Wednesday 19 July 2017

19th July

Perfect conditions on Saturday night meant it was a record-breaking moth catch in the Magic Garden. We caught a total of 876 moths of 115 species (plus six still to be identified/confirmed with the county recorder). This included 14 new species for the parish including this rather worn Blackneck…

Pebble Hook-tip…

Iron Prominent…


Southern Wainscot (a good record for this area and reflection of placing a trap near the reed bed)…


Note the John McEnroe headband!
And this locally rare micro Rose Tortrix…


Together with the strikingly named Dotted Oak Knot Horn, Summer Rose Bell, Two-coloured Bell, Brown Elm Bell, Spruce Bud, Purple Argent, Poplar Cosmet, Small China Mark and Hawthorn Ermel.   
It’s not been a bad few days for birds either. Chris Knight rang me to say he was listening to a Quail by The New Inn. I dashed round to hear at least one calling from a cornfield by the road.

John and Ann from Langlands then rang to say they had seen a Red Kite on the farm. I dashed down but no sign (although there were seven Curlew and three Oystercatcher here).


Then a couple of days later a villager said he had seen what he thought was a kite near the solar farm. Another fruitless search but as I was looking I got a call from a couple of friends who were watching it circling over Thrintoft! To rub it in even further my wife and son spotted the bird down Back Lane and had excellent views of it circling low over the fields here yesterday.
My only compensation was in looking for the kite I stumbled across a Hobby hunting in the fields to the east of the church. It gave excellent views, at one point even turning over on to its back as it stooped after a Swallow.  

I’ve had to go in for an emergency operation for a torn retina this week so not sure how long until I can use binoculars/camera again so might be a gap to my next blog. 

Thursday 13 July 2017

13th July

The only ‘guaranteed’ bird I hadn’t seen this year was Spotted Flycatcher so when Jim and Sue rang to say they had one in their garden I shot round. There was no sign but after a slightly nervous wait it reappeared…



It was later seen singing in a tree in the rectory garden. This is my 100th species of the year – well behind last year (mainly reflecting the drying up/draining of the remaining wader habitat in the parish).

On Tuesday evening the Magic Garden was alive with Willow/Chiffs and I counted at least 20 very actively feeding in the trees around the lake. I presume these were migrants passing through and yesterday evening I only found a single bird.


More surprisingly I had a singing Reed Warbler. Was this a bird singing on passage or the one from earlier in the year?
Talking of warblers we have now received details of the French-ringed Blackcap trapped in the Garden in May. It was caught in October 2016 in Villeton, a small community in south-west France down towards the Pyrenees. 

Insects continue to fascinate/frustrate but here’s a couple of identifiable hoverflies. Great Pied or Pellucid…


And Episyrphus baltreatus…



Sunday 9 July 2017

8th July

It’s inevitable when you are known as 'the birdman' that you get calls at this time of year. Last night it was a friend in the village ringing about a young Swift that had fallen down their drainpipe. I’ve never seen Swift in the hand before…


We tried relaunching it a couple of times but it wasn’t quite developed enough to take flight so we ended up fetching a ladder from the church and heroically Tracey, who has no head for heights, slipped it back in to the nest…


Then last week there was an envelope slipped through the door containing this…


This Treecreeper had flown into a neighbour’s window. It’s doubly unfortunate because they are so scarce in the parish these days (although I did see one in the Magic Garden today and another prospecting the lime trees on the village green).
The week before that it was the guitar group knocking to say one of the young Swallows had fallen out of its nest in the church porch. I only had a pair of step ladders but thanks to a particularly tall member of the group we were able to put this back too and it has now happily fledged.

There seems to be the first early signs of birds on the move this week. I added Hobby to the year list and a Yellow Wagtail and a small group of Curlew flew high over the Magic Garden. Four Oystercatcher flew over the house and I had a brief glimpse of a chat down Back Lane today, most likely a young Stonechat. There were also four young Yellow Wagtails along the lane.

It’s been a productive week on the dragonfly front too adding Southern Hawker, Common Darter…


Common Blue Damselfly and this ovipositing Emperor to the year list ….


All of these were in the Magic Garden.