Wren's Nature Notebook

Birds and other beasties at Rodden Nature Reserve

2011-08-04T15:03:00.011+01:00

This is the first year that I've been able to get proof of breeding for our pair of Reed Buntings at the Reserve. This male was in the process of feeding the young bird with its back to the camera. It's a shame I didn't get a decent shot of the actual feeding, but you can't have it all!

Here's the young bird waiting for some more food to be brought!
Another bird I was pleased to get proof of breeding for is the Winter Wren. This is the only wren we get in Britain and it is widespread and common. There were 5 young birds waiting for their parents to bring food to them. I managed to get three in one photo in the end.

If you enlarge the photos, you can still see the fluffy tufts on their heads and the baby gape is still evident.

Another young bird I managed to capture was this Blue Tit. It's the same bird in both photographs but you can see the young Blue Tit plumage better in the second photo.

We have sheets of corregated iron put down in various places around the Reserve and I always take a peek underneath to see what is about. Here is a Short-tailed Vole (probably the most common mammal on our Reserve). You can see the reason for its name in this photo!

Last but not least, is this Common Toad under one of the iron sheets, which also seem to be doing well on our Reserve.

There'll be more from Rodden Reserve soon.

July at Rodden Nature Reserve - Bugs!

2011-07-27T19:43:00.016+01:00

I spent a few hours on several days during July walking around my local nature reserve, primarily to try and prove breeding for certain species before the BTO Bird Atlas finishes at the end of this month. While there I took photos of anything else that caught my eye. This first post will be about bugs! Below is the female Oedemera nobilis (the males have obvious swollen hinds legs).

We have some Ragwort on the reserve, the flowers of which have been strimmed off as we're adjacent to some farmland with cows grazing and Ragwort is poisonous to livestock. Ragwort is the food plant for the striking Cinnabar Moth caterpillar.
This deadly looking beastie is an Ichneuman fly (a parasitic fly). I can't give a definite ID as there are many many of these!

Below is a Meadow Grasshopper which is a widespread species throughout much of Great Britain.

I've not had a chance this year to photograph many Damselflies, so this Blue-tailed male was a welcome find.

This lovely golden Bumblebee is Bombus lucorum.

This white Crab spider isn't on the best flower for camouflage!

This Leafhopper is tiny (about 3mm long). They proved to be very camera shy, but I persevered as I wanted to try and capture those stunning colours!

Here's a lovely iridescent Mint beetle, not surprisingly on some Water mint!

I'd been told by Bryan Pinchen, the entomologist doing yearly surveys on our Reserve that he had seen Roesel's Bush Cricket on his last visit. So, as I'd never seen one before, I went down to try and get some photos. With some patience I managed to get a couple of shots.

Sometimes it's best to just sit for a while and see what comes into view. I spent an amusing 5 minutes watching and photographing this Soldier beetle (Rhagonycha fulva) as it tried to get on top of this flower, it's antennae waving madly about. It just goes to show that there are no colour clashes in nature!

There'll be more from Rodden Reserve shortly.

Hare raising encounter!

2011-07-03T16:33:00.010+01:00

Hello blogger friends. I'm hoping to make a return to blogland and thought I'd start up again with this magical encounter I had the other day while walking one of my bird surveys for the Bristish Trust for Ornithology. I noticed this young hare about 100 yards away down the track and fully expected him to disappear into the undergrowth. I took a quick photo, but then to my amazement, it started running towards me, stopping every few steps. So, I contintued to take photos with my 70-300 ml lens until it was just too close! When I lowered my camera, it was sitting in front of me, just 3-4 feet away! Needless to say, I had a big grin on my face for the rest of the survey! (-:

I'll hope to post another blog again soon! (-:

Cornish trip - Porthgwarra and other places! - part 1

2011-01-30T17:35:00.020Z

Well, it's been a while!

The other weekend I was invited to spend a few days birding in Cornwall by one of my best birding friends Jane (she'd got a freebee holiday (3 nights) from her sister for Christmas).

This first of three posts isn't in chronological order, just how the photos went together! (-:

Jane and I both love sea-watching (it's an acquired taste) and one of the best known places for this is at Porthgwarra on the extreme south western tip of Cornwall. The wind direction for sea-watching was probably the worst possible on this day, but that didn't really matter as it was a gorgeous blue sky day, if a bit chilly! Below shows a photo of Jane finding a comfortable position (we were here for an hour or two).

Before I carry on with Porthgwarra in this post. Jane and I were lucky enough to come across some Chough during this trip. Chough used to breed in Cornwall a long time ago before dying out, but just a few years ago they recolonised naturally from the continent and are here in small numbers. I can't reveal where we saw these birds, but it's safe to say that we were chuffed to see Choughs making a comeback! These two were happily digging away for grubs in the grass and then lifted off playfully (it seemed) to perform some aerial acrobatics.
I managed to snatch a couple of photos while they were flying above us. Their bright red slightly decurved bill and red legs can just been seen in these photos.
They also have a beautiful 'chow chow' cry which fits perfectly with their rugged clifftop existence! Beautiful birds!
Back at Porthgwarra and I left Jane to her sea-watching to wander along the cliffs to see what took my eye. I was in the mood to click with my camera! I loved the colours and textures of the cool sea and hot baked lichen on the cracked rocks in this shot (though it wasn't exactly hot on this day)!
I could never be bored watching a relentless sea crashing against immovable rocks. I could have sat watching this all day I think!

However, birds did 'call' to me after a while and I practised my actions shots on these Fulmars that were checking out the cliff face for suitable nesting sites.

They are such distinctive birds in flight with their stiff wing beats and are masters of the air. They are the closest we get to the Albatross in this country as they're part of the 'tubenose' family of seabirds.

As I make my way back to where Jane is still sea-watching (she likes to count when she's birding), I pass the coast guards house. What an amazing view from your workplace!!! (-:

There were some wonderful rock formations here. I'm not sure the camera does justice to this stunning scenery!

There'll be more from Cornwall in my next post...oh, and it's nice to be back! (-:

Apology!

2011-01-07T19:42:00.002Z

Dear blogging friends. I just thought I'd better write a short note to apologise for the lack of posting recently. I think I've just needed a break from blogging. I hope to be back sometime soon. In the meantime, here is a photo taken back in November when Chris and I spent a couple of days down at Exmouth.

Happy New Year to you all!

Odds and ends from Norfolk

2010-11-27T12:43:00.017Z

Well, I seem to be apologising quite a bit recently for not keeping up with my blog posts. So, I'm sorry this has taken so long to get here. I think I've fallen off the edge of the blogging world at the moment! Here are some 'odds and ends' photos from my trip to Norfolk back in October. We were staying at a small town called Hunstanton on the North Norfolk coast. This is just about the only place along the coast in this part of the country that has cliffs.

We spent one day birding inland at a place called Sculthorpe. It's a nature reserve run by the Hawk and Owl Trust which has a mix of deciduous woodland and reedbeds.
I didn't get many photos of birds here, but found some other things to point my camera at! Below, some lovely peeling birch bark.

Common Darters are one of the latest flying of our Dragonflies. Here is a male basking in some sunshine on the broadwalk railings.

And the female doing the same not far away.

There are some nice fungi in the wood here. I took a couple of photos of ones I could see from the broadwalk.

From one of the hides, we waited patiently for this shy Water Rail to emerge from the reeds to feed on dropped seeds from the feeders above.

A windmill at Waxham on the east coast side of this large county.

One day we were lucky to be in the right place at the right time to experience a flock of 30 Bohemian Waxwings. It was right at the end of the day though so unfortunately the light was absolutely terrible for photography. However, it was lovely to stand just a few yards away from these beautiful birds as they communicated to one another with their amazing trilling call.

Right towards the end of our holiday, we stopped in at a Farm Shop that we'd passed several times during the week. They had a great selection of Apples and Pears as well as other seasonal vegetables and home made cakes etc.

I'll finish with a sunset at Warham on the coast. This is a great place for roosting raptors and owls. We spent a couple of evenings here watching Hen Harriers, Marsh Harriers, Merlins and Short-eared Owls.

Hope to be back blogging properly sooner or later.....maybe later! (-:

Thornham, North Norfolk coast

2010-11-08T20:18:00.014Z

Sorry this has taken so long to get online, I've been caught up with other 'stuff'.

The small village of Thornham on the north Norfolk coast is one of my favourite places to visit, mainly for it's quietness and sense of being unchanged. I always seem to be here when the tide is right out (the sea is out there somewhere in the distance!) (-: This exposes a lot of muddy gullys for waders (shorebirds) to feed in.

It was quite a gloomy day with the occasional fleeting flash of sun between the brooding clouds.
Some of those sunrays seemed to shine on down towards the church in this photo below making for a lovely atmospheric shot.
It was that lush green field that Jane, Sue and I spent some time watching, attempting to identify a small flock of birds as Lapland Buntings or Lapland Longspurs as they are called in the States (a bird we all needed for our year lists). This flock of about 30-40 birds would occasionally get up from the field, fly around and around, this way and that for a bit and then descend back into the oblivion of longish grass! Very VERY frustrating! I've not seen or heard enough Lapland Buntings to be familiar with their call, but I tried to memorise it and promised myself, that when I got back home, I would check it out. Needless to say, when I played back the call, I just couldn't say for sure that it was what I'd heard that day. So, they didn't go on the list. Shame.

After our failed attempt with the Buntings, I consoled myself with taking photos of some waders. This Redshank was feeding close by in one of the exposed gullys. As you can see, its shanks were no longer quite so red!

Black-tailed Godwits are very similar to Bar-tailed Godwits, but have subtle differences. These two photos below are of a Black-tailed Godwit. The bill is straighter than the slightly upcurved bill of a Bar-tailed and the winter plumage on the back of the Black-tailed is plainer than on the slightly spangled back of the Bar-tailed. The Black-tailed also has slightly longer legs than Bar-tailed (a stumpy looking bird), though this is less noticeable in the first photo .

