Friday 22 September 2017

It might only be five minutes but arrrghhh!

The Safari is a little miffed! At the end of the previous post we told how we'd narrowly missed the Otter and a couple of Ravens down at Marton Mere well we did the same trick again the following day.
We took Monty for a wander along the cliffs at Chat Alley on the rising tide with the intention of looking out for the 10 Bottlenose Dolphins that had been seen in the far southern corner of the bay off Hilbre Island the day before. The sea was too choppy there were white horses everywhere so spotting any cetaceans was going to be very tricky especially as we only had our bins with us, they'd need to be really close in to be able to see them. So we concentrated on the cliffs themselves as we walked northwards. All very quiet until a single Wheatear was found flitting about dropping in to the long grass to pick off some morsel sheltering from the wind and then returning to a dried Dock stem, or suchlike, lookout post. No camera so no pic.
We walked almost the full length of the cliffs reaching the point where they sort of become more dune like than cliff like about 1 1/2 miles up. With not a lot happening and no 'friends' for the Monster to play with we turned round and headed back to the car. The Wheatear hadn't gone far and when we did stop for a doggy play we spotted a Turnstone on the seawall and a grounded Meadow Pipit on the steep grassy slope.
We got back to car at roughly high noon and drove off for Base camp and a cuppa. A little later we learned that an Osprey had passed a watcher not far to the north of our walk and probably would have coasted right over our head with ample warning from the local gulls had we only stayed out a few minutes longer - well you can't win em all but grrrrrrr all the same! There probably won't be any more opportunities to see Ospreys locally - but you never know there might just be a late one waiting in the wings.
In other news it does seem to be a good season for Red Admirals, this one was taken on Patch 1 but we've seen good numbers of them everywhere we've been - even the shops. Anecdotally to us at least it seems like we've seen more this autumn than we've seen for a very long time, if ever - they really are everywhere and some are on the wing in the cool of the early morning dog walks almost invariably heading south.
Let us know if you think there's exceptional, or at least large number of Red Admirals about this season. We'd like to be able to report that other butterflies are doing well too but other than Speckled Woods and a Comma or two we've struggled to find other late season species like Peacocks and Small Tortoiseshells. We have seen a couple of day flying Vapourer moths though which look superficially like skipper butterflies at first glance.
The (not so) big news from Base Camp is that a large dragonfly, one of the hawker species, flew through yesterday but didn't stop, not even for five seconds never mind five minutes, and we've had a family of Greenfinches return to the sunny seeds after a lengthy absence.
Hope you've all had better luck than we have.
Where to next? Back to Patch 1 early doors where hopefully this ind with a bit of east in it might have dropped something of interest, otherwise it'll be the usual Robins, Wrens and Blackbirds to count. After lunch we might get out somewhere with Wifey and Monty
In the meantime let us know who's waiting until your back is turned in your outback.



No comments: