Finally some very welcome sunshine

The Safari has been waiting for the promise of some sunshine for weeks and at last the weather forecast looked promising. We joined CR for a drive up the motorway to our favourite little reserve where we met IH. Drops of rain at the start of our journey had disappeared by the time we arrived and the sun was trying  to get out from behind the clouds. Time to look for some things with scales...and not before time! 

Up in the eaves of the warden's house House Martins investigated their old nests from last year but didn't hang around for any pics. We checked the walled areas of the gardens for Grass Snakes and Slow Worms without success nor were there any Bee Flies hovering around the Primroses. Maybe the sun needed to climb a little higher and come out from the clouds a little longer as it was still quite cool. In the little bit of scratty woodland beneath the empty Osprey nest we found lone Red Deer. Through the gate into the reserve 'proper' there were no Adders to be found on the remains of the old wall either. We passed slowly through the wet (very very wet) Silver Birch dominated woodland checking the base of the trees and edges of the boardwalk for Common Lizards - again no joy. But we did hear the song of a Pied Flycatcher and following flits of movement through the trees soon got half a glimpse of the little fellow. A nice one for our Challenge, #137

He wasn't for showing himself at all. From the end of the boardwalk we battled bravely through yards of  thick, gooey, welly-sucking mud to where the wood ends and drier ground with another boardwalk begins. Here we heard a Redstart sing and then witnessed a couple of male Redstarts were having a ding-dong of an aerial dogfight - a veritable blaze of red hanging in the air! We've never seen that before, and then spotted why all the fighting a female was perched not far away. #138

It wasn't long before one of the males reappeared, chosing to sit on a rather unphotogenic gate and fence rather than perch on some more attractive foliage.

For some reason best known to themselves both our cameras seemed to have trouble focusing on it...it might not have been all the cameras' fault, the operator can be a bit flaky at times. 

We expected the track across the moss to be a lot wetter than it was and soon came across a Tree Pipit which, like the Pied Flycatcher, wasn't wanting to show itself to best advantage. #139

A bit further on we looked back across the moss to the Osprey nest but there were no birds sat on it.The sun was doing its best to come out and in the brief moments it did it was much warmer and butterflies began to appear, we had a couple of Peacocks and a Small Tortoiseshell in fairly quick succession. only the first Peacock settled for a pic though.

Crossing the bridge, where the stream was much lower than expected, the large patch of Bilberry hadn't begun to come into leaf so our chance of a hoped for Green Hairstreak butterfly was slim to remote. There were no Red Deer faces peering out of the woods beyond the Bilberry patch today. We did see a couple of Crossbills disappearing into the distance from the next patch of woodland after picking them up on call but sadly we couldn't find any others still feeding in the cone laden conifer trees where they'd flown from.

Soundtrack of the day once again was Willow Warblers and as usual they were invariable singing from the back side of the trees and bushes. We waited ages and passed how many 'hundreds' before we found one on the right side of the tree and even then it was partially obscured. See them or not it's still a great sound to listen to when the spring woodland is full of them.

Given our squelching, slipping and sliding along the non-boardwalked sections of this path it was inevitable that we'd come to a sticky end. This is a circular route back to the bridge the final stretch of which runs alongside the stream...it was inaccessible today the last few yards before the stream being far too muddy to contemplate trying to cross unless you were wearing chest waders - which we weren't. Here's a couple of habitat shots of the tangled and mossy wet Willow woodland, you wouldn't want to go off-piste into there, you'd never be seen again until your peat-preserved body was dug up some thousands of years into the future.

Nothing for it but to retrace our steps. Still no Common Lizards and no futher sign of the Crossbills and no Raft Spiders but we did see a trio of cronking Ravens and a somewhat out of place Little Egret land in field of sheep. We had more but not better views of Tree Pipits while crossing the moss and a far to brief for a pic Lesser Redpoll landed briefly on the electricity wires crossing the site. Back in the Birch woodland we soon came across the Pied Flycatcher again and this time it was more obliging but still a litttle distant.

The tumble-down wall wasn't for giving up its Adders again as thoughts turned towards pies and butties. A Mistle Thrush landed not too far behind the wall and for a moment thoughts of lunch disappeared.

While scanning the wall we happened across our first Large Red Damselflies of the year, first a teneral (recently emerged) individual then a fully coloured up one.

And then a Dung Beetle crossed our path - would we ever get to our pies???

Fortunately we did make it back to the cars and our lunches. The sun came out while we were tucking into our goodies and we enjoyed sightings of Brimstone and Orange Tip butterflies and then heard the unmistakeable high pitched yickering of Ospreys calling. We grabbed the camera and pointed it at the nest where one bird was hunkered down not showing very well but then the male flew in and landed on the nest. #140. The sun was strong now and there was a serious heat haze going on so the pic isn't that good.