Man, that mud looks gloopy!

The next four photos were captured using the continuous shooting mode on the camera. This Curlew fancied a stretch!

The light was going fast and so we made our way back to the car. On the way back I snapped a shot of this Dunlin in winter plumage wading around in the river close the car (I think the tide was beginning to come in).

My last shot from Thornham is of boats waiting for that incoming tide.

Hopefully, it wont be such a long wait for my next post! (-:

Titchwell RSPB, Norfolk

2010-11-01T22:56:00.014Z

Titchwell RSPB reserve is another 'must see' place to bird when visiting the north Norfolk coast. It has a variety of habitats which is always going to attract a proportionate variety of birds. There's some woodland as well as reedbeds, freshwater marsh, saltwater marsh and also the beach and the sea. For more information on this popular reserve click on the link above. Titchwell reserve is definitely a place that warrants the use of a scope, so maybe you can picture me (5ft 1" )juggling with a scope, bins, and two cameras! (-: In this photo, you can see the legs of my scope getting in the way of my shot (I guess I should've taken the time to put it down, but at the time, I was on a mission to get to the beach)!

The blue sky reflected beautifully onto the freshwater marsh which made the sandy tufty islands and banks really stand out in contrast.

Some, but not enough of the waders were reasonably close. This Redshank was obliging enough.

The calm day made for some nice reflections.

Here it's showing off the reason for its name! A common but very smart looking bird.

I enjoyed this Eurasian Teal with the early morning sun showing up his rich chestnut and teal green face. I also loved the patterns in the water here.

As he swam away from me, he made interesting textures in the water.

Here, showing the sun on that bright emerald green speculum.

One of the great sights and sounds I associate with Norfolk is the geese spectacle. Most of my previous trips here have been in the winter (February) when the geese are at their peak (in their thousands). In October they were just beginning to build up numbers and it was great to see this visible build up as the week went on. Below are a few Brent Geese flying over Titchwell reserve with their abrupt brrrrrup type call.

I finally made it out to the beach ( a good 20 minute brisk walk) and settled down with a few other birders to scan out to sea as well as pick off the names of waders feeding on the tideline. These included Oystercatchers, Dunlin, Turnstones, Sanderling, Bar-tailed Godwits, Curlew and Grey Plover (Black-bellied US)

Only one species of wader ventured further away from the tideline and closer to us. It was great fun to watch these Sanderling 'working' the soft sand here. Running along in their peculiar but endearing clockwork toy style. (One of my friends remarked that when there's a good bird to go for, I resemble a Sanderling somewhat! Hmmmm!) (-:

You can see in both of these photos, adult winter birds (very pale) and beautifully patterned juveniles.

I'll have more from Norfolk in the next post.

Birding in Norfolk - Cley next the sea

2010-10-29T16:38:00.014+01:00

I've just come back from a week birding with friends in the county of Norfolk on the east side of England. The north Norfolk coast is without doubt, one of the best birding areas in the country (click the link for more info). There's also a video by Chris Packham one of our best television naturalists talking about birding in Norfolk here. I hope my blogging friends abroad are able to watch this!

The first of my posts is about birding at Cley next the Sea. Cley NWT is the oldest wildlife trust reserve in the country that, as well as hosting exciting resident species of birds, tends to draw in rarer species too. It's also a great place for a spot of seawatching if the winds are right. You want a north or north-easterly ideally. On this occasion below, the winds had moved round to north-westerlies, not ideal but we still managed to see flocks of male and female Common Scoter (Black Scoter US), juv Northern Gannets, Brent Geese and beautiful male Common Eiders. The jewel in the crown though was a close Little Auk sitting on the sea. Absolutely gorgeous!

Whilst seawatching from Cley beach (pronounced Cleye) I was eyed up by this opportunistic Black-headed Gull (in winter plumage). It was obviously after an easy meal.....
....and when it hopped off its rocky perch to the shingle beach to approach me, the NW wind got its feathers in a twist. Unfortunately I didn't have any food on me!

After our seawatch we walked back inland along the 'east bank' of Cley reserve. Here I found a Little Egret feeding in the shallows......

....but not for long as it got spooked and flew off to find a quieter place.

Considering the strength of the wind, I was amazed to first hear (a distinctive 'ping' 'ping' like flicking a rubber band) and then see some Bearded Tits in the reeds as we walked the East bank. Beardies are notorious for not showing in windy weather, so I was chuffed to get some shots of this male even though they're not sharp.

I put this photo in because I liked they way these distant Bearded Tits in flight are all together in their flight action. Like mini ginger torpedos!

This next shot was taken with my Canon G10 through my scope. I'm not set up properly for digiscoping, but I sometimes like to give it a go to see what results I can get. These Curlew Sandpipers were way too distant for my Nikon zoom lens, but are passably ok digiscoped. They are similar looking to Dunlin, but have subtle differences, being slightly larger and more 'clean' looking with that more prominent supercilium and slightly longer decurved bill.

Here's another digiscoping effort. We were lucky to see some Shorelarks (Horned Larks) feeding quietly on the sandy bank amongst the weeds. The best chance I ever get to see these birds in Britain is here on the north Norfolk coast and they are by no means a given.

I'll end this post from Cley next the sea with another photo of us seawatching. I love those clouds marching across the sky! (-:

On another day later in the week, the winds turned round to the north again and we had a much better if more uncomfortable seawatch at Cley with 3 species of Skua (Jaegers), Great, Arctic and Pomerine. Also Red-throated and Black-throated Divers (Loons), Slavonian Grebe, Kittiwakes and lots more Common Scoters and Razorbills.

There'll be more from Norfolk shortly.

Odds and Ends at Rodden Reserve

2010-10-04T20:28:00.013+01:00

Here's the last of three posts from Rodden Reserve. Sorry it's taken longer to get this one up, but life outside blogging sometimes gets in the way!

I just loved this autumnal tangle.

If you saw someone wearing these colours together, you might think....hmmmm....interesting combo, but there's no such thing as colour clashing in nature I think. A last Buddleia flower with Rosehips behind.
Fly on white flower.

Fragrant wild Honeysuckle still in flower.

A view of the Mill House with the usual distant Grey Heron and some Canada Geese.

Lush Rosehips still hard looking and crispy before any hard frosts yet.

Now I paid a high price for this particular shot. It was early morning and the dew was clinging closely to the seedhead in the centre and I wanted to get down low for my shot. So I sat down on the path without looking behind me and promtly stood up again. I'd sat slap bang on the middle of a stinging nettle plant! I was still feeling it that evening! (o:

Of course, I then managed to find another plant very similar without a neighbouring stinging nettle thank goodness!

The startling pink of Euonymous europeas hit me between the eyes as I walked round. In a few days time this will be even more of a dazzling show as the bright orange seeds peep out from their pink pillows!

An autumn post wouldn't be right without a shot of ripening Hazelnuts. I'm sure the squirrels will make short work of these.

In Britian, Privet is so often used as hedging and is generally clipped and sheared to uniform shapes, but on the reserve, we get to see this unassuming plant as it is meant to be with its plump black berries at this time of year. I'm sure these will be snapped up shortly too!

That's all for now from Rodden Reserve.

Birds and Bugs bonanza!

2010-09-28T19:46:00.016+01:00

This post concentrates on the birds and bugs that I found on my walks around Rodden Reserve. An obliging Tortoiseshell sits on one of our signs.

I think I shall feint if I ever get close enough to get a decent photo of these resident Grey Herons before they get spooked! First one and then the second took off to settle on a quieter part of the reserve.
I think there must've been some aphids on this rose as there were three Blue Tits feeding together. I only managed to snap one of them though.

Long-tailed Tits tend to fly around in quite large parties at this time of year and I had a flock fly through quite close while I was standing in one of my favourite spots on the reserve.

In the same area, I also had about 8-10 warblers pass through too. From the calls, I think most of them were Chiffchaffs. As I was standing there, all of a sudden there were lots of alarm calls and a Sparrowhawk swooped into a nearby tree. It gave me a fierce glare for a second before dashing off again. I didn't have time to get my camera up unfortunately. As a consequence, all the small birds that had been busy around me had shut up and completely gone to ground.

I often see Common Buzzards at the reserve. I'm sure they must nest somewhere close by. I love their wild cry.

On to the bugs. This is a Long-winged Conehead with it's amazingly long antennae. It's also a female with that long ovipositor.

I was pleased to find this Southern Hawker still patrolling his chosen area of pond.

A common Garden Spider (Areneus diadematus) just wrapping up something tasty for breakfast! They are easily recognised by the white cross on their back. Another name for it is Cross Spider.

I don't know which spider this is, but it had an impressive web which showed up well due to the dew!

There was still the odd plant flowering on the reserve and this Small Copper was taking advantage of that fact. They are one of my favourite butterflies. Always looking so neat and vibrant.

Lastly, this is what I would call a 'des res' (desirable residence). I can't help but think this Ladybird is checking it out as a place to settle down for the winter months. This is the seedhead of the wild Carrot which makes a distinctive concave nest of seeds.

I'll have one more post about my walks around Rodden Reserve.

A surfeit of seedheads!

2010-09-25T18:03:00.017+01:00

I've had another round of walks around my local nature reserve on the outskirts of Frome. Here's a link to our website if you have time for a quick look. I was in the mood for some macros, although not all these were taken with my macro lens. I also used my 70-300ml lens. As I walked around, nature's way of preparing for the following year was most obvious. So, this particular post is saturated with seeds and seedheads! (-:

Ash Keys

I'm not sure what this flower is, but I loved the rich gold colour of the seeds.

The Purple Loosetrife has now faded from it's vivid colour of summer to this more muted and soft pink/brown.

Rosebay Willowherb, often called Fireweed as it quickly colonises ground cleared by fire.

The seedheads split to reveal the plumed seeds.

This is some sort of Thistle or Knapweed seedhead, maybe someone out there can tell me which? The early morning dew is clinging to the fluffy seeds.

