Sunday 13 December 2015

North Norfolk Coast ~ 13 December

A morning spent twitching various things along the North Norfolk coast beginning with the juv. Iceland Gull at King's Lynn Docks. This rather brutish individual showed well along the embankment in terrible light, coming into feed on Tesco's finest bread!

Iceland Gull 
Iceland Gull
Moving on to Thornham Harbour, a number of Twite were feeding by the car park and the usual assortment of waders were on the mudflats and saltmarsh. A very showy Red-necked Grebe showed in Brancaster Harbour

Red-necked Grebe

A small flock of White-fronted Geese were seen in their usual field at Holkham and a Cattle Egret was successfully twitched over at Hickling

Cattle Egret

Tuesday 3 November 2015

Landguard Bird Obs - 3rd November

Pied Wheatear (male) watched from ~ 2-4pm. Showing well on beach at point





Friday 30 October 2015

UEA ~ 30 October

A nice find by Michael today in the form of this 1st/w Meditteranean Gull in Earlham Park. My first one on campus and by all accounts rather rare to get on the deck


Friday 7 August 2015

Aston Rowant ~ 7 August

A morning trip to Aston Rowant in search of butterflies, parking here and exploring the downs to the north of the M40.

Silver-spotted Skippers were in high numbers with over 40. Chalkhill Blues and Brown Argus were abundant, particularly towards the bottom of the slope as they nectared in high densities on Wild Marjoram.

Brimstones, Small Tortoisehells, Peacock and all 3 of the common orange skippers were in high numbers.






Tuesday 4 August 2015

Stockbridge Down ~ 4 August


A very quick mid-morning trip where Chalkhill Blues were out in astonishing numbers with 500+ across the down. A couple of Essex Skipper were at the bottom of the down among the more numerous Large and Small.

A couple of late and rather tatty Dark Green Fritillaries were still flying

Chalkhill Blue ~ Polyommatus coridon

Chalkhill Blue ~ Polyommatus coridon
Essex Skipper ~ Thymelicus lineola




Friday 31 July 2015

Alner's Gorse - 31 July

My first visit to this excellent Butterfly Conservation reserve between Blandford Forum and Yeovil. Parking available in a small layby here.

The main target of this visit was Brown Hairstreak, and 1m and 2f were found at 2 locations:
   ~ thistles at the end of the footpath running downhill from the entrance
   ~ on blackthorn/thistles on western side of main reserve

Purple Hairstreak were common on virtually all of the more substantial trees and regularly coming down to nectar on bramble. 1 White-letter Hairstreak was seen nectaring on brambles low down on western side of reserve.

Impressive numbers of Silver-washed Fritillaries were present in the woods to the north including one Valezina.

Purple Hairstreak ~ Favonius quercus

White-letter Hairstreak ~ Satyrium w-album

Brown Hairstreak ~ Thecla betulae

Brown Hairstreak ~ Thecla betulae

Thursday 16 July 2015

Mill Lawn Damselflies ~ 16 July 2016 - DAMSELFLIES

Quick trip to the NF focusing on my favourite spot at Mill Lawn where the cloudy weather was preventing the numbers of Southern Damselflies as seen last year. There were still around half a dozen along with good numbers of White-legged Damselflies.

1 male Scarce-blue Tailed showed well in a brief sunny spell, before practically disappearing into the riverside vegetation. Image & diagram below for ID features:



Friday 10 July 2015

Scotland ~ Days 7-9

~Friday~

On this day we decided to visit Sanna Bay; the beach here is probably one of the most beautiful in the UK, and so it was with no hesitation that we spent a while exploring what the dunes had to offer. Lots of Sand Martins were visiting their colonies (the peninsular as a whole had an abundance of these), and a male Wheatear was busy collecting food.

Wheatear 
On our drive back we pulled into a lay-by to scan the ridges for eagles. Alas there were none, but we were still very glad we stopped as we had very good views of a pair of Whinchat, along with my first Small Pearl-bordered Fritillary of the trip.

