St Swithin has a lot to answer for

The Safari has been out and about looking for wildlife but we haven't had many opportunities to take any pics. Mostly we've been participating in this year's National Whale and Dolphin Watch but the weather his been a severe hindrance. Spotting blubber when the waves are crashing in pushed by a strong sou'westerly, not to mention the horrendously heavy rain showers all down to St Swithin and his very wobbly Jet Stream this summer. The week got off to a rocky start when just before our first watch a juvenile Harbour Porpoise had to be rescued off the beach to the south of us. Fortunately we haven't heard anything more of it so it would seem there was a positive outcome. But that's about as close as we've got to seeing cetaceans although a couple of Grey Seals have been spotted on our watches.

The south westerly winds are usually good for seabirds along our coast but it seems they've all got stuck off the far west of Cornwall! All we have to show for our many hours of peering down the scope out to sea is a few Gannets a handful of Manx Shearwaters and small numbers of Sandwich Terns passing by...The biggy must be coming on the next watch - Certainly hope so...and if the 'biggy' is a diminutive Storm Petrel we'll be well happy!

Early morning and ready to go - before the crowds turned up

A Peregrine (P2 #56) gave a good show right over our heads as we were finishing one of the watches.

In other news we've tried to count as many butterflies as possible for the Big Butterfly Count and hope you have too. We haven't seen many mostly due to being in the best places too early in the morning or too late in the evening while out with Monty. During the day we've been sat out our desk or stood on the Prom both butterfly-free zones. The work's garden has been a bit too exposed to the wind so we've only seen a couple of Small Whites there. All a bit annoyingly disappointing. 

However while doing a bit of weeding in the new garden we had to cut the work short when we came across these beauties. Small Tortoiseshell caterpillars enjoying a bit of sunshine on their Nettle leaf.

Back over on Patch 1 excitement has been provided by the first Kestrel (P1 #40) of the drifting over the school field while out with Monty on his pre-breakfast walk and then later that evening a small flock of House Martins (P1 #41) bombing up and down the end of our street, but sadly not coming close enough to get themselves on the Garden list too.

This evening we're helping out at a moth and bat night and lo and behold we found a Silver Y hiding on the washing line, the first macro-moth in the garden this year we've not had the chance to any trapping so far all we've seen a few micros and those have mostly been Light Brown Apple Moths.

Where to next? We'll let you know how we get on with the moths and the last of the National Whale and Dolphin Watches for this year. 

In the meantime let us know who's hiding extremely well in your outback

National Whale & Dolphin Watch 2016 so far

The Safari has been doing an hour's watch midweek during lunchtime for National Whale and Dolphin Watch but without success. Indeed we've probably had negative success when we recovered another dead baby Harbour Porpoise which is now awaiting a post-mortem. Today we learned of another youngster dead on the beach 'one day last week' which was found on the tide-line to the south of us along the toe of the dunes - what's going on with them? There does seem to be an awful lot washing up. Best of the rest has been daily Grey Seals, two today but always distant and not so easy to get the generally inexperienced at using telescopes volunteers on to them. Eventually everyone got at least a few seconds look at it/them. Thursday morning also provided a decent birding session when at least 20 Sandwich Terns and 10 Common Terns were fishing quite close to the wall. It's a pity it was so dull as they were probably just in range of the lens. Today bird excitement was limited to a brief build up of Gannets at a small bait ball just this side of the horizon to the south west early in the watch. There were never more than 20 and they soon either dispersed or drifted back over the horizon...it didn't amount to much at all and that was about it bird-wise for the next three and a half hours. Apart from the rather strange sighting of a pair of Common Scoters coming over the road from inland and landing on the sea just behind the surf - never seen that before!

Here's some pics from our trip north of the border to the capital of Bonny Scotland last weekend.

Edinburgh Castle with flaming torches

Late 16th century building skills - engineered onto the solid basalt rock The original 12th C castle was destroyed during a siege in 1570s

We were there to enjoy what may or may not have been Runrig's last UK gig after 43 years on the road. If it was the last it was an absolute cracker to end with and we can say "we were there", if it wasn't we'll have to go back!

Bruce - Canadian from Nova Scotia...New Scotland; so we suppose that's OK then

Here's Wifey's pics of the Greyfriar's Bobby pub we found by accident after the gig. What a dedicated doggy he was.

Oh and on the drive up we saw a real choo-choo train with smoke and all!!! Chooowwooooo. In Lancashire too! Showing our train-spotting 'knowledge' it might have been a Black 5.

After watching no whales or dolphins this morning we took the camera into the garden at Base Camp this arvo but there wasn't really that much to point it at.