This below is some sort of Sorrel. It never fails to make a russet show at this time of year.

A close up of the seeds.

More Thistle type seedheads.

A lovely graceful grass with the early morning light shining through.

The bold seeds of Yellow flag iris.

The next two shots are specially for my friend Evie as I know they're one of her favourites! (-:

Teasel makes up for being somewhat insignificant looking during it's flowering period with it's beautiful (and bountiful for birds) seedheads which stand out during autumn and winter.

The next couple of posts will show what else I saw whilst walking around the reserve.

A day at Slimbridge WWT

2010-09-20T19:56:00.022+01:00

A couple of weekends ago I went with two of my birding friends to Slimbridge Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust . This reserve lies on the banks of the River Severn about 90 minutes north of Frome. For more information on the reserve you can click on the link. To be honest, it's not somewhere I go to often. It's not cheap to get in and also most of what is there are collections of wildfowl from around the world, interesting but not wild.

There are parts of the reserve that are set up for watching wild birds though and there happened to be two or three good year ticks here. This (below) is the view from the Zeiss hide. If you click to enlarge this photo, you will see more clearly the River Severn in the background and beyond that, Wales. From here we watched an energetic Red necked Phalarope, spinning and twisting after food on the water (when are they ever not energetic!) (-: This is a bird that I certainly don't get to see every year, so was a real treat. We also picked up Curlew Sandpipers, Spotted Redshanks and Little Stints, all good yearbird waders (shorebirds).
It's hard to walk around Slimbridge and not take the opportunity for photos of exotic birds! Flamingos are certainly birds that I'm not going to see anytime soon away from Slimbridge!

They're amazing looking birds. It would be great to see them in their natural habitat sometime!

On the other hand, Common Crane is a bird that I can get to see in Britain, usually in just one area of Norfolk on the eastern side of Britain. At present, Slimbridge are in the process of rearing young Common Cranes with a view to releasing them into the wild somewhere on the Somerset Levels, which is an exciting prospect as that is very local to me!

I took these photos through a wired fence into the rearing compound and unfortunately never got a good shot of the whole bird.

My mind was mostly on birds on this day, but I did notice someone else taking a photo of this clump of fungi. It looks like some sort of Fairy city to me! (-:

Here are some more of the exotic wildfowl in the collection here. This is a very pretty female Mandarin Duck. They have successfully maintained a feral population in Britain and I've actually seen them on the River Churn at the bottom of my Mum's garden in the Cotwolds.

I took this photo just a little too late. These three ducks (not sure what type they are) were all upright and alert and looked just like the duck equivalent of Meerkats! The one of the left just started to move at I took my shot which is a shame.

I should've been more attentive as to names for some of these wildfowl, so I don't know what this goose is called (white headed something or other), but I liked they way it kept straining up to reach this twig. Not sure what it was after!

They also have a compound with Otters here. These photos were taken behind glass or perspex so arn't entirely sharp. It was lovely to have the opportunity to watch these beautiful creatures up close as they twisted and writhed in the water after a giant cube of frozen fish was chucked in there for their lunch.

This Moorhen is a wild bird that has become pretty much used to close human activity so I was able to get reasonably close to take a couple of shots.

My favourite subject of the day though has to be this Moorhen chick. Look at the feet on this fluffball! It posed beautifully for me, first to the left....

.......have a preen.....

......preen the other side....

.......and face right. So sweet! Have a good life matey!

We had a good day here and it was well worth the entrance fee!

Rodden rambles - part three

2010-09-02T20:08:00.014+01:00

For the final set of photos from Rodden reserve (for now), I thought I'd start off with the ubiquitous Purple Loosetrife photo (-: It really is a lovely sight at this time of year.

Common Blues seem to be plentiful over there at the moment. This one is feeding on water mint along with some type of Bumble Bee, not sure which as there are a couple of similar species!

I was walking along the path to check one of our mammal areas (corrugated iron sheets that small mammals love to stay under to get warmth) when I became aware of this female pheasant hunkered down on the path ahead of me. I stopped still and took a couple of shots of her before slowing retreating to leave her in peace.

A sign of summer being over, lovely bare teasel heads!

While walking round, I heard the unmistakable loud 'chip' of a Great Spotted Woodpecker. He landed on a dead tree ahead of me and I got off a few shots as he was busy having a preen.

A slightly faded looking small copper on this dead thistle head made for an autumnal shot.

And as it's now September and officially autumn in my book, I'll finish this set of posts with some lovely autumn fruits, sloes and blackberries.

Thank you all for coming along on my Rodden rambles. (-:

Rodden Rambles - part two

2010-08-31T19:20:00.013+01:00

When I first started coming to Rodden Reserve a few years ago, it was still quite a newly made reserve by the supermarket Asda as mitigation for building on a wet meadow area. All the paths were pristine gravel and the bridges brash new wood. I'm pleased to say that now the paths have 'weathered in' beautifully as have the bridges. The Purple Loosetrife helps soften the bridge here I think.

Here's my obliging Migrant Hawker. I had to wade through some foliage to get close to him, but he posed well both at rest and in the air.
I'd have liked to use this photo for my header but the background looked too messy when I tried it.

This one was taken while it was hovering against one of the bridges around the reserve.

I put this distant photo of these Blue-tailed Damselflies in because I'd never before witnessed two males trying to mate with a female at the same time. The one trying to muscle in had to give up in the end.

There are a couple of Grey Herons that use the ponds on the reserve and they always spook very easily. I had to do a lot of creeping to snap this sneaky shot through the foliage!

I know in my previous post, I said that I'd keep the Purple Loosetrife photos to one per post, but I'm not counting the one by the bridge. So here's the official one! (-:

Now on the whole I'd consider myself to be what I'd call a sociable birder. I like to share birding experiences with other like minded people. Sometimes though, there are advantages to going out on my own. On one of my morning walks around the reserve, I knew there were a couple of Sedge Warblers flitting about in the reeds and sedges that surround the main lake. So I stood in one of my favourite spots.....and stood.......and waited, watching subtle twitches of leaves, knowing those small skulking birds were just out of my sight. After about an hour of standing there with the occasional brief glimpse, I was able to take a few quick shots. In the one below, a spider was having a bad day!

'Clocked' again!

This one is just making a dive for cover so I left them in peace and carried on my walk.

I'll finish off my Rodden rambles in the next post.

Rodden rambles - part 1

2010-08-29T18:35:00.013+01:00

Over the last week or so I've managed to snatch an hour or two at my local Rodden Reserve. Here are some of the sights I've seen while wandering around. The Mill House always seems to nestle nicely along the River Frome which runs along our reserve here. If I lived there, I'd be sitting in that overlook area all day!

They say that women are good at multi-tasking, well this photo of a Common Blue was taken one handed while I was on the phone to my eldest brother trying to organise a birthday get together! Actually I'm amazed it came out at all! (-:
One of my walks was made early in the morning and this Common Blue female was just getting heated up by the sun, ready to unfurl for the day.

I don't know what this plant is, but the sunlight coming through those ping pong ball flower heads was lovely.

The Purple Loosetrife is irresistible at this time of year, I've relegated myself to one photo per post though! (-:

On one of the mornings I had a mini fall of warblers flitting through the foliage close to me. There were Willow Warbler (below), Blackcaps and Chiffchaffs.

This Chiffchaff (below) had obviously 'clocked' me, but carried on gleaning in the undergrowth despite my clicking camera!

Again, an unknown plant, but I liked how it looked with the strata of Purple Loosetrife in the background.

There'll be more from Rodden shortly...

See a rainbow....

2010-08-25T19:51:00.007+01:00

Red

and Yellow
and Pink and Green

Orange

and Purple

and Blue!

These images were taken on a couple of walks around my local Rodden Reserve just outside Frome. I was inspired by Mary as she is colour co-ordinating her posts at the moment! (-:

Thanks Mary. There will more images from Rodden Reserve to come.

Butterflies on Buddleia and a Blackcap.

2010-08-22T18:47:00.017+01:00

Here are some beautiful butterflies that were feasting on Mum's Buddleia as well as the Hummingbird Hawkmoth (featured in the previous post). The Peacock is one of our biggest butterflies and so showy. Each time I looked they seem to have multiplied. First one.....

...then two.....
.....then four! I'm trying to remember what is in the background in Mum's garden that would make such bold colours and can't think right now.

Red Admirals seem to spend most of their time with wings firmly closed....

....I did manage to get a brief peek of that striking pattern.....

.....before it was back to the usual posture!

I have to confess that I was playing around with my shutter speed settings as I was hoping that the Hawkmoth would come back and I'd get better photos with a higher shutter speed, but instead, the Hawkmoth failed to reappear and I got this effect on a Small Tortoishell. Nice and rich if a bit dark!

The Brimstone, another one that keeps its wing almost permanently shut. The veins and shape of this subtle butterfly make up for that though I think.

Finally, a Comma, not the freshest one in the world but still lovely to see.

Here is one showing it's underwing. I like the way it fades into the Buddleia flower that has gone over (well that's my excuse for a bad photo anyway)! (-:

While I was waiting patiently by the Buddleia bush a Blackcap started to search for and eat fruit from this Chinese tree (I don't know the name) very close to me. I think it must've been a young bird rather than a female (they both have brown caps) as it was so confiding. Blackcaps are normally quite skulking birds.

Here it's making its way to the Leycesteria shrub (common name is Pheasant Bush) which also has berries.

That's all from Mum's garden for now. I'll be up there again shortly though...

Hummingbird Hawkmoth

2010-08-18T19:05:00.008+01:00

Every week or so, I drive up to visit my Mum in the Cotswolds (about 60 miles) to help out in the garden. This last Monday, whilst taking a break from the weeding I decided to see what was supping on the fragrant nectar of her Buddleia. I was chuffed to discover this Hummingbird Hawkmoth dashing about frantically from bloom to bloom. This is only the second time I've seen one of these amazing creatures. It certainly didn't make it easy to get any decent photos, but below are some of the better ones I managed.

