eyes: it is a silvery crow! I remembered that Andy Gibson messaged me about such a bird on New Years Day. I went to find it the following day and I have been visiting the area regularly, so it has taken me over 4 months to find it. It is likely to be a genetic variant of the usual colour plumage, instead of it being due to poor nutrition (as exemplified by this very tame young bird at West Park). Carrion Crow young being fed on bread appear to suffer from discolouration of their primaries, and are more frequent around public parks. They might grow black feathers in their next moult, but in the meantime, the white feathers fray more easily and sometimes these crows look like they have to make more effort to fly.
I've been for a long walk to the north limits of the city following the Beverley and Barmston drain. Had a close look at the Mistletoe, and nearby was a little flock of Siskin coming down to drink on a puddle after feeding on the Alders. Also had my first Colt's-foot by Oak Road Lake, and my 2nd picnic of the year!
Upper (top) and lower (bottom) leaf surfaces.
Four members attended our first field trip after the latest lockdown. There was a good range of birds, both on the water and in the woodland with the star record being a Great White Egret. Although early for many flowers, we found a patch of Rue-leaved Saxifrage (Saxifraga tridactylites)- top - not far from the car park. In the floodplain meadow were Cuckooflower (Cardamine pratensis) and Marsh-marigold (Caltha palustris) amongst what promises to be a good display of Great Burnet (Sanguisorba officinalis). We were interested to find most of the patches of Broad-leaved Dock crawling with iridescent green beetles which were busy mating and laying eggs - middle. These were identified as Green Dock Beetles (Gastrophysa viridula)! Other finds included the fungus Blushing Bracket (Daedaleopsis confragosa) and a slime mould, the False Puffball (Enteridium lycoperdon) - bottom - about to crack and release its spores.
Over 2020 I kept a daily record of all (identifiable) birds seen or heard from our Wawne garden. Travel restrictions and cancelled holidays resulted in an unbroken sequence of 366 lists with 47 observed species. The above chart shows the frequency of occurrence (as a % of days listed) of the twenty most frequent species.
Chris Sulston spotted this female Red-crested Pochard on East Park lake at the end of last year. They occur commonly in Europe, but are fairly rare visitors or escapees in the UK. East Park has a good selection of waterfowl and is well worth a visit.[AC]