Pleasant surprises all round

The Safari was very pleasantly surprised the other day, wehappened to be looking out of the window when a family of Greenfinches dropped onto our feeders. That might not be a big deal to many readers but they were the first actually IN the garden since we moved here 2 1/4 years ago, our only other records have been single fly-overs in each of the previous autumns. Unfortunately two off the feeders were empty, the House Sparrows are eating us out of house and home at the moment, and the only one that was nearly full was the nyger feeder, the holes of which are almost definitely to small for a Greenfinch to get its chunky beak through so it was unsurprising that they didn't stay long - we wonder how long it'll be before we get our next IN the garden record.

The following day we had another surprise, a fun one but at the time not so welcome. We've had a pair of Herring Gulls nesting on the roof again this year and thankfully neither of the chicks have fallen off and had to be chucked back up. Both chicks fledged successfully, unlike previous years when only two out of the three survived to fledging. One of them had returned overnight and in the morning we found it our small wildlife pond have a right old sploosh.

Whether it had deliberately flown down for a bath or got blown off the roof and decided to make the most of a bad situation we don't know. We do know that it struggled to get enough lift to fly over the fence in the morning but a stronger breeze blew up after lunch and when we went to check on it it had gone saving us having to get a soft blanket to  throw over it and take it to the beach.

The recent more settled weather also encouraged us to get the moth trap out. The selection of weather forecasts we look at suggested a dry muggy still night so there should be a good chance of a decent catch. No such luck, when we got up the following morning we saw it had rained overnightand the trap was very wet inside, fortuantely the electrics hadn't blown or tripped out. The catch wasn't anything to write home about either just nine moths of only six species. However, one of them was a new species for us, the tiny Argyresthia geodartella. A stunning shiny wee beasty, it's a shame that some these micros are so small and overlooked by 99.9% of the population; if only they were the size of butterflies then those folk would be able to see how absolutely wonderful they are and might appreciate them more.

The following day CR very kindly took us to Brockholes at the other end of the motorway just beyond Preston where we'd arranged to meet up with IH again. We arrived first and had a few minutes to wait so headed to the floating visitor centre to  look for Roe Deer and Great Crested Grebes from the open air viewing/pinic area. There was a single distant Great Crested Grebe but there could have been more Roe Deer than there are Wildebeest on the Serengeti, the vegetation had grown up so tall anything smaller than an Elephant would be impossible to see - one of the few woes of summer! The floating platform makes for great fish watching when the water is still. There's a large shoal of either Roach or Rudd or probbably both right under your feet no doubt waiting for a passing sandwich or pie crust to be dropped in.

While we waited for IH to arrive the Great Crested Grebe came a lot closer but sailed right past us.

But then it did the decent thing and caught a fish, a Dace by the look of it.

And took it off to its young at the far end of the lake.

IH appeared as the grebe paddled off into the distance and likewise the three of us would toddle off into the distance starting with a wander along the riverbank. Before we got to the riverbank there's a bit of a woody patch to go through which gave us the first of the many millions of IH's least favorite plant, Himalayan Balsam.

A Common Darter dragonfly and then a female Black Tailed Skimmer landed on the path for a bit of warmth but we were too slow for a pic. Would these early dragonflies and their kin bring out one of the day's target species? A yard further along the path the sun shone on a little glade where several insects buzzed around a few Ragwort plants. We looked for Cinnabar moth caterpillars as we've not seen any so far this summer. None to be seen. Among the mostly Eristalis sp hoverflies around the flowerheads was a small black and yellow 'wasp'. On closer inspection it wasn't a wasp but a Conopid fly, probably Conops ceriaeformis.

Back under the dappled shade of the trees a Speckled Wood sat on a leaf wonderfully backlit.

Along the riverbank we hoped to find an Osprey but didn't, at least IH was happy to see his first Heron of the morning. As the morning warmed butterflies began to flit around the grassland, mainly Meadow Browns and Gatekeepers with a supporting cast of a couple of Red Admirals and, a little more surprisingly, a Painted Lady. A female Mallard dabbling mid-stream in the river turned out to be a Shoveler when we looked through our bins, what an odd place for one of those with all the still water around the site, not really a species you associate with running water.
Just away from the bankside vegetation CR found this pait of mating Gatekeers

From the riverside we walked up the hill back towards the main path and a specific location for the other of our main target secies for the day. Slowly walking along the edge of the trees we heard a Whitethroat 'chrrrrr' from the solitary Hawthorn bush in the field behind us but that;s not what we were after. We really wanted to find a little bronzy butterfly, a bit like this Small Skipper but one that flies much higher.