The Hummingbird Hawkmoth is an immigrant to Britain from southern Europe and north Africa, although it is believed that some do hibernate in the South West of Britain. They can be seen anytime from April through to December, though mainly during August and September. Apparently they have long been considered a messanger of good tidings in Italy and Malta. A small swarm was reported flying over the water in the English Channel headed to England from France on D-Day! I got this information from the excellent Field Guide to the Moths of Great Britain and Ireland by Paul Waring and Martin Townsend. The amazing illustrations are by Richard Lewington. I can't recommend the book highly enough.

There'll be more from Mum's Buddleia in my next post.

On the Levels

2010-08-16T20:33:00.008+01:00

My friend Jane and I were hoping to get down to the south coast for some birding this last weekend. Unfortunately the winds were from the NE which is not a good direction for birding down there! So instead we spent a few hours down on the Somerset Levels. I didn't get my camera out an awful lot, but a some close cygnets were too tempting to resist.

After the invasion of Painted Ladies last year, this year has seemed pretty poor for them in comparison so I was pleased to see this one feeding on some Hemp Agrimony.

This Cormorant was preening quite some distance off so I thought to try digiscoping him. Not brilliant but it's always worth a try! (-:

I'm very glad that I have the Levels virtually on my doorstep when other plans go awry. (-:

A stroll along the River Thames

2010-08-14T17:02:00.034+01:00

This last Wednesday I had to drive Chris up to London. He had some research to do at the V&A (Victoria and Albert Museum) for his work. I drove to Richmond, a suburb in the west of London. I would spend the day here while Chris went on the tube into central London. There is a large car park at Richmond just a short walk away from the River Thames.

I skirted the edge of Richmond Park to get to the Thames (I know this is a stomping ground for Frank The Early Birder, so maybe he could recommend something different for me to do when I next have to drive Chris up this way???). There was a lovely metal railing bridge across a parallel watercourse to get to the Thames river path.
The parallel watercourse probably has some use, but I don't know what it is.
When I got over to the pathway I had a decision to make....which way to go and this sign gave me a helping hand. I would aim for Richmond Lock.

A view approaching Richmond bridge and lock.

It's a pretty bridge and I got a bit carried away with taking photos! (-:

A London Port Authority boat was using the Lock while I was there.

A view up river from the Lock.

A nice pedestrian walkway across the bridge.

A view down river (I think, maybe I got up and down wrong! Frank'll tell me! (-: )

The bridge lights were impressive.

Enough of bridges, here are some of the birds that I saw on my stroll along the river. Nothing really rare, but fun to try and photograph all the same. This Great Crested Grebe was playing hide and seek with me. I sustained several stings from nettles to get this shot and still I managed to get him behind some foliage (the reddish blurring)!

I was surprised to come across a few Egyptian Geese here, though maybe Frank will tell me they're common along the River Thames?

My 70-300ml lens was straining to get this Grey Heron posing on the other side of the River.

Here's a shot of him with a rower passing by.

Another Grey Heron, this time on my side of the River, but still not close enough for much detail.

These Black-headed Gulls are just in the process of losing their brown heads, changing into winter plumage.

Moorhens are generally shy birds, but this one was strutting boldly on the path ahead of me (mind you, it soon scuttled over into the undergrowth as I got nearer).

One on the water making a quick getaway!

A view of some of the buildings and boats across the River from me.

Some rowers out for a practice. They created quite a lot of disturbance as they sliced their way through the water....

.....as can be seen in the photo below of many Black-headed Gulls taking flight.

It wasn't all Birds, Bridges and Boats though. The path along this stretch of the River Thames was nice a leafy.

There's something irresistible to me about sunlight through foliage. It always lifts my spirits!

Here is the fruit of the tree above. The Horse Chestnut. It will be quite a few weeks before the lovely rich brown conkers start to appear from these prickly casings.

I used to play conkers as a kid.

This is a pretty looking flower, but it's an alien and a bit of a menace. It's called Himalayan Balsam and spreads rapidly, specially along water courses.

After a while I made my way back to the start and walked a little bit along the other way. This bridge is the one that I drove over to get to Richmond. You can see some interesting riverside homes on the far bank.

The Purple Loosestrife along here made for a lovely river scene.

Walking back under the bridge to make my way back to the car, I noticed the water reflecting on the bridge roof.

Something I noticed particularly on my walk was the constant noise of the planes low overhead making their final approach to land at Heathrow airport. It certainly made me glad that I'm not under a flight path back in my home town in Somerset!

Haweswater in the Lake District

2010-08-05T19:35:00.020+01:00

Haweswater is the most easterly and remote of the Lakes in Cumbria. It was controversially dammed in 1929 to help provide water for the conurbations around the Manchester area. In the process, two villages were flooded and their inhabitants moved elsewhere. When the water is low, remnants of the villages can still be seen. Haweswater is an RSPB Reserve and if you click on the link, you can find out a bit more about this beautiful area.

We had come here to look for particular species of bird. Namely the Ring Ouzel (similar to Blackbird but with a white crescent on the breast) and also England's last remaining Golden Eagle. There is one lone male Golden Eagle which still displays here in the hope of attracting a mate (the female died many years ago). You can see in this photo below that the sun is TRYING to peek out through the overcast sky. Jane is optimistically wearing her t-shirt!

I loved the meteor shower effect that these distant Goosanders made on the water as they made their serene way across the lake.

Here's the whole shot to give perspective.

Another effect on the still waters here was the wonderful reflection of some flying Cormorants. There were five birds in this shot.

All the public rights of way signposts seem to be well kept up here. This one shows three different types of Rights of Way. A Byway is open to walkers, horse riders, cyclists and motor vehicles but isn't maintained to a roadworthy standard. A Bridleway is open to walkers, horse riders and pedal cyclists and a Footpath is open to just walkers. I think I have that right! (-:

On the way up the footpath to look for our target birds, I saw this lone lamb with a fantastic outlook over the lake.

Below are some scenic views along our walk to the Golden Eagle watchpoint.

In the photo below is the valley where the watchpoint is located (close to those small trees in the distance in the upper middle of the shot). From there we set our scopes up to view the end of the valley where the lone Golden Eagle was perched. We had good but distant scope views of this charismatic birds. It was a shame not to see him flying, but it was a bonus to get any sort of view (my last sighting of Golden Eagle was way back in 2004!). The elusive Ring Ouzel managed to elude us on this occasion.

On the way back down to the car and lunch, I took more notice of my immediate surroundings. There are dry stone walls all over Britain, but the ones up here are quite distinctively dark and blocky with the local stone obviously being used.

This shepherds hut had seen better days!

Not so easy to build walls with more rounded stones!

Give me a wall with lichen on it and I can't ever resist! (-:

After a few hours walking and watching, we made it back to the car and found ourselves a wonderful spot for eating lunch. I can't think of many better places to eat!

Many thanks for Andy and Sue for being such great hosts. It was a fun trip!

A weekend in the Lake District

2010-08-02T21:02:00.019+01:00

A couple of weekends ago my friend Jane and I drove up to The Lake District in Cumbria for a long weekend with birding friends. Cumbria is the county on the western side of England just below Scotland. It is England's most mountainous region with some of the deepest lakes. The link above will take you to some images of this beautiful area of England. Below is our friend's home where we stayed during our trip.

Under the eaves of his house, there were a couple of House Martin nests. These grotty photos of one of the nests with a young bird in were taken through a window.
Just about to receive some breakfast I think!

The lovely local River Kent allowed Jane to see Dipper for her year list.

Andy took us to one of his local birding spots, the RSPB reserve of Leighton Moss.

There had been sightings of an Osprey reported earlier in the day here, but despite looking for over an hour from the hide, we were out of luck. We did enjoy watching some Greenshank, Common Sandpiper and Green Sandpiper here though.

It was also lovely to watch the always graceful looking Great Crested Grebe from the hide.

The weather while we were up there was what one might expect in this predominantly wet region of the country. A lot of the time we had 'Scotch mist' to contend with so we did quite a lot of sightseeing from the car. Here we're waiting to cross Lake Windermere on the car ferry.

You can see the ferry on the far side of the Lake. The crossing takes less than 10 minutes.

A view of some of the yachts on Windermere. Motorboats are now banned from going more than 10mph on the Lake now I think.

We thought we'd have another stab at seeing Osprey, so we went to Bassenthwaite Lake (the northern most lake) where they are known to breed.

Alas, despite at least 2 hours of searching, we failed to see these charismatic birds again. It was a beautiful and atmospheric place to be though with the low clouds hugging the tops of the mountains. (-:

On the way back south at the end of the day, we drove through some stunning scenery past Ullswater. The overcast weather made for some atmospheric shots, but I'd also love to come back here in better weather conditions and with more time!

The next post will be about our time at Haweswater in the east of the Lake District.

Flora and fauna at RNR

2010-07-22T19:54:00.019+01:00

I apologise for the delay in this post. It should've gone out earlier this week, but didn't.

Dragonflies and damselflies dominated the couple of short walks around the Reserve, but that didn't mean that there was nothing else about. Here are some of the other bits and pieces I saw.

My current header of this busy Ladybird on a grass stalk.

Two of my favourite wild flowers around the Reserve are the creamy white Meadowsweet and Purple Loosetrife.
Moorhens have been breeding on the Reserve, I couldn't capture any young ones on these walks, but this Adult posed briefly before slipping out of sight into the vegetation.

One of the days I visited, there seemed to be an explosion of Ringlet Butterflies. This is one of the few butterflies that will fly even in a light shower, quite an advantage in our damp climate here in the southwest!

I should know what this is, but I can't recall it right now, maybe flowering rush? Any other suggestions out there?

This beautiful day flying moth is the Scarlet Tiger Moth. Here it is at rest.....

.....and a different individual feeding on thistle flowers.

The forewings have a lovely metallic sheen and the underwings (just about showing here) are a brilliant red.