Not that we mind strong sunshine - it means the snakes come out to bask so as soon as we'd eaen it was back to the wall where....there were no snakes...b*gger! In fact the most exciting thing we found was a Banded Snail that had stashed itself among the delicate Bracket Fungi of a rotting stump.

Our route after lunch took us up the 'hill of death' but today wasn't too bad and we weren't huffing and puffing like an old steam engine by the time we got to the top. We discovered a new pond had been dug which will require much inspection later in the year, the older new ponds would have been inaccessible due to feet thick gloopy mud in the valley today so we gave them a miss. We'd brought a pot to see if we could nab one ofthe Nomad Bees that like this stretch of the road but didn't see any. Seeing them is one thing,catching one would have been something else entirely. Why were we after catching one? Well, we've seen them many times over the years but have yet to identify them, we don't know if anyone else has tried to identify them either. 

Passing the tarn the Little Grebes were calling, there's always a Little Grebe or two, or three, on there. Down at the entrance pond we looked in vain for tadpoles - how come there weren't any, there's always loads at this time of year, surely with all the cold wet weather they can't have metamorphosed and left the pond already? IH spotted the only newt of the afternoon, probably a Palmate Newt given the site. Then he found another Pied Flycatcher, like the first it wasn't for showing itself.

We went to have a look at 'Great Crested Newt corner' and obviouslty saw none, we didn't see any other water life either, no water boatmen or other swimmy things just a few Whirlygig Beetles buzzing around on the surface, we guess the water must still be very cold. Then CR beckoned us to join him on the other side of the pond, he'd got much better views of the Pied Flycatcher...at last!

And it alllowed a stealthy closer approach...bonus!

Also in the woods around the pond was a Blue Tit with a beakful of nesting material. It hung around a while perhaps waiting for us to get out of the way before delivering it to a nearby nestbox.

A bright male Orange Tip wouldn't do us the courtesy of landing on a Bluebell but shot straight past and promptly vanished. 

Around the reserve IH had noticed that the winter storms had smashed up a lot of the trees, the Silver Birch being especially badly hit, much more so than any of the other tree species. Large numbers had high broken branches like these.

On the walk back yet another Willow Warbler gave us the runaround and while we were trying to get on it IH found a tiny Crab Spider on the top of a gate. Top banana eyesight that lad has.

We've no idea what species it might be, one for our good mate and expert in all things spidery AB. 

Unfurling Bracken fronds are always worth getting down to eye-level with - do ferns have eyes?

Cambrian Poppies were in flower along the roadside too.

Time was now getting short but with the sun out for a while and warmth in the air we just had to have another look for the Adders. Through the gate we went, ignoring the snail secreted among its fungi friends, and for some reason we looked to the right rather than scanning the wall to our left. Oh joy of joys there was an Adder, no there were two. We hastened the others to come for a look.

Two Adders - fantastico - - but wait - - - look closely, there's two heads down there at the bottom of the pic. Three Adders even better than fantastico. And they even started to move about a bit as we got as close as we dared without disturbing them.

The sun kept going behind a cloud and this made them flatten themselves down to get the maximum warmth when it came back out. The two males might have been tempted to do their dance had it been just a bit warmer. The female was more or less stationary all the while.

With such a superb opportunity we just kept firing shots off.

At no time were they upset by our (fairly) close presence although we're sure they knew we were there.

To break the snake monopoly a Longhorn Beetle landed on IH's lens. Rhagium mordax to give it its full name.

A fabulous wee beasty. anyway enough of that back to the Adders.

What a brilliant experience, well worth that last look.

And to finish we had a couple of really bright Large Red Damselflies on the wall by the car park before we had to leave.

Where to next? Maybe something a bit different to report on, if we can remember to take some pics.

In the meantime let us know who's slipping and sliding round your outback.

Avoiding the cold and windy local patch

The Safari is getting fed up with the grim weather, there just seems to be no respite from it...Noah only had to put up with 40 days and 40 nights of rain, we've had six flamin months of the stuff!!! And the wind...did Noah have to suffer howling gales week in week out? Our wildlife garden is beyond battered and bruised as well as mostly underwater, we really hope it recovers.

