Tuesday 18 August 2015

Can't beat a bit of snail racing

The Safari was hoping to be able to take a tasty looking moth or two to our summer fair on Sunday but there wasn't anything in the trap colourful enough to inspire the general populace. Best of the bunch was the first Willow Beauty of the year.
Easy to spot on the wall
A little trickier on a wooden background
The fair had a sustainability and community theme and went well, the first one we've done, thankfully the weather was glorious and that brought lots of people out.
Marine animals touch tank
Welly throwing competition - very popular
Male Sand Lizard
Juvenile Sand Lizards nearly ready to be released into the wild in North Wales as part of the captive breeding reintroduction scheme - most people didn't know we had lizards in this country never mind on the dunes only half a mile away!
About half an hour before the finish all the gulls went up with a racket and the Starlings and Pigeons too. We didn't see what made them flush but we did here the unmistakable call of a Green Sandpiper (P2 #60) a Patch 2 lifer, where it had come from is anyone's guess there's precious little habitat for one anywhere near.
The sea has been quite calm so far this week but produced little of interest other than distant Grey Seals. Mammals were also represented at Base Camp by the first Grey Squirrel we've seen there for a long time, maybe over a year!
Today we had a family group pond dipping and mini-beast safari-ing. All the usual suspects were netted. Nothing outstanding was found other than a huge load of tiny snails when the kids were looking for Garden Snails to 'race'. We think they are probably juvenile Garden Snails.
Over turning one the laths of wood we've managed to get a huge splinter of rotten wood down the underside of our finger nail and have only been able to get about 1/3 of it out. It's beginning to throb and we can feel some septic fun coming on.
Where to next? A day out with LCV on his Midlands patch - should be good.
In the meantime let us know who's got where they shouldn't in your outback.


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