Another mystery flower, all I know is that it in an umbilifer. Again, any suggestions gratefully received (maybe difficult without the leaves)!

An unidentified grasshopper. I shall call him Gerald! (-:

Another butterfly that was much in evidence was the Small Skipper. Below are various individuals.

Having said earlier that the southwest has a tendency to wet weather, we have had quite a run of dry weather so far this spring/summer. This is not good news for Moles and I found this one on the path. After a brief examination, I could find nothing outwardly wrong with it.

Another day flying moth, this is the 5 spot Burnet Moth again feeding on Thistle.

For this last shot I decided to 'do a Chris' and get down on my belly to get a bugs eye view of the world!

Dragonfest at RNR

2010-07-16T16:37:00.014+01:00

A couple of short visits to my local nature reserve recently gave me the opportunity to photograph some of the Dragonflies and Damselflies there. Many thanks to Steve Covey for his help with the ID of one particular species. He has an excellent website for Wiltshires Dragonflies and a link to his blog from this website.

Below is a fresh looking female Broad-bodied Chaser. This medium sized Dragonfly is usually seen over shallow, sunny ponds and lake margins during early summer. Our reserve certainly fits the bill habitat wise.

The male is a beautiful pale blue with a broad body that gives it it's name.
Here is a female Common Darter, a small, restless dragonfly which regularly perches among bankside vegetation. In mild autumns it can still be seen in flight as late as November and occasionally December!
A male Emperor dragonfly. These large Dragonflies are unmistakable with their bright green thorax and sky blue abdomen with black markings. They patrol their chosen area aggressively and rarely settle (in my limited experience!)

I don't know which species the blue damselfly is, but I think the other damselfly is a female banded Demoiselle that is adopting the position (abdomen up) in defence of her perch.

I should've asked Steve about this Damselfly below as well. The colour of the body suggests a male Demoiselle, but there is no darkness in the wing which suggests it is a female. Help!

Here is a close up of the head and thorax.

I'm ok with the name of this one. A male Azure Damselfly. This is a very common Damselfly which has a distribution that stretches from southern Scandinavia to North Africa!

The more I get into learning about these creatures the more I realise how much there is to know! This female Blue-tailed Damselfly is of the form rufescens which means that it commences life with the reddish pink thorax. Within a few days this changes to a yellowish/brown.

Lastly, here is the female White-legged Damselfly. Again, this appears to be a newly emerged one. As it matures it develops from a creamy white into a light green with more pronounced markings. I'm just realising that I need MUCH more spare time to be able to really get into these amazing creatures!

Another close up to finish this Dragonfest!

The next post from Rodden Nature Reserve will show other flora and fauna that I saw on these all too brief visits.

Hot and cool in the garden

2010-07-07T19:57:00.018+01:00

I took the camera round the garden the other day (it didn't take long). We have a small plot of about 90 foot long by 15 foot wide, tapering down to 5 foot at the end. In this small space is Chris's workshop and his piles of wood ready to be turned into works of art. Anyway, what's left of the garden after that, gets stuffed with flowers and vegetables and here are some of the plants that are showing well at the moment. I graded them from hot colours through to lovely cool blues.

A lovely wine red Hydrangea (the colour is a bit deeper than shown here).

Some fiery hot Calendulas.
A nice mix of Poppies.

I have a soft spot for Primulas even though they seem to struggle in my garden.

This soft yellow one below has the most gorgeous, delicate scent. I think it is Primula Florindae.

Both Chris and I love Ferns and we're building up a nice collection gradually.

One of my Hostas escaped the snails this year!

This is an Allium, but I can't remember which one, maybe Frank could help me out?

Another of my favourites is Salvias, this one is East Freisland I think.

This Clematis was sold as a clump forming variety last year! This year it seems to want to escape its clumpy personality. I don't mind really, it looks good rambling over the rocks around the pond.

This is our first try of growing Sweat Peas. Lovely cool shades!

Another Hydrangea, this one a cool blue.

It's also a double flower. Lovely!

Well, I couldn't get out in the garden without my under-gardener helping out. She doesn't do much work, but likes to find a comfy spot to lounge around and delegate!

Her seat is actually a log of Holly that Chris will be cutting up shortly to use for inlay work.

You'll have to find somewhere else next time Pops!

New Forest weekend - Acres Down and home

2010-07-05T21:12:00.012+01:00

Having spent the morning at Needs Ore Point, we headed inland to a well known place to see Honey Buzzards (a rare summer visitor to Britain). First things first though, was finding a shady spot to have lunch!

We needed a good view overlooking the New Forest in order to search for Honey Buzzards and Acres Down is one of the more well known spots to come for this purpose. It was hot out in the open, but luckily for us, there was a blissful breeze to encourage us. After about an hour of scrutinising small dots in the distance trying to make one of them into our target species, we were rewarded with a reasonably close scope view of one. This was a life bird for a couple of our group, always a good way to end a club weekend! (-:
Again, this area of the New Forest seemed to be filled with Birch, though there is plenty of Oak and Holly as well as Pine too.

A particularly striking growth on this large Birch tree, caused by some sort of irritant.

The Pine cones were full of deep rich colouring.

A lovely pure white wild Rose flower.

Large Skipper enjoying the sunshine.

And finally, just to show you that it's not just ponies that roam wild in this part of the country (the speed limit throughout the New Forest is 40mph)

Just before this weekend, I thought that it was going to be too hot to be a successful birding weekend. I was proved more than wrong!

New Forest weekend - Needs Ore Point

2010-07-03T19:24:00.016+01:00

Our second day started out at Needs Ore Point, a private reserve sticking out into The Solent (the body of water between the mainland of Britain and the Isle of Wight).

There were several hides to take a look in and also right down the end of the spit, this view across to the Isle of Wight. Below are some of the birds we saw here. Little Egret

Grey Heron

Curlew taking a drink....

Some Black-tailed Godwits in varying stages of summer/winter plumage. A bit distant unfortunately!

A lone Lapwing (usually seen in flocks).

Lastly some Oystercatchers (or Oiks for short).

The final post from the New Forest will be back in woodland as we make our way back north towards home.

New Forest birding Day 1 - part 2

2010-07-01T19:08:00.020+01:00

Having spent the morning meandering over the heathland, the hot weather drove our leader (Jane) to find shade for the hottest part of the day. Late June in the afternoon isn't the best time in the world for birding generally, nevertheless we picked up some nice woodland birds including Great-spotted Woodpecker, Willow Warbler, Blackcap and Treecreeper.

The shady canopy was a blessing!
In this particular area Birch seemed to be the dominant tree.

You might think I'm mad, but I was really chuffed to get a photo of this usually shy bird, the Stock Dove. They breed in wooded areas but generally it's hard to get close looks at this bird. The usual sight of them is of distant flying birds! This particular one was serenading us with is monotonous but soothing song.

Even the ponies were finding places to stay out of the sun!

I liked these sun kissed sculptured trunks.

The graceful Foxglove is a feature throughout the Forest.

After dropping off our 'stuff' at the Hotel B&B, and a delicious dinner at the Beaulieu Road Station pub, we headed for heathland again for some evening birding.

Watching the evening sunlight across the heath was a beautiful way to end the day.

We were hoping to see an heathland specialist here (the Dartford Warbler). We had no luck and we all wondered whether the harsh winter had taken it's toll on the population of this bird in Britain. Only time will tell.

As the sun went down, our target bird was the enigmatic Nightjar. There were no real sightings during the evening but some of us heard distant 'churring' and apparently, I nearly stepped on one in the dark going back to our cars!!!

The next two shots are slightly out of sequence, sorry! Just a couple of photos of the inevitable ponies grazing peacefully.

As the sun set we slowly made our way back to the cars.

My final shot of the day was the moon rising up through the Forest trees.

New Forest Birding Weekend - Day 1 part 1

2010-06-29T20:24:00.016+01:00

This last weekend I went on a Bristol Ornithological Club trip to the New Forest in the county of Hampshire. The New Forest is about 1.5 hours south east of where I live and is mostly a mix of heathland and ancient Woodland. There were 12 of us on the weekend and here are some of the group striding out to start our first days birding.

As mentioned in previous posts, there are hundreds if not thousands of semi wild ponies wandering free throughout the Forest area. These are owned animals and are rounded up each year to be branded.
At this time of year there were plenty of foals about and it was hard to resist taking loads of photos!
There were plenty of these boggy peaty areas which proved wonderful for Dragonflies and Damsels.

I don't often see Cotton Grass, but whenever I do, I always find it photogenic!

One of the charismatic Dragonflies around these boggy areas was the Four-spotted Chaser. This one looks to be an immature and was my first sighting of this species. I love the touch of gold in the wings.

I could easily have spent hours here if I'd been on my own and I would have needed to in order to get really decent photos as these creatures are just sooooo restless!

Another new tick for me was this Keeled Skimmer (I obviously need to get out in the summer more!) (-:

Another inhabitant of the bogs was this lovely green frog. I'm not good on frog ID and so would appreciate any suggestions as to which one this is?

The Forest ponies also get attracted to the open water and these three dropped by for a drink while we were there. They seem to take no notice of humans, but I'm not sure what they'd do if they were approached. We just let them be and enjoyed them from a reasonable distance.

Yet another new species for me (I was having a good insect day) was the Silver-studded Blue Butterfly. This species is a rarity in Britain and is very localised to particular habitats. Here in Hampshire, it favours the short Heathland and feeds on various species of Heather, Gorse and Bird's-foot Trefoil.

The male is distinguished from other Blues by it's clear white fringing and wide black border on the upperwings.

The underwing is distinctive too with a broad band of orange next to the black eyespots. It doesn't show up well on this photo, but there are also blue 'studs' on the hindwing which give the butterfly it's name.

The next post will be in the shade of the New Forest woods.

Bits and bobs!

2010-06-18T20:50:00.013+01:00

Sometimes I take some photos but they don't seem to hang together for a proper blog post, so here are some I took earlier in the year, mostly May and June I think. On a days birding around the Somerset Levels, I was very lucky to come across this Adder slithering across the path in front of me at Ashcott Corner.

We have only three snakes in Britain and the Adder is the only venomous one. This one was about 30 inches long from memory and I was thrilled to see it.
A great success story for the Somerset Levels is the explosion of breeding Bitterns on the various reserves there (I think there are possibly 14 booming males this year). Just a couple of years ago, I would consider myself very lucky to get to see one Bittern. Last year and this, it is not uncommon to have several flight views during a mornings walk! It really is a treat!

Another area I like to go walking is just south of where I live on the borders of Somerset and Wiltshire. It's a totally different habitat from the flat but characterful Levels. It's right on the western edge of Salisbury Plain with rolling chalk hills and a great sense of space. Corn Buntings breed here, but are right on the western edge of their breeding range and don't quite make it into Somerset. These dumpy looking birds have a lovely tinkling song, somewhat like a bunch of keys rattling.

Another wonderful character of this habitat is the Brown Hare. They're quite skittish for the most part and this was the closest I got to this one poking it's ears up in the middle of a grassy field.

I was chuffed to find this field of Linseed (Flax). I'm definitely not a fan of oil seed rape, but I guess it makes a startling contrast with the lovely soft blue of the Linseed here.

The Hawthorne flower has been good this year which means we should get a good crop of red haws in the autumn (great for our winter thrushes, but I don't want to think about that right now!) (-:

The last area in this post is a bird club trip to Exmoor which is about 2 hours west of me, nearly into the county of Devon. Like the ponies in the New Forest that I posted about earlier in the year, Exmoor ponies are free to roam throughout the Exmoor National Park.

They are hardly tame or confiding and so this shot of a young one was taken at a distance and is cropped quite a lot!

Whereas this lamb was quite happy to pose just a few feet from me, looking very content in the shade. Mind you I didn't hang around as the mother was keeping a good eye on me!

The wrong type of Poppy?

2010-06-14T21:14:00.006+01:00

This pot was going to have some Poppies in it for the summer, but......

.....our Poppy has taken it over for her own use!

Delusions of grandeur!

2010-06-11T19:29:00.014+01:00

The other morning whilst drinking our early morning tea together, Chris thought he caught a glimpse of a squirrel in the trees across the road (he didn't have his glasses on)! A squirrel would be a rare sighting where I live (only one in the 20 odd years we've been here). Anyway, I got my bins (never toooooo far away from my birding hands) and what I saw wasn't a squirrel but this male House Sparrow with a wacking great big piece of string. He flew across the road to our front garden with this string trailing behind him, so I grabbed my camera (never toooooo far away from my bins) (-: and took a load of snaps of him trying to get to grips with his home diy project! He was obviously nesting in the eaves of our house as he tried several times to get the string up there without success.

I think maybe he should stick to small twigs! (-:

Last post on Lesvos.

2010-06-04T20:05:00.028+01:00

Apologies for this last post taking so long to get on here, I left my laptop at work earlier this week and all my photos were on it! Well, we had about 1/2 a day before we had to leave the hotel for the airport so we went to some local spots for a last few hours of birding on this amazing island. At Metouchi Lake I got the opportunity to digiscope this Squacco Heron. I wish we had them in Britain, they're such stunning looking birds!

These next couple of shots were taken by my friend Jane of a White-winged Black Tern over Metouchi Lake (thanks Jane). I never did get a decent shot, something to aim for next time! (-:
Harder to see, but if you click to enlarge you'll see the White-winged Black Tern flying towards the camera and also an House Martin just skimming the water below it.
I put this photo in specially for Mary as I've seen so many images like this on her blog! (-: I was thinking of you Mary as I took this photo.

Our next stop was the beautiful Potamia Valley. We went back here to try and find one more life bird for me, the Olive Tree Warbler. Thanks to some other friendly birders (are there any other kind?) (-: who gave us directions to a one singing further down the valley, I managed to see my 19th life bird of the trip on this last day!

Now you might be wondering what three of us found so fascinating to photograph in the river below this bridge in the Potamia Valley. Well........

......firstly a frog.

And then another frog.......

.......but finally, this rather gruesome sight of a terrapin on the back of a dead sheep! Not the nicest of basking spots I have to say!!!

Something just a bit more pleasant to see was this bunch of Lupins. I don't know whether Lupins are a native plant or not on Lesvos, but these were flowering in the middle of this valley and the sun shining through them was gorgeous.

After the Potamia Valley, we drove slowly along the East River again. The light on this day seemed to show the river at its best I think. The river was drying out, and the colours of reflected sky, algae and soil was a lovely combination.

As we drove along the East River, I'm glad I grabbed a shot of this Grandma cadging a lift on the back of this bike. I'm not sure I've ever seen anyone riding side saddle on a bike before!!! (-:

And finally, we couldn't leave Lesvos without a final few hours at the Kalloni Salt Pans. As usual, the birds didn't disappoint here.

Thank you all very much for coming along on this birding trip to Lesvos with me. It's been so much fun to look back through my photos for these posts and it brought back great memories. I'm sorry it took longer to tell the story than I'd hoped!

Oooooops! I nearly forgot to include this video of those sheep being herded past our hotel on our last morning, so here's the url to click on to view: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5iUz4w0zAtc

Springwatch webcams for next few weeks.

2010-05-30T21:07:00.002+01:00

Hi folks

Just a quick note to let you know about some great webcams that are running over the next few weeks. Every year the BBC runs Springwatch on TV. On the Springwatch website you can watch 4 live nature webcams (even during the night). Here is the url. I hope my friends abroad can watch these too. http://www.bbc.co.uk/springwatch/webcams/index.shtml .

Enjoy!

Sunrise to Moonrise and Molivos inbetween!

2010-05-30T16:38:00.052+01:00

Our last full day on Lesvos so we used every minute of it starting with a beautiful sunrise at Metouchi lake.

The Barn Swallows were still at their roosting place amongst the reeds. We had about an hour here looking at Herons and Crakes before getting back to the hotel for breakfast.
Today, we would be heading north but as usual we drove slowly along the East River just outside of Kalloni to look for birds. This Black-headed Bunting decided to stay nicely close by the roadside to sing.

The yellow flowers show off his yellow breast beautifully.

At the river ford we were rewarded with close views of this Little-ringed Plover. It's yellow eye ring showing up well.

Also at the river ford was a Wood Sandpiper that didn't mind our car being used as a hide!

We were going to the north of the island today towards the town of Molivos. On the way we went through the Napi Valley with the usual stops along the way.

The scenery along this valley was lovely and this shelter was a perfect place to spend some time enjoying the views.

There were also some lovely flowers here. I don't know the names of any of them I'm afraid!

There were some lovely old Olive groves along here.

With some very old and gnarled Olive trees.

Some of them must be hundreds of years old.

Some sort of Skipper. I guess I need to get a European Butterfly book sometime!

As usual, we find a nice spot to have our lunch. This old stream bed suited us fine.

With plenty of handy seats available.

Tucking in!

After lunch, we carried on along the coast road towards Molivos.

Approaching Molivos, one can't help but notice the castle which dominates the whole area.

We made a brief stop at the castle before heading down into the town. There was a Kestrel nesting in the castle wall.

There was also this tiny but striking jumping spider.

Small but quite ferocious looking!

It was fun to watch this lizard pair playing hide and seek with each other.

On down to the harbour where we were proper tourists for a change! (-:

At this time of year, the harbour was pretty quiet (I'm sure it's stuffed with people just a few weeks later). We stopped and had an ice cream and Jane decided to share hers with the local cat. Only trouble was, that all of a sudden there were about 9 local cats! (-:

We made a quick getaway and had a stroll round the harbour. The view of the town and castle from here was stunning.

As you can see from the fishing boats here, the fishing is really low scale.

Molivos is arguably one of the prettiest towns on the island. It has strict planning laws which bang building anything over two storeys high. This has preserved the place well. We had a pleasant wander through the streets.

This particular street had Wisteria growing along it's whole length which gave some welcome shade as well as being pretty.

I wonder if Geoff is thinking which setting to have his camera on? (-:

This was a typical roof tile feature all over the island.

I couldn't travel to Greece and not have a Greek urn photo! (-:

Having left the delights of Molivos and being a tourist behind. We made our way back south. David remembered a track through the hills that he'd enjoyed on his previous trip to Lesvos which had this old bridge along it.

I couldn't see why the bridge had been built in the first place, but it was a lovely old bridge to stand on and take photos of! (-:

Towards the end of the day, we inevitably found our way back to the Kalloni Salt Pans. The evening sun on the Glossy Ibis really showed up that deep rusty plumage and the irridescence in the wings.

This one was either choking or laughing at one of my jokes! (-: I suspect it was choking!

Back at the hotel and an evening shot of Nelly the Nightgale. This was when I shot that video of him singing.

And a shot of the moon rising from our hotel balcony to end our last full day here.

My final post from Lesvos will be our mornings birding before heading for the airport.

Return trip to western Lesvos

2010-05-29T11:06:00.041+01:00

The weather forecast (damp and overcast) for this day suggested to us that a return trip to the west side of the island might be a good idea. We had specific places to go so didn't stop at all on the way. Our first stop, Ipsilou Monastery seems to be a magnet for birds on migration and we weren't to be disappointed. Here is the entrance to the monastery.

Women are tolerated but not encouraged at these monasteries, but Jane and I had made sure we were covered up well and we took a few minutes to take a peek inside the church here. This photo below wasn't intentional, but I like the surreal look it lends to the interior of this amazing church!
Switching to flash gave some more detail.
One of the paintings on the wall.

On the way back out to carry on birding, we found this monastery cat in an obviously favourite position! (-:

Here's the eastern european form of Black-eared Wheatear. They're alot more silvery looking than their sandier western cousins.

The last time we were here a couple of days ago, it had been dry and sunny and if not lacking in birds, well, we were hardly tripping over them! Today, the place seemed to be dripping Golden Orioles and Wood Warblers particularly. I didn't get any photos of the more distant Orioles here, but managed some shots of the closer but flighty Wood Warbler.

When I first started birding about 12 years ago, Wood Warbler was one of my favourite birds. They are a summer visitor to Britain, mainly in the western side of the country. They always look clean and fresh to me and when they do their trilling song, their whole body quivers! It is STILL one of my favourites! (-:

Another migrant that we saw many of at Ipsilou was Pied Flycather and the rarer Collared Flycatcher. They are quite similar in appearance. I didn't manage to get any photos, but Jane got these two below of a Pied Flycatcher (thanks Jane).

I was concentrating on birds mainly, but did snap a shot of a very flighty Small Copper before it sped off into the distance!

After leaving Ipsilou Monastery, we drove straight to Sigri to find some bread to go with our lunch.

It's a pretty little town with a small harbour.

After wandering the streets for a while, I found a nice old man who walked me right to the door of the local bakery. I don't think he knew any English, but I'd managed to communicate my need somehow!

If we hadn't been in birding mode, it would have been nice to wander around these streets some more, but we only had so much time and birds come first!

I did take some more photos on the way back to the car though! (-:

This in an old Turkish castle, the Greeks and Turks arn't the best of friends so I don't think this castle is preserved in any particular way.

We visited some of the same places from the previous day out here. Last time we didn't see any Turtle Doves, on this day we had 35+ of them just in one field!

Back to Faneromeni beach and...

.....a new bird for our trip list, a Little Stint.

At Faneromeni ford, we went searching for Rufous Bush Robin, we didn't have any luck with that, but I liked the tiles on this barn roof.

We found this curious thing built right in the middle of nowhere, I'm not sure what it is, maybe an outside oven (it had a round roof inside it)? There were certainly no houses anywhere around that we could see. A mystery.....

A male and female below of what turned out to be one of my favourite birds of this trip to Lesvos.

Back at the ford, I tried digiscoping a distant Squacco Heron with mixed results.

We decided to take a southern route home via what has been described as a 'rough' track in the past. Apparently it had been improved over the last few years. It was still a bit dodgy in places for a non 4 wheel drive car, but the birds and scenery were well worth the risk! In photos below, you'll see the kind of country we were driving through. It was pretty barren but beautiful. We stopped at one place along the track and experienced our 'birding moment of the trip'. In this barren landscape there were occasionally small fig trees dotted about. One of these fig trees had 4 Rollers, 1 Golden Oriole and a Lesser Grey Shrike in it all at the same time! Roller was a bird that we all really wanted to see on this trip and to see 4 all together with the other birds thrown in was just magical stuff!

These photos were digiscoped and the light was in totally the wrong direction, but I'm glad I got some record shots to remind me of this moment in years to come, not that it isn't clearly in my memory right now!

Below are some shots of the scenery we were travelling through, though the camera really doesn't do it justice.

In the photo below, you can just about see a small building on top of that mountain. It is probably another one of those chapels that are dotted all over Lesvos.

Here is the same place zoomed in with my 70-300 lens. How they got the materials up there I don't know. It must be a great place for some peaceful contemplation!

A goat and donkey shelter.

We had one more place that we wanted to stop at Skala Eressou where we'd heard a pair of Penduline Tits were building a nest. When we got there, we found the nest, but unfortunately we'd arrive too late in the day to see the birds (they must've settled down for the night). We did have fun watching these Terapins on the river there though.

And finally for this post, a sunset shot as we got back to Skala Kallonis and some dinner!

A bits and pieces kind of day in Lesvos

2010-05-24T20:05:00.034+01:00

Another pre breakfast walk, and I decided to walk along the beach to Skala Kallonis harbour to take some photos. A Jay hopped along in the trees ahead of me, but never quite near enough for a photo unfortunately. You can see the harbour wall in the distance here.

I'd learnt a few words of Greek just so that I could be polite to any native Lesvosians I came across. Well, when I got to the harbour, there were some crusty old fishermen sat together 'chewing the cud', so I called out what I thought was 'hello' in Greek. I don't know whether my accent was appalling or they just didn't know what to make of me, but I didn't get any response out of any of them! (-: Shame as it made me not want to linger too long. I did manage to take a couple of photos around the harbour before setting off back to the hotel to meet up with my friends and breakfast.

After breakfast we set out to go north today. This photo below as taken in the town of Petra. Jane told me that when she first visited Lesvos many years ago, there were a lot more donkeys being used around the island. We only came across one or two during our weeks stay.

Our first destination was at a place just north of Petra to look for Ruppell's Warbler. While looking for the bird, I was taken with the formation of the rock. Lesvos has a past filled with volcanic activity.

This was the typical type of scrubby habitat that Ruppell's warbler like. After a long wait, we did finally get a view of this elusive bird, no photo though.

The weather was quite overcast and cool on this day and Jane felt that rather than go north, we might do better to try some well known migrations spots further south so we headed for the Potamia valley which is just west of Skala Kallonis. This is a beautiful valley with lovely views all along its length.

We'd seen several Long-legged Buzzards before this one, but this was the first time I'd had a chance and taking some photos. Not brilliant but this is the best one I got. This one was the rufous form with is reddish tail, paler inside.

Our next stop was at a place called Devil's Bridge (I don't know the reason for the name).

We noticed lots of these large black spiders here, so many that it was hard to keep from stepping on many of them! From memory I think they were about 2 inches long (inc legs)! (-:

I don't know what this plant is, but it was incredibly spiny!

There was one of those tiny chapels here which was open so I took a peek inside. It's was very well kept and rather simple and beautiful.

Our final destination of the day (as it was yesterday) was the Kalloni Salt Pans. This place never disappointed any time we were there! These shots aren't pin sharp, but they show the beautiful white wings of the Squacco Heron as it comes in to land.

A bunch of Ruff with a few Wood Sandpipers in amongst them.

Little Terns with their fluttering hovering while hunting for food.

Preparing to dive.

Here's this pretty bad 'record' shot of a male Red-footed Falcon. It was quite a way away and this is heavily cropped.

I had the most fun trying to photograph Whiskered Terns that were hunting close to the track were we were standing.

They were sooooo quick. I must have taken hundreds of shots!

Not many made it past the delete button, but after a while I did get better at trying to follow them with the camera!

These next two photos I like particularly with the beads of water still clinging to their feathers.

Our way back to the hotel took us through the East River ford. There were usually birds feeding here and using the car as a hide, it was possible to get some nice shots. Wood Sandpipers are the most common wader (shorebird) on the island. In southern Britain they are a scarce passage migrant which I don't always get to see every year.

We decided to eat out at a local Taverna in Skala Kallonis on this evening. The menu was wonderfully varied. I wish I'd taken more pictures of the inside and our meal, but maybe next time! The Taverna was right on the beach so after our meal we took a stroll around the harbour (minus the old fishermen)! (-:

A lovely end to another good days birding.

Achladeri Forest and beyond

2010-05-21T19:44:00.046+01:00

Nearly halfway through the week already! Time just goes too quickly sometimes! Our pre-breakfast birding on this day was at Metouchi Lake just 15 minutes drive from the hotel. This is a great place to see Herons and Crakes. On this particular morning we saw Reed, Sedge and Great Reed Warblers, Little Crake, Little Bittern, Squacco Heron, Purple Heron and two male Golden Orioles. In the early morning light, the grasses had a wonderful golden glow.

Another wild flower I don't know the name of, but pretty! There'll be more from Metouchi Lake later in the week including some bird photos.
Today, we were heading south around the bay of Kalloni to Achladeri Forest. We had a target species in mind and this is one of the best places to look for it.

It was shaping up to be quite a warm day so being in the shade of these pine trees was lovely!

And here is the target bird, A Kruper's Nuthatch. It prefers nesting in Pine forests on Lesvos and neighbouring Turkey. This bird had a nest hole just above him in this photo. We didn't want to get any closer and cause disturbance.

I was surprised to see and hear this Cirl Bunting in a Pine forest. Back in Britain, we generally only see them in scrubby hedgerows along the south coast of Devon.

Whenever I've planned a birding trip abroad in the past,I always had certain birds that I really want to see badly! For this trip to Lesvos, my most want to see bird was Masked Shrike. While we were watching the Kruper's Nuthatch, Jane suddenly said to me 'Jenny, look up'! There at the top of the tree we were standing under was a beautiful Masked Shrike singing it's heart out! This picture below is taken with my Nikon with my 70-300ml lens on. Nice but a bit far away!

I was absolutely desperate to try and get a good photo of this bird, so I thought I'd try a spot of digiscoping and hope for the best. So I set up my Leica scope and slapped my Canon G10 point and shoot up against the lens and snapped away. Below is the uncropped outcome with the inevitable vignetting.

This one below is also digiscoped and then the vignetting cropped out! I'm really REALLY pleased I tried this out and used the technique again later in the trip on other birds, not so successfully! (-: Certain birds just 'do it' for me and this is definitely one of them!

Having left the success and excitement of Achladeri Forest, we made our way further round the bay of Kalloni heading, eventually for the Polychnitou Salt Pans. On the way as usual, we made various stops. This beautiful field of Poppies caused a break in the driving.

I decided to get down low and play with my f stops a bit! (-:

Our journey took us along a track following the Kalloni bay which proved to be a perfect place to stop for some lunch.

Our usual lunch seemed to be bread roll, cheese, crisps and fruit juice (no gin Roy!) (-:

A view of our road towards the Salt Pans, I don't think there is a high/low tide drop here!

Before we set off, we couldn't resist a spot of beach-combing. There were some lovely shells along the beach, some of which came home with me.

Another stop at a river ford gave us nice views of a Temminck's Stint (another vagrant to Britain).

Here's a slightly better image of a male Red-backed Shrike. I think Shrikes are one of my favourite bird families!