When news broke of a Common Scoter on Stanley Park lake it gave us the opportunity to get away from the promenade and the worst of the weather, at least there's a bit of shelter in the park. As it happened we bumped into a couple of our neighbours also walking their dog here to escape the weather. T'mutt and old Paddy had a sniff around while we pointed out the Ring Necked Parakeets and Nuthatches to our friends. At the lake we quickly found the Common Scoter but it was a long way off, against the light and asleep, so perhaps not the best thing to show newby wildlifers, it was just a dot in the distance, although a much bigger dot than we normally see through our scope from the prom, and wouldn't have meant much to them - brighty coloured parakeets and Blue Tits crossed with woodpeckers were much more easily appreciated. We left them to their walk while we went to try to get a closer look, or at least a further look but in slightly better light, from the bridges. Still not the best view and it hadn't woken up as you can see.

Good to see a bonus Common Sandpiper too. It was swimming around whilst sleeping and drifted to the front corner of the island so was a little nearer.

We strolled on anticipating it would have woken up by the time we'd done a circuit of the lake. As we crossed the bridge a pair of Great Tits scolded us loudly, they must have had a nest somewhere close by. The roadside path wasn't producing anything much and as we said in our last missive we're not going to take any more shots of Tufted Ducks unless they're engaged in some unusual behaviour, which they weren't today. We hoped to find the Great Crested Grebes engaged in thir weed ddance display but only one was out on thevwater and that was right in the middle. It did catch a decent sized fish but 'processed' and swallowed it facing away from us so no photo...Rude! Passing Heron Island we saw the wind-felled tree and the nest with two youngsters thankfully OK and doing well after the calamity.

Every day out on safari has a soundtrack and today's was Wrens, they were everywhere blasting out their happy little ditty.

Robins, Willow Warblers, Chiffchaffs and Blackcaps provided the accompaniment although all remained unseen or seen only very briefly. The fallen tree in the top corner of the lake held an acrobatic Moorhen - we do like a Moorhen up a tree they just seem so incongruous and ungainly clambering about in the twiggery.

Not jumping just unbalanced, the twigs are too small for its huge feet!

Nearly down now and at least it can grip this thicker branch.

You've got to ask why? It climbed up from the lake shore to about 10 feet then seemed to get vertigo and clambered down as quick as maybe. But what made it go up in the first place, it definitely wasn't looking for food while it was up there - more concentrating on not falling out of the tree. They must just like to go up from time to time to get a different persperctive on their world. 

Continuing further round the lakeside path we came across another showy Wren, most of them were singing from deep cover.

On the remains of the barrier across the lake separating the Conservation Area from the main lake stood two more Common Sandpipers.

Eventually we made our way round the north lake and saw the Common Scoter again at least now it was awake and in abit better light although back on the far side of the island.

Off we went round to the south bank for, hopefully, a better view. On the way we heard a Nuthatch calling loudly from behind the boathouse and went to investigate. We soon saw one go into a hole in a tree and waited for it to come out.

We waited round for it to return which it did a couple of times before coming back once more with a massive bit of stick which, after a good look around to make sure no -one was watching, it took inside.

As for the Common Scoter, yes it was a bit nearer and yes it was awake but the light was still dire.

The following day we decided to avoid the prom again and with some bright sunshine hoped to get better pics of the Common Scoter. We found it straight away, tucked under the overhanging branches fringing the island fast asleep - no chance of a pic! A Cormorant made a nice silhouette against the early morning sunshine.

And today the Great Crested Grebe was a little easier to get a pic of zthough still not perfect nor doig the dance thingy.

We had another look at the Heron chicks in their water-side nest but waited for a pic of one off the adults stood calmly at the water's edge ignoring photographers, dog walkers, joggers etc passing close by.

Today's soundtrack was Blackcaps but they refused to be photographed as we walked along the lakeside to go and have another look at the Nuthatch nest. We stood there for the best part of 20 minutes but not a sniff of a Nuthatch today. The best thing we noticed was a Horse Chestnut sapling growing out of a hole on the truck of a neighbouring Plane tree. We wonder how that's going to turn out in the future.

Wandering on past the boating jetty we noticed a couple of Cormorants enjoying a bit of sunbathing, and why not - the sun has been a rare commodity in recent weeks if not months.

We love the green eye and scaly patern on these prehistoric looking beasts.

Especially when they get a bit closer.

And are very striking in their full breeding attire, the white head feathers we usued to think of as representing the continental subspecies 'sinensis' but this one is difinately 'just' a 'regular' north Atlantic 'carbo'.

As for the Common Scoter? It didn't come out from under the foliage.

With the weather being so bad we've spent quite a bit of time garden watching and had a few unusual sightings to report. First up a Blue Tit on our feeders is a real rarity, no doubt an inordinately common sight in many of our readers' gardens but here not so. Last year we only had 39 sightings of Blue Tits in the garden, that's less than one a week, and normally they're too afraid of the three dozen rumbustuous House Sparrows to go anywhere near the feeders.

