Me again

Hello, remember me? Not really been out and about chasing wildlife as much as usual of late, and so haven't had much to tell you about. Add that to the fact when I get home I generally just fall asleep, what I have had to tell you never quite made it online.

I went to Dorset a couple of weeks ago with my mum, and it was pretty good really. Didn't do much birding to speak of, but we did walk from Swanage to Corfe along that big Chalkhill ridge which eventually turns into Old Harry Rocks/ the Needles.

Corfe Castle is a bit cool really...

Poole Harbour as seen from just outside Swanage.

There were a fair few swallows and martins zipping around the fields as we walked along. Plenty of stonechats and many other birds that I didn't stop for long enough to identify. Dorset also has big flocks of rooks/jackdaws, all of which seemed to take off in the air simultaneously at one point. Pretty impressive if slightly scary thing to witness... From being at such a relatively high vantage point we were able to see loads of kestrels, sparrowhawks and peregrines hunting below us. Oh and this guy sitting in a tree being very vocal.

Rargh I am loud Buzzard

On setting out on our walk, mum mentioned that she never really saw any butterflies anywhere anymore. Just to prove her wrong, I had a ridiculously productive lepidopterrific walk, especially considering that I didn't even have my book with me. Large white, small white, green-veined white, speckled wood, painted lady, gatekeeper and peacock butterflies made welcome usual appearances, but there were also hundreds of small heaths flitting around our feet, and loads of different blue butterflies that I couldn't really tell apart on my own.

Butterflies everywhere...

Small heath really are very very small...

Most exciting of all was one particularly pretty bright blue butterfly that was very obliging when I pointed my camera at it. I later checked it out in my book and am pretty certain it's an Adonis Blue. Now this is a pretty rare spot but everything seems to add up. The black marks around the edge of the wings together with the underwing pattern don't really point to anything else, plus the shade of blue is completely different to the usual purplish-hues of common blues. Plus the habitat requirement "short herb-rich turf on sunny south-facing downland slopes", with a distribution limited to pockets of south central England. Awesome.

Adonis Blue being very blue and adonis-like

We were a bit tired after our walk and big ploughmans pub lunch, so just took the train back home :)

Local birding again

Mostly as a result of not being motivated enough to head any further afield after some hula-related drunkeness the day before, me and the man ended up at Rainham on Sunday for a very pleasant if not particularly productive few hours.

Wennington marshes

We started off at the other entrance to the reserve near the tip, as I've never been there before. There are some brilliant views across the Thames and across Aveley Pools. Other than the unsuprising smellyness, this area of the marshes is really interesting and has such a great variety of wildflowers considering it's only been developed over the past few years (enough to warrant me needing to buy a ID book now). Some more gorse bushes are needed, and then it'll be full of dartford warblers :)

Of course, to keep up with my recent habits of completely neglecting to take any bird photos in favour of lots of invertebrates, here are my efforts from Sunday. Suddenly the gatekeepers are out and about, and we also spotted some small heaths, peacocks, commas, ringlets, large, small and green veined white, a couple of different types of skipper and loads of cinnabar moth caterpillars on ragwort. Quite pleased with some of the photos :)

Peacock butterfly

Large white butterfly

Gatekeeper butterfly

Comma butterfly

Common darter (common but still pretty awesome)

In other news, The Man saw a quail on the road towards my village yesterday. I didn't. I think I was probably too busy telling a Very Important Story about something, while trying to avoid all of the suicidal wood pigeons and collared doves that like to fly at my car. Anyway, that's another one for me to have to keep up with on my year list. Also, the field in my BTO survey area that was full of butterflies and yelllowhammers was completely cut down a few days ago, and I haven't seen the yellowhammer since. Never really sure why they do this so early in the year, as I dread to think how many caterpillars were harvested along with the crop... Oh well it was nice while it lasted.

Sunday sunset- been plenty of good ones lately but this is the first one I've got on camera.

off to the woods

I meant to make a post at some point in the week, but seemed to be busy every evening as tends to happen. The boy and I were hoping to go out for a walk somewhere today, but am currently waiting for the rain to subside. It means I get to catch up with some blogging though, so lucky you :P

Last weekend we went for a walk in the woods at South Weald, hoping to find some bluebells and possibly some black kites (maybe a bit hopeful there)...

Said hi to the chav deer before heading around the lake at South Weald and away from the 25493 other people that seem to accumulate around the car park. Weird group of deer, as they've been penned in as part of the original group of the estate, but must be sooo inbred by now. Can't say they're the finest specimens but nice for people to see I suppose.

I think I can safely say that the bluebell mission for this spring has been safely achieved... Very pretty stuff and I've even thrown in a bonus caterpillar there for your perusal (identifications please :) )

Must head off, the sun is beginning to poke out through the clouds and boy is looking a bit bored...

Of birds and butterflies

So Norfolk is quite good isn't it?


We saw loads of stuff, including some life firsts (bearded tits, long tailed duck, bittern, various warblers, and a certain amazing bird of prey) , but just as impressive as the fact that Norfolk has so many birds that you practically trip over them, we also racked up an impressive mammal and butterfly list. So in light of the fact we found a veritable shitload of biodiversity, here are some very edited highlights...

orange tip butterfly

speckled wood butterfly

a common cockchafer, which seemed to not be very good at staying the right way up

early purple orchid? (maiden is welcome to correct me on this )

A muntjac that lept in front of our car

An obvious highlight of our Norfolk trip was a boat trip to Blakeney Point, and saw plenty of common seals, a grey seal, all four tern species, piles of oystercatcher and more suprisingly brent geese, and a sing female long tailed duck flying over our heads and landing on the water as we landed on the shore.

Common seal trying not to float away apparently

four sandwich terns (copyright Parus for this one)

One of the most entertaining birds we saw wasn't massively rare, but was absolutely stunning. I think Parus has a video of this sedge warbler somewhere, I'm hoping that he will be putting it up for us to share :)

sedge warblers are awesome :)

Other highlights included barn owls and tawny owls keeping us up in the night, loads of cuckoos, bearded tits pinging over the reeds at Titchwell, a little ringed plover at Cley, and a bittern flying out of the reeds at Lakenheath on the way home.

This is the best barn owl picture I have out of about 20. Oh well :)

ahh, East Anglia how I love thee...

I am sure we will be visiting again in the not too distant future, and camping was good fun. As long as we don't have a screaming 18 month old in the tent next time I'm definitely up for a revisit.

One day I might tell you about how I lost my mobile phone somewhere in a forest for a day, and the adventure we went on to recover it...