All over the island, we would find these roadside shrines (probably where a road death has occurred). They varied from very simple to quite elaborate. I wish I'd taken photos of more of them. Maybe next time!

We had to stop the car for these close Common Sandpipers posing by the side of the beach.

This hot Hooded Crow caused a stop too. It's just as well we were all of us into taking photographs! Hooded Crow is the most common corvid on Lesvos, but it proved to be quite tricky to get a good photo as they were pretty skittish.

Just a lovely meadow full of wild flowers...

One of the many Olive groves that we passed along the way. This one was pretty well tended, almost too well as there wasn't much under the trees to attract birds.

After a long and winding track, we eventually got to the Polychnitou Salt Pans which were quite disappointing birdwise in the end. That's not to say we didn't have fun with the cameras here. Here's Jane in photography mode.

A Black Stork in the middle of one of the barren salt pans.

With a lack of close birds, I turned to the flowers there. Some pretty sea lavender I think it is?

I wanted to capture this bright red poppy against the cool silver foliage, but it didn't work as well as I'd hoped. Can't win 'em all.

We decided to go back via a quicker inland route as we wanted to spend some time birding at the Kalloni Salt Pans before dinner. Some of the hillside towns were very picturesque and demanded a stop for photos.

I love the lush green against the grey/greeen of the hills at this river on the way back.

We stopped here for some birding and found some Squacco Herons.

This was definitely my favourite Heron and not just because it was a 'life bird'. Their soft golden plumage is lovely and then when they fly, the white in the wings is a show stopper!

Back at the Kalloni Salt Pans, we weren't disappointed here with the birds! Avocets are always lovely to see, specially in flight when their black and white patterning really shows up.

A pair of Black-winged Stilts.

Not a bird, but the only Damselfly I managed to photograph during the trip. I don't know which one this is, any thoughts anyone?Glossy Ibis, fun to photograph as usual. You can see his meal in this photo!

I didn't get any decent shots of Red-footed Falcons, so thanks to Jane for this photo. This is a female. I have a 'record' shot of a male for another post.

The day was almost done and this sunset view from the Salt Pans finished it off beautifully.

Our drive back to the hotel took us through the East River ford, a great place for birds, more from there in a later post.

Finally back at the hotel and this pair of House Martins where having a polite conversation about the ins and outs of housebuilding! (-:

It was a great days birding, probably the best of the trip so far.

Birding on the way to Sigri

2010-05-19T19:06:00.033+01:00

First of all, apologies for the length of the post, I'm finding it hard to keep the photos down to a manageable level as I want to tell the story of each day!

To make the most of my week on the island, I got up early each morning to do some birding before breakfast which was at 7.30 most mornings. The hotel where we were staying (Kalloni ii) has a wetland area right in front of the hotel which is ideal for a pre-breakfast walk. In years past this has been a fantastic area for herons, terns and waders (shorebirds), but over recent years has dried out somewhat and become more overgrown. It is still a great place to see some birds though. Here is a view of our hotel from the other side of the Kalloni pool wetland (the beach behind me).

Frank and Tony probably wont recognise this as being the Kalloni pool!
Even with the lack of much water, I still managed to see Squacco Heron, Bittern, Wood Sandpiper, Ruff and Snipe here.

Here is the beach which was only about 50 yards from the hotel.

One of the real delights each time we left or came back to the hotel was the sight and specially the sound of the resident Nightingale. I know it was a 'he' singing but I named him Nelly! I managed to get a short video of him singing one day. It's not the best view of him, but it shows off his amazing song! You will eventually see him hopping onto the fence.

After our breakfast, we set off for the day. We were aiming for the town of Sigri on the west coast with plenty of birding on the way. Just a few miles outside Kalloni, is the Limona Monastery (you really need a month or two here to see everything!) an impressive complex of churches etc. Click on the link to read a bit about it (scroll down a little way).

Some amazing buildings here, also notice the olive trees behind (there are everywhere on the island).

We screeched to a halt in this small town as Jane thought she'd seen Bee-eaters, we didn't managed to find any of those, but did spot this Black-eared Wheatear perched on what is obviously a favoured spot judging by the decoration! (-:

While we were looking for the Bee-eaters, I noticed this lovely fig tree with ripening fruits looking lush against the hills in the background.

Another stop on the Sigri road was at what is called the 'grand canyon'. We were specifically looking for Crag Martins here and also Blue Rock thrush. We saw both, but they were either too far away or two swift for photos.

I did manage to see some nice flowers here though. Some Spanish Broom just coming into flower.

An unknown Blue butterfly.

Some sort of daisy like flower? I love the deep pink shading out towards the edge.

A view of our windy road westwards. There arn't many straight roads on Lesvos! (-:

Whenever we found a layby, we would stop to check for any birds. This proved fruitful as we picked up birds like Subalpine Warbler, Cretzschmar's Bunting, Alpine Swift, Hoopoe, Blue Rock Thrush, Cirl Bunting and many others. At one particularly layby, we saw loads of these beautiful grasshopper/crickets. I wish I knew what this one is called.

Another unknown flower....

Scanning the hillsides for birds.....

One of our target birds along this road was Isabelline Wheatear. They are a very localised breeder here on Lesvos. At this particular location we were lucky to see 4 or 5 birds. This is a record shot while it was doing a display flight which shows the diagnostic tail pattern reasonably well.

One of our main stops before getting to the coast was Ipsilou Monastery. This is another impressive monastery set high ontop of a hill with amazing views over the surrounding countryside. It's also a wonderful place for migrants given the right weather conditions. On this particular day we didn't have the right conditions (it was too nice), however we did visit again later in the week, but that's for another post.

With a lack of motorised traffic (compared to Britain), the scents of wild flowers is much more noticeable. One of the most obvious plants along the roadsides was the Giant Fennel. These wonderful plants averaged around 4-5 feet high and exuded at subtle fragrance which was exaggerated when the foliage was pinched!

An unknown Fritillary butterfly up at Ipsilou Monastery.

The views were absolutely stunning from the Monastery. The camera really doesn't do it justice!

The small town and harbour of Sigri.

The fields around Sigri are generally good for migrants. As I said earlier, the weather was a bit too nice for much to be seen, but we did find Pied Flycathers, Red-rumped Swallows, Orphean Warbler, Whinchats, Wood Warblers, Yellow Wagtails, Bee-eaters and Marsh Harrier to name a few. Below is chapel in the middle of nowhere. There are loads of them dotted about all over the island. You could spend ages just visiting these!

We spent a little time at Faneromeni beach, sea watching for Shearwaters (we saw lots of Yelkouan Shearwaters and just one Cory's).

Not the best photos in the world, but a record shot of a couple of Red-rumped Swallows collecting mud for nest making.

Our last stop for the day was at Faneromeni river ford. This is a great area for Heron species. We saw Squacco Heron, Black-crowned Night Heron, Purple Heron and Little Bittern here. We also saw THOUSANDS of these little frogs. No wonder the Herons thought is was a good spot!

One of my target birds for the trip was to see a male Red-backed Shrike. I'd seen duller immature ones back in Britain where they occasionally they overshoot as vagrants. These beautiful birds used to breed in Britain, but became extinct partly due to egg collectors! I was thrilled to get to see an adult at last!

Kalloni Salt Pans

2010-05-15T19:55:00.031+01:00

One of the best birding spots on the island are the Kalloni Salt pans which were just a few miles from our hotel at Skala Kallonis. These salt pans still have water at this time of year and are a magnet to all sort of birds as a stopping off point on migration.

It was worth stopping in here several times during our stay in Lesvos. There was always the chance of something new passing through.

A massive pile of salt in the distance!

One of the tracks running through the salt pans.

I don't know what these yellow flowers were, but they were wild, not cultivated and made a beautiful foreground to the hills beyond.
Lots of photo opportunities for me and my friends here!

Here are some I took at the salt pans on our first full day on Lesvos.

Common Tern about to plunge.

These Spanish Sparrows nest in large colonies (the sound was deafening!). The bold black streaking is distinctive.

A flock of Little Egrets passing through.

Greater Flamingos, a life bird for me. These were always pretty distant unfortunately and this photo is heavily cropped.

Glossy Ibis, the only time we get to see these in Britain is as a vagrant if one or two overshoot occasionally. Here they seemed to be everywhere on the salt pans.

It was great to get some quite close views of these amazing birds.

This Black Stork was riding on a thermal over the salt pans. You can get a sense of it's size when seen with the Yellow-legged Gull in this photo.

Barns Swallows arn't rare birds, but I had fun trying to get some photos of some dipping down for a drink.

Eventually they took a break for a good preen!

One of the best things about the Kalloni salt pans was the opportunity to watch various 'marsh' terns up close. This is a White-winged Black Tern. Again, these are usually only vagrants to Britain.

There'll be more from the salt pans in later posts, but for now, lunch beckoned! One of the good things about our hotel rooms was the inclusion of a good sized fridge. This meant that we could buy food and drink and store it in the fridge for whenever we needed it. We also had a balcony with pretty good views, so on our first day, we had our lunch there. From left to right, Geoff, David, Jane and me (thanks for the loan of the photo David).

After lunch we drove along the dead goat pit track. I know this doesn't sound very inviting, but in fact we didn't see any dead goats and it was lovely and peaceful! I'm not sure why it got such a nasty name.

I don't know which type of lizard this is, but he was posing very nicely in the sunshine.

This is another bird that is only seen in Britain as a vagrant. I think the Ruddy Shelduck is particularly striking when in flight with that bold black and white wing with the rusty coloured body. This was the best photo I could get, they were remarkably skittish.

A migrating Whinchat, a summer visitor to Britain, I wonder if this one will end up on our shores?

By far the most common Gull on the island is the Yellow-legged Gull (halfway between Lesser black backed and an Herring Gull). I like this photo because it shows three different ages together.

Our last stop of the day was at the Kalloni football pitch where we had been told a Scops Owl was roosting. With the great instructions we received, it wasn't long before we located it snuggled up against this trunk oblivious to our clicking cameras!