A Small White butterfly was fluttering around Wifey's Nasturtiums so we went to have a look for any eggs finding some tiny already hatched caterpillars had started muching holes in the leaves - they'll be defoliated before too long!

Also lurking on the underside of the leaves were a few Blackfly, but with Aphids a few can very soon become very many!

The big one in the middle is exuding a drop of honeydew from its backside

On the upper surface of a nearby leaf an rather nicely marked dipteran fly of a totally unknown species was taking in the afternoon sun during a welcome break in the clouds. It's possibly a parasitic Tachinidae maybe Dexiosoma sp??????

Far easier to identify was this 'Batman' hoverfly, Myathropa florea. It's a whopper and an excellent wasp mimic.

Even easier to ID were the Red Tailed Bumble Bees  on the Thyme flowers. Plenty of Honey Bees on there too.

Where to next? The last throw of the Whale and Dolphin dice tomorrow. This time we're up at the start of Chat Alley - wonder  if there'll be any migrant birds on the cliffs below our watch point.
In the meantime let us know who's playing hard to get in your outback.

A great find on the beach

The Safari is back at work now and so Patch 2 it is. This morning it was lashing down but we able to wait til it had died off a bit. Getting to the wall we saw the tide was in, we've not been taking much notice of the tides while we were off. A tiny movement where we put the scope made us look closer and it was a small caterpillar no more than 2cm long.

Any one any ideas. Late Edit - Small Tortoiseshell...dohh we shoulda known that one, but it was out of context - any lame excuse will do.
Looking out there wasn't much to see on the sea just a couple of distant Gannets.

Mid-morning we had a job to do. Next week we've got some kids' groups on the beach but we can't access it from our normal place due to the engineering works so we had to find somewhere else suitable. We had a walk towards town and eventually found the best place was on the far side of the pier. A quick scoot around as the tide was dropping off the wall had us finding a large Cuttlefish bone.

A bit more scootling about had us finding our first jellyfish of the year, a small Moon Jelly.

On the way back we spotted a Grey Seal only a few yards off the wall so out came the phone again. Now with our naked eye we could see it easily and could even just about make out its whiskers...the phone on the other hand...and this is a heavy crop!

That tiny black speck in the centre of the circle is a Grey Seal's head - Honest!!!

Look at the size of that Cuttlefish!

At lunchtime we got out again and although the rain had stopped the air was now so hazy it was almost impossible to focus the scope at anything more than 1/2 - 3/4 mile. A quick scan gave us two male and a female Eiders going towards the river along the surf line. We soon picked up a few Manx Shearwaters, we seen a single one (168, P2 #53) yesterday. We saw more in the haze and in the end had well over a hundred at all ranges from quite close behind the surf to wobbly blobs on the horizon. In amongst the shearwaters were a small number of completely unidentifiable auks. There were more Gannets to including some that were fishing using very shallow dives so we assume the fish were pretty close to the surface.

Three Common Terns from the dockland colony passed us as did about half a dozen Sandwich Terns and there's still a few Common Scoters out there. And small flocks of both Ringed Plover and Dunlin went south towards the nearly exposed mudflats.
JD had almost exactly the same birds but we didn't get his Little Egret, that probably came off the salt-marshes in the river to the south of us.

After work we dropped a printed off copy of our children's story to a good friend and had a good old chat. As we left she showed us her Nuthatch nesting in her box, well we saw the box, but how bonkers for it to be there when they seem to have just about disappeared from their usual haunts in the big park. On her Silver Birch tree we both spotted an unusual looking fly.

Any ideas anyone

Where to next? A weekend means we'll be out and about on safari somewhere.We've got some stealth-cam footage to look through too, hopefully there'll be something worth sharing.

In the meantime let us know who's climbing the trees in your outback.

Calling the knowledgeable

The Safari has been busy in the garden at Base Camp today so no wildlife news at all...disturbed it all with various crashings and bangings.

Aussie Glen sent us this pic and asked if we knew what it is...any one out there like to hazard a guess...species would be good, family, order, class or even phylum might be helpful!

Over to you...we're pretty sure it's an invertebrate!!!

Tbh we don't know exactly how big it is (2-3cm?) which end is the front (right?) and if it has feet or not...we have an inkling of what it might be but will wait for your suggestions.

The location might give you a clue, the forests of the far SW Australia.

Where to next? The Shoresearch coastal wildlife volunteer training event tomorrow - looks like the weather will hold off long enough for us to do some serious rummaging in the rockpools.

In the meantime let us know how the weird and wonderful are shaping up in your outback.