Bizarrely this was the only skipper we saw all day, there should have been loads of them in the grassland we'd just walked through. Anyway there were quite a few Meadow Browns and Gatekeepers to keep us occupied as well as a couple of Large Whites and Small/Green Veined Whites too - the now strong warm sunshine meant butterflies weren't for settling much. And then we spotted our quarry, small, fast, bronzy gold and high up towards the tree tops, it can only have been a White Letter Hairstreak and a few minutes later a second (or the same one doing a circuit) flew past us at height. Leaving the other two patrolling that area of treeline we went on a bit further to the White Letter Hairstreak hotspot by the bench and path junction in the hope that one might get altitude sickness and come down to our lowly height for some nectar but when we got there we knew this wasn't going to happen as there we no Thistles in flower and all the Brambles had gone over to become proto-blackberries. We walked back to join CR and IH to learn they'd had no further sightings. Not the best sightings we've ever had of these elusive little butterflies but a bit of a relief in a funny old summer to know they are still about. 

The cool of the woods was a welcome relief from the now blazing sun, at this time of day and at this time of year the birds go very quiet and there was little to be seen or even heard. Logs tied to trees provided an interesting diversion.

We assume they are to attract Willow Tits. As the logs rot the Willow Tits will be able to excavate a nest cavity as they do this rather than use an existing hole like other members of their family. The trees with logs were all Poplars, a very soft wood that should break down pretty quickly. Even if no Willow Tits appear,we're not sure if there are any in this area, the logs will be great habitat for a wide range of invertebrates. Coming out of the woods past the smaller pools it was very hot it was very noticeable how few insects were about even on plants like Hogweed which are normally teeming with life. A handful of Common Darters and a few Brown Hawkers were the only dragonflies we saw and they were keeping low over the vegaetation, what we wanted were some high fliers waiting to be picked off by a Hobby (or two!). There were no dragonflies acending to any height at all which would suggest there were no midges or other aerial plankton up there for them, no Sand Martins either (or Swifts or Swallows) again suggesting a lack of food up there. Even the butterflies along this stretch of the path were limited to a handful of Gatekeepers (below) and Meadow Browns.

The corner where the open path turns back into the woodland was busy with a family of Chiffchaffs, the youngsters keeping ma n pa busy collecting and delivering tasty morsels to hungry mouths, a Treecreeper briefly flitted through too.

At the first viewing screen overlooking the water there were no birds in sight so we checked the path edges for invertebrates and found this rather unusual form of Gatekeeper. We've had a good ole trawl through Google Images and Flickr and found only a tiny number showing either two black dots on the forewing or the small white centred dot on the hind wing and none showing both these features! It's a female too with no scent brand on the forewing.

Rejoining the main drag a little way along was a bit of a clearing on the right with some big white blobs at the back, a look through the bins revealed them to be massive, really massive fungi. It's hard to tell if they're growing on a fallen log or out of the ground but they are certainly impressive, each one being well over a foot in diameter. We're useless at fungi so we've no idea which species they are.

We were now getting towards lunchtime and thoughts were turning to the joys of pies and other goodies but there was still a couple of hundred yards to go before we got back to the cars. We'd not gone much further when a small white moth landed on a leaf right in front of our noses. It turned out to be a Bird Cherry Ermine, we should have cast our shadow over it when getting the pic, we never realised how reflective they are, it didn't look anything like that reflective to our naked eye.

One more viewing area overlooking the lake to visit before we could lay our hands on our butties. Here the nesting raft for the Common Terns looks more like some kind of prison but the terns seemed to like it.

There were still at least four adults hanging around but no sign of any juveniles so we don't know if they've been successful or not this season. Out on the lake there was a flock of a dozen or more Tufted Ducks, another pair of Great Crested Grebes with a youngster, too many Canada Geese and a good few Mute Swans. The island held several Lapwings and a noisy Oystercatcher. 

With nothing close enough for his lens CR had taken hinself off to check the sunny path edges for macro subjects and called us over to have a look at a good find, probably a 4-Barred Major fly, Oxycera rana. Another wasp mimic.

A quick look at the Sand Martin nesting bank didn't give us any photo opportunities although if you look closely there are two juveniles peeking their heads out of their burrow right of centre.

Lunch now called more strongly than wildlife!!! 

After feeding our faces we were off again and on route to putting our bags back in the cars we passed a couple of 6-Spot Burnet moths having a tussle over a Creeping Thistle flower. There should have been many more insects on this flowery bank but it was almost devoid of other invertebrate life.

Walking back to the the lake we'd just left for a look from tyhe big Lookout hide we stopped when CR found a small number of Cinnabar moth caterpillars on their Ragwort foodplant. These were the first we've seen this year and not for want of looking there just aren't any around Base Camp despite there being plenty of Ragwort. We've not seen an adult yet - is this going to be the first year in probably well over 50 we've not seen one?!?! 

Another plant a few feet away had some too but they were the exception rather than the norm as we hadn't seen any on the plentiful Ragwort all morning and that was with keeping an eye out for them since we've not seen any this year.

The afternoon was getting proper hot and more butterflies were on the wing, this Comma stopped right by us and started to furl and unfurl its tongue.

The only insects we'd seen in any numbers all day were Eristalis sp Drone Flies, even they weren't visiting as many flowers as they ought to have been and blue damselflies the lattter not really wanting to settle in convenient places for a pic. When a Common Blue Damselfly did deign to settle in front of us we muffed the shot a bit.

Along the path coming away from the big hide CR spotted a Swollen Thighed Beetle, a female - without the swollen thighs! A species we don't see on the Fylde for some reason...lack of looking??? A look on the NBN Atlas shows they are a mainly southern species so might not have made it this far north and west yet. The nearest dot to us is here at Brockholes and there are only four dots to the north of us of which only one is a confirmed sighting, just over the border into Scotland

As we mentioned earlier it was getting hot, must have been over 25°C in the sun, the butterflies were flitting about very rapidly. We'd already seen a few Ringlets but finding a stationary one was another matter until this one kindly stopped for us.

Rounding a little bend in the path we stopped in our tracks, a female Blackbird was full on sunbathing right in front of us, all it needed was a sunlounger, sunscreen and a cocktail and it could have been on the beach in Benidorm.

It wasn't for moving but eventually was disturbed by a family coming from the opposite direction, that gave us the opportunity to move on. We were making our war back to 'Hairstreak Corner' when we met JB, a stalwart volunteer at the reserve and keen entymologist, he told us some good places to look for his favoured dragonflies and also that so far this year he'd only seen one, yes ONE, Common Blue Butterfly here, it should really be teaming with them. This year's weird poor weather has had a dreadful effect on our already severely depleted invertebrate populations. Needless to say we'd not seen any here yet.

He pointed us in the direction of a field pond noted for it's dragonflies and on the way to find it we passed a chirpy little Robin.

And then came across the best sighting of the day so far, a Red Admiral 'feeding' on dung, probably Fox dung as dogs aren't allowed on the reserve.

This is something we've seen other species do on the telly but don't ever recall seeing it in Britian in real life before. That's one of the wonders of nature, you just never know when you're going to see something new. We found JB's pond and saw a couple of Brown Hawkers flying over it but we didn't fancy the walk through the thick vegetation to reach it - it just smacked of too many bitey Cleggs. To be fair we'd hardly seen any all day and folk much more scantily clad than us didn't appear to have bite marks all over their exposed flesh - another sign of the current Insect Apocalypse? 

After giving JB's pond a miss we continued to 'Hairstreak Corner' and soon found several Meadow Browns and Gatekeepers low down, but we wanted to spot things high up. Which we did after a few minutes, not bronzy gold but paler, we thought it might have been a Holly Blue but IH saw it settle and told us it was a Purple Hairstreak. It buzzed around a few more times always settling out of view, one of these times it was passed very swiftly by what was probably a White Letter Hairstreak that disappeared into the canopy never to be seen again. Eventually the Purple Hairstreak did do the decent thing and find a leaf in full view to rest on.