Small Pearl-bordered Fritillary
Male Whinchat
~Saturday~

As it was my final full day at the house, I decided to start the day by getting up early and explore the woods near the cottage. 3 Wood Warbler and a Spotted Flycatcher were good to see.

Wood Warbler
We then drove to the RSPB's Glenborrodale reserve. En route we stopped as Matt spotted a large raptor just breaking the horizon, which excitingly turned out to be a Golden Eagle!

Golden Eagle
The reserve itself provided a very pleasant walk with 2 Spotted Flycatchers, a reeling Grasshopper Warbler, several Small Pearl-bordered Fritillary and 1 very fresh looking Chequered Skipper!

Small Pearl-bordered Fritillary

Chequered Skipper

Chequered Skipper
~Sunday~

The long drive back from the highlands to Rugby took all day, though a brief stop near Arnside yielded a few Northern Brown Argus, the 2nd butterfly lifer of the trip for me!

Northern Brown Argus




Sunday 28 June 2015

Scotland ~ Days 4-6

~ Tuesday ~ 

The day got off to a good start when we opened the moth trap to find 3 Poplar Hawk-moths and 1 Elephant Hawk-moth! We decided to make our way over to the Ardnamurchan Lighthouse, the most westerly point on the British mainland. In the pools by the lighthouse we found several Palmate Newts and offshore we found Guillemot, Razorbill, Black Guillemot and a decent flock of around 40 Manx Shearwater.



Poplar Hawkmoth

Buff tip


On the drive back we ticked off Twite, before arriving at Ben Hiant for a walk, where eventually we picked up a distant soaring White-Tailed Eagle. A Golden Plover flew overhead, Redshank called on the marshes below, and a Whinchat sang from the bracken.

We returned to the cottage where once again the Pine Marten put on a fantastic show...I'll let the photos speak for themselves!


Pine Marten


Pine Marten


Pine Marten


~ Wednesday ~

Crap weather meant that we mainly spent time lounging at the cottage, where we had a couple of sightings of Otter, before unbelievable close views of the Pine Marten in the evening on the step just outside the window.

Pine Marten


~ Thursday ~

We took a day trip to Mull where unbelievably we picked up our first Wheatear of the trip, including several family parties.

Wheatear

Loch Na Keal proved fruitful with 2 otters - most likely a mother and cub - which we followed for a few hundred metres along the loch edge. We also got good views of 2 sub-adult White-Tailed Eagles flying over the loch!

Otters


White-tailed Eagle


We decided to make the long drive down to the island of Iona on the south-western tip of Mull. One of the first discoveries we made was   a white-winged Gull, which initially got us rather excited...until we realised it was just a leucistic Common Gull!

Common Gull (leucistic)

After a short while (including a detour going the wrong way!) we were in the area with the best chance of hearing a Corncrake. With strong winds, rain, and the wrong time of day - I was feeling less than optimistic! Our luck was in however, and over the course of 30 minutes we heard at least 3-4 individuals calling, including one around 5m away. The long vegetation of course meant it was impossible to see them.

We also saw Twite, Skylark, Carrion Crow, Jackdaw and Rook (the latter 2 being quite scarce in this part of Scotland).
On our walk back to the ferry Matt and Megan spotted a Corncrake in a resident's front garden. After an anxious wait, I managed to get a 2-3 second view as it ran from one clump of vegetation to another, a brilliant tick!


Driving back along Loch Na Keal we saw an adult White-Tailed Eagle in a usual spot and then we spotted a recently-fledged juvenile flapping its wings deeper in the forest: an incredible end to what had been a brilliant day.

White-tailed Eagle (phone-scoped)




Wednesday 24 June 2015

Scotland ~ Days 1-3

Early saturday morning I travelled up to Scotland with Matt Bruce and Beth Aucott. We were to spend 2 days exploring the Cairngorms (and Forvie Sands on the east coast) before meeting up with Matt Williams, Megan Shersby, Liam Curson and Pete Cooper to spend the next 7 days on the Ardanmurchan Peninsular, located on the west coast.