An unknown neighbour feeds the local Grey Squirrels a mixture of Hazel nuts, Walnuts and monkey nuts. These get eaten or more often than not stached for later. We've got a couple of Hazel seedlings growing in our borders and one near neighbour has them growing among her pot plants. We regularly get craters dug in the lawn where a Walnut has been buried. We like seeing the squirrels carrying these around - a nut as big as their head!

Over our back fence ther's a pair of Blackbirds nesting and they regularly visit our lawn to forage...too many local lawns are made of lifeless plastic and totally useless to the Blackbirds or indeed anything else. If you're on X (formerly Twitter) have a follow of @ShitLawns. The Blackbirds find worms and sonmetimes what look like leatherjackets (Cranefly larvae) from our lawn but this time the male has found a large slug and spent several minutes wiping across the grass to deslime it, fascinating to watch.

Those three pics were taken through salt-encrusted double glazing so apologies for the lack of quality.

Yesterday we joined the volunteers at Marton Mere again. They were getting a pond ready for a pond dipping event coming up soon so we had our wellies on ready for work.We got stuck in forking pulled reeds and rushes into the wheelbarrow for disposal...it felt like being a teenager on the farm shoveling horse do-doos again...until our back had a little ping and we knew it's been a very long time since we were a teenager! With a big excting safari coming up soon we had to stop work, can't rick a bad back for that. Instead we had a gentle stroll around the reserve to see what we could see and then meet up with the group of volunteers working further on. At first we didn't see much but our ears heard plenty. Our first Reed Warblers of the year, a singing Reed Bunting trying to make itself heard against the strong wind, soundtrack of the day were the numerous Cetti's Warblers and best of all a Grasshopper Warbler which we caught a couple of brief snatches of in the distance when we were sheltered from the wind. In a more sheltered and sunny spot wec saw our second butterfly of the year, a Peacock.

From the scrub came the songs of Chaffinch, Blackcap, Chiffchaff and Willow Warbler. A single Greenfinch sang too.

No Sedge Warblers, Whitethroats or Lesser Whitethroats yet though. Passing the Paddock, looking good after a bit of winter management, we saw our second butterfly of the day another Peacock and then our third, a Small Tortoiseshell. It's great what a bit of warm sunshine can do, but sadly we didn't see many bees or hoverflies on the multitude of Dandelions. 

The gulls began a commotion, but it was 'only' a Buzzard upsetting them not the hoped for Osprey. After having a chat with the other volunteers we continued on our way and out of the reserve and back towards the car. A pair of Linnets by the reserve gate were good to see. Then another species of butterfly, a Speckled Wood which wouldn't settle for a pic. Not far beyond that we heard a Bullfinch call close by and looked up to see a female high in a Willow tree joined by a male a minute later.

The female left while the male flitted about among the twigs but never really showed himself to best advantage.

Ah if only he'd faced the front!

The rest of meander back to the car was uneventful apart from a minor detour to have a look at a couple of ponds - big mistake...t'mutt was in and now stinks of foul pond bottom! 

Another sunny morning saw us back at Stanley park where we bumped into FB who, like us, was on the fingers crossed hunt for Redstarts, Pied Flycatchers and all things migratory and scarce. He hadn't had any joy. He hadn't seen the Common Scoter since yesterday morning either. We aimed for the bridges anyway and thence the roadside of the lake where we hoped the Great Crested Grebes might be performing. At the bridges a couple of Moorhens were squaring up to each other tails aloft and we got thee impression it was going to excalate. We scurried across the bridge hoping to get down the bank where the light would be over our shoulder and the birds more eye-level with us but they couldn't care a jot about our photographic wishes and kicked off big style before we'd crossed the bridge.

Far more serene were the pair of Gadwall at the top end of the lake.

The Great Crested Grebe was out again, right out in the middle of the lake as usual, and the Heron chicks were tucked up deep in the cover on their water level nest so no pics of either of those.

For once we got up close and personal with one of the many Robins. Most camera wielding visitors to the park get excellent Robin shots but for some reason the seem to shy away from us.

We'd not seen any of the Red Eared Terrapins this year until today when we found four. A bigish one, two medium sized ones and this one a real monster about the size of a dinner plate!

With nothing happening at the Nuthatch nest again it was time to head back to base camp and a well earned cuppa.

That's all folks...sure we've heard that somewhere before

 

Where to next? We've got a more distant safari coming up soon.

In the meantime let us know who's doing all the kicking off in your outback.