It's a rare day out on safari when you see two species of hairstreaks even if one of them only gave brief flight views. Our bad hand was now getting swollen and uncomfortable with all the walking and the heat so we made our way slowly back  to the  cars via the riverside walk. It was busy with summer holiday picnicers now so we didn't linger too long, just long enough to find our first Banded Demoiselle of the day.

And the last Heron of the day, although they had been ahead in the Herons v Egrets Stakes they were overwhelmed when a flock of three Little Egrets flew up river. The river also held a huge shoal of small to medium sized fish which repeated scattered in a surface breaking swirl. We couldn't see a submarine predator and they could have all been trying to chase down a tasty morsel being brought along in the current. We think (=guess) that given the size and number of them they were Dace. The Heron was stood in the wrong part of the river! More food than he could shake his beak at was 50 yards up river, or he'd eaten his fill!

On the fishy theme a last look around the edge of the visitor centre didn't give us any more fishy photo opporunties with the big shoal of Roach/Rudd as the wind had now ruffled the water too much. In the more sheltered parts we saw lots of small fry and some very small Jack Pike

Another day of quality over quantity left us musing over the distinct lack of insects as we headed back to Base Camp. As for our targets, yes we got brief flight views of the White Letter Hairstreak but there was no sign of any Hobbys to add to our Challenge tally so still nine species required for our target.

Where to next? Probably on the trail of more insects up north but anythinig can happen between now and then - keep your eyes peeled folks.

In the meantime let us know who's missing from your outback

Our first post-operation safari

The Safari was very kindly taken up to Leighton Moss by CR for our first day out after jour recent surgery. 
Our first stop was at Tim Jackson hide where a noisy pair of Oystercatchers were on and off the Sand Martin nest bank/box, they must have had a youngster somewhere but it was out of sight from our vantage point. The obligatory check for Red Deer under the trees to the right was negative - again! A family of Mute Swans cruised around the back of the pool but there wasn't really enough going on to keep us interested for long. having seen all that was on offer we soon moved round the corner to Grisedale Hide. Here a Heron and a Great White Egret were having a preen-off in the large tree across the pool, if you look closely thesere's a Cormorant up there too.

Below them in the pool was another Heron fishing in quite deep water.

Hardly anyone was about, the early morning rain keeping people tucked up at home, but that did give us the rare opportunity to get into 'Photographers' Corner'. last time we were sat here a Reed Warbler was singing from very close by but deep in the reeds, this time, probably the same bird was singing from the Willow bush a bit further back.

A very late addition to our Challenge tally coming in at #153. While scanning over the reedbeds for any Marsh Harriers that might be up now the rain had stopped and maybe a distant Osprey hovering beyond the tree line over the Causway/Lower Hide pool we spied something in the field on the far hillside that didn't look like cattle, two Fallow Deer were in 'Fallow Deer Field', so named as decades ago the Safari and IH (who couldn't be with us today) saw a herd of Fallow Deer in there. Closer scrutiny revealed there were three, if there were any more hidden by the large Ash tree we never saw them. It's a long way from here to there and any sensible photographer wouldn't have bothered to press the shutter but hey-ho if you squint hard enough you'll see them.

While continuing to scan for raptors and check if any more Fallow Deer had emerged from behind the aforementioned tree we ddi get a big brown bird in flight circling not too high over the reedbeds in the middle distance - not a raptor but a very welcome Bittern...#154. Not the best pic- we should have upped the shutter speed a bit...but when it all happens in a moment we'd didn't get a chance to think to do  that before it had descending into the reeds never to be seen again.

With no Marsh Harrier activity this morning - where were they all? - we trundled off back down the path to Lillian's Hide. From there we saw numerous Coots and a Great Crested Grebe with an almost independent youngster doing its own thing and another Heron or two. So far today Herons were easily out numbering egrets. A few Swifts scythed through the air above the pool but nothing like the numbers we've seen in the past. Are we going to be able to reverse this dramatic loss of wildlife or are we just going to document its inexorable decline to almost nothing, hopefully not the latter but if it's not to be that then a lot of people have got to do make serious changes starting with governments doining joined-up thinking across all departments and policies to include nature in their thinking....and more impotantly DOING.

