Trying to make the most of the last of the sunshine

The Safari got out for a long lunch yesterday. Patch 2 was very quiet so we took the camera for a stroll round the work's garden. We were looking for butterflies, one species in particular but the sun had gone in by now and that make our target species might be a bit trickier.

There were still several Ragwort plants with Cinnabar moth caterpillars munching them bare.

Above them in the hedge the local House Sparrows were noisy and active.

Near to them we heard the high pitched begging calls of nestlings but it would be a while before we learned their identity. Butterflies were plentiful with Small Whites the most numerous.

Followed by Meadow Browns.

The hoped for Grayling hadn't made the few hundred yard flit from the dunes to the south. Or if one did it wasn't around when we were looking.

When we got to the end of the hedge and associated wildflowers we turned round to see a Dunnock on the lawn a ways off. It hopped around a bit grabbed a morsel and took it to the hedge from where we heard the heard the begging youngsters again - mystery solved.

Still keeping our eyes on the flowers, just in case of a Grayling, we saw plenty of Red Tailed Bumble Bees mostly on the Ragwort. Watching them we spotted another much smaller bee working the flowers.

We're fairly sure it's the tiny Colletes daviesanus which we've recorded here in previous years.

Today we've had a day off pending an adventure northwards this weekend. We concentrated on the flowers blooming in the garden

Wish you had smellavision - this one is delicious

Purple Loosestrife buzzing with bees

Oregano

Salad Burnet - in a pot donated by a local botanist

Honey Bee on the Oregano, lots of them being busy today

In the afternoon we had to take Wifey up town for an appointment and while we waited we set for the big park with the big camera and met up with BD for a couple of hours to see what we could find.

We haven't processed those pics yet so here's a cute cygnet off the phone - shame about the bag of turd in the top corner.

Sadly there were far too many people walking round staring at phone screens playing Pokemon, they were passing inches away from amazing real creatures all with awesome super-powers, if only they could be made as interesting and 'important' as the digital nonsense...how can we do that before it's too late?

Where to next? You'll have to wait to find out about our adventure to the north.
In the meantime let us know who's buzzing around in your outback.

We didn't get em all!

The Safari had a mixed bag today. The Peregrine was seen on the tower on the drive up the hill. On the prom R'Ouzel Puddle has been drained, filled in and resown with grass, but a new puddle has developed a little further down which held a (local?) Pied Wagtail this morning; still haven't seen a Blackbird on those new grassy areas!

A marine biology student and her tutor came in for a bit of advice/ideas about her dissertation and itt would seem that the distribution of the Sabellaria reefs is going to be well analysed over the course of the winter months.

The Young Uns came round to do a bit of work in the Untidy Garden getting it ready for the autumn, it is currently swarming with hoverflies at the slightest hint of sunshine. They found a roosting pug which we all thought was a worn Double Striped Pug. But we could all be wrong.

Only a few bees were around in the mostly dull conditions but this Buff Tailed Bumble Bee was truly enormous and not at all happy with our close approach with the camera, persistently waving her middle leg in the air as a warning for us to back off. A pose we somehow failed to capture on digital film!

After the borders had been attended to it was time to see how many 3 Spined Sticklebacks were left in the pond after the last 'battle' in the 'war' against stickles. A few days after our last netting session we counted about half a dozen still in the pond but yesterday we had a slow walk around the pond and counted at least 30!

With three of  us netting we soon had 50 in the bucket! No wonder there is virtually no invertebrate life in the pond these days.

We left the pond to settle and the fish to forget about the nets and went to have some lunch. After three quarter of an hour we crept up to the pond again and started fishing. before long we had added at least another 30-40 to the bucket!!! All were released unharmed to a site where there are plenty of their brethren and they can do little harm to the ecosystem...But how many do you think we'll see when we get to work tomorrow morning? There's bound to be more than two and if we don't get them out there won't be any pond life for the kiddies to study next season. We'll have another netting session later in the autumn and another around Easter just to make sure we either got them all or have the 'starting' population as low as possible to give the other animals a chance.

Next it was a site visit to our now well grown, and difficult to crash through, Water Vole site. And what a sight it was; the Purple Loosestrife was simply stunning.

One of the main reasons for going was to check on the locals and see if they had done the jobs we'd asked them too a while back - disappointingly they hadn't although that could have been due to the high water levels in the pond after all the recent rain. We couldn't find any Common Meadow Rue either despite it being quite numerous when we were last here, but it did look like Meadowsweet had had a bumper year as had the Spearmint. If access was easier we're sure this would be a crackin place to put a moth trap out.

The dull blustery conditions kept the larger insect down but we did find a nice bright male Common Darter who wouldn't stay still enough for a pic and later a stonking Brown Hawker.

Lifting the sheet put down for amphibians and reptiles only produced Red Ants and ground beetles although a very neat grass nest suggested a Short Tailed Field Vole had been active recently.

But what about the Water Voles - well we still haven't actually seen any, nor heard them 'plop' at this site but we did find some nice feeding signs and a latrine, in the pond too rather than the ditch so our habitat works have been successful but we think we'll need to put up a trail-cam to stand any chance of actually 'seeing' the cutesy little blighters!

So not a bad day's safari-ing and it just goes to show you mightn't see what you want to see but there is ALWAYS something of interest to be seen!

Where to next? Gotta be something on the sea tomorrow - we gave it a short go with precious little success this morning but Young UN AB watched a reasonably close Arctic Skua pass by on the rising tide a couple of hours after we'd left.

In the meantime let us know who's eating you out of house and home in your outback,