~ SATURDAY ~
After setting off at 1am, we arrived in Scotland at around 5am to low cloud and frequent rain showers! These were not ideal for searching the moors at our first stop, where visibility was down to about 30m. Amazingly however, we spotted a Black Grouse lek right by the road which consisted of around 10-15 birds - a brilliant start to the trip!

Black Grouse

We headed northwards to Forvie Sands and the Ythan Estuary to see if we could find the drake King Eider that had been frequenting there. Regrettably we dipped, with the bird being seen further north. The area was still very much worth the visit, as we had great views of Sand Martins nesting in the dunes (I've only ever seen them nesting in artifice banks previously!), 4 species of tern (Common, Arctic, Sandwich and Little - in total over 1000 terns nest at Forvie every summer), Seals and hundreds of Common Eiders.

Little Tern

Little Tern

Sand Martin
Sand Martin


Our first night was to be spent near Aviemore in the Cairngorms, and so by 4pm we were searching the moorland this area has to offer. With the weather now much clearer, we were very lucky to find Merlin, Osprey, Red Grouse and 2 Hen Harriers, which even did a food pass for us! A Common Sandpiper also showed unbelievably close, perching on a post just 5-6m from the car. A Woodcock was also seen roding over our campsite.

Common Sandpiper

~SUNDAY~
The next day was also to be spent in the Cairngorms, and despite initial concerns that the weather was too poor, we decided to go for a walk up (partially) Ben Macdui first thing. After no more than around 200m, we found an adult male Ring Ouzel feeding 3 fledged young. Continuing up the mountain, we eventually located a Ptarmigan (in the end we probably saw at least 2 individuals). No photos unfortunately but we had great views of one flying and calling around us.

Ring Ouzel
After drying off at the ski-centre café, we took a trip to Loch Ruthven, an RSPB reserve most famous for its breeding Slavonian Grebes. We enjoyed good views of 1 pair from the hide (a volunteer for the site informed us that there were in fact 7 pairs nesting on the loch), along with a cracking pair of Red-Throated Diver. The walk back to the car yielded numerous Willow Warblers as well as a Spotted Flycatcher.

Our final stop of the day was made at Ardgour, where a handful of Black Guillemots breed on a disused pier.

Black Guillemot

We arrived at the cottage late afternoon to meet up with the others, and after just 30 minutes we spotted a Pine Marten feeding on the peanut butter we had put out. Later that evening, things got even better when 2 visited together (1 of them even ran up to the window). It was a perfect end to what had already been a great start to the trip.

~MONDAY~
The weather forecast indicated that this might be the best weather we were due all week, and so we were understandably keen to try and see our insect targets of the trip.  Matt (Bruce), Peter and I spotted a Narrow-bordered Bee Hawk-moth in a small area of overgrown vegetation in front of the cottage.  Regrettably we failed to catch it and so the others missed out on this beautiful moth. As a number of us searched the area in the hope the moth would be re-found, Matt (Williams) spotted a dragonfly low down in the vegetation. I walked over to have a look and was stunned to find a teneral Northern Emerald, a real local specialty which is only found in wet meadows in North-west Scotland. I was particularly chuffed as this was one of my main personal targets of the whole trip! A number of recently emerged Golden-ringed Dragonflies were also to be found in the vegetation.

Northern Emerald (teneral)
As the weather was good, we took a trip to Claish Moss - this is a difficult site to access with a 2 mile walk through the forest just to reach the edge of the bog. Whilst walking through the forest rides, we had hoped to pick up more Northern Emeralds and perhaps Chequered Skipper, but sadly the much needed sunshine failed to materialise! Once we had reached the edge of the moss however, our luck was in and the brief spell of sunshine encouraged 3-4 Chequered Skippers to reveal themselves. This was another one of my most wanted species for the trip. On the moss itself I saw a male Hen Harrier, Curlew, Teal and Redshank.

Chequered Skipper
We returned to the cottage and were treated to the most incredible views of Pine Marten at around 17:30.

Pine Marten
The day was to get even better however, as at around 20:30, an Otter gave great views as it swam through the bay in front of our cottage!!