One species that is sort of thriving and making a comeback from being extirpated from the British Isles is the Osprey, and we saw one briefly from the Causway Hide while chowing down on our pies and butties. From tentative nesting attempts in the 1950's and then protection in the late 50's followed by more recent re-introduction schemes there are now maybe 300 pairs and a good number of non-breeding individuals around the country. 300 pairs might sound quite a lot but there's more people than that in our street!

Sadly it didn't hang around and do some fishing like they seem to do for everyone else but flew over our heads towards Lillian's Hide but didn't stay there more than a few minutes either according to other birders. 

With butties munched it was time to take the path down to Lower Hide, all quiet along there now that putting seed down has been discouraged. The only thing of note we saw was a juvenile Cetti's Warbler skulking along the pathside ditch. In the hide it was good to catch up with KL and his mates and while chatting we spotted more deer on the far hillside, not more Fallow Deer but a pair of Roe Deer in the field to the left of where the Fallow Deer had been, they'd moved on by the time we'd got down here. Once again too far away for a sensible photographer but you get the gist and it's always great to see them no  matter how far away.

The chat and banter continued as did the Heron's annihilation of egrets with a Heron doing a balancing act on a stick taking the biscuit.

No more Ospreys turned up and the only Marsh Harrier was very distant and not very active on the far side. A prominent wake disappearing behind a reedy island had us going, was this to be our first Otter of the year...no -  a Cormorant appeared at the other end of the island a minute or so later. The best of the rest was a female Emperor dragonfly ovipositing among the Water Horsetails in front of us but although we had good views through the bins she was too obscured by intervening vegetation for a decent pic.
Heading back to the car we'd not gone far when we saw a group off photographers pointing their lenses at something close by in the bushes. It turned out to be a trio of juvenile Cetti's Warblers waiting patiently for the/an adult to come back  with a  beak full of delicious grub(s). One of them was probably the one we'd seen earlier as they weren't far from where we'd seen that one. Getting a pic through the jungle was far from easy, the could have done the decent thing and sat a foot or so higher where the vegetation was much thinner.

You might ask if we didn't bother with the ovipositing Emperor why did we bother to get a pic of these? Well you do see Emprerors egg-laying fairly often if your out n about along the water's edge but a trio of Cetti's fledglings is a whole differrent ball gane - a once in a lifetime event! 

Our next stop was the Allen Pool out on the saltmarsh but it was deserted apart from looking far left against the light. So straight to the  Eric Morecambe Hide it was. KL had told us where he'd seen the Wood Sandpiper, a good bird for us it's a feair few years since we've seen one. It had moved since he was last in the hide but it didn't take us long to find it although it was now quite a bit further away than he'd seen it. A good one for the Challenge, a 'Bonus Bird' taking us to 155

After a while it left the sanctuary of the fringing reeds on the far side of the pool and joined a few Black Headed Gulls on the slightly nearer island.

With our boots filled with Wood Sandpiper and helping get several other birders onto it we turned our attention to the other side of the hide where rumour had it a Greenshank was somewhere to be found. While scanning around for it we saw plenty of Avocets and Redshank, a few Little Egrets (at last!), more Herons(!) and some Shelducks. The large flock of Black Tailed Godwits which has recently held several of the needed for our Challenge Bar Tailed Godwits was miles away and didn't even flinch when everything else was put to flight by a passing Sparrowhawk. Eventually we did come across the Greenshank just about close enough for a pic #156 - only 9 more species to photograph to reach our target!

For several minutes it worked its way back and forth along that far bank.

Once it had flown off we turned our attention back to the other side of the hide where a couple of well grown Avocet chicks were swidhing their growing bills through the shallow water.

On the loppy exposed mud a flock of Lapwings loafed about, one got hungry and went to get a snack.

A young Pied Wagtail was close by scampering about picking off hatching flies.

An adult Avocet flew in and landed among the Lapwings and showed the young Avocets how to use their bill once it had grown to its full length.

Guess who blew the highlights - is it really the cardinal sin of photography? Darn not having time enough to check and change those settings!

for much of the afternoon birds had been walking round a bit of wood stuck in the mud close to where they  were feeding. When a Lapwing walked very  close to it we saw there was an eggshell caught on it. Looks like either an Avocet's or Black Headed Gull's and if you look at the full size image you'll see a hole in it which may be from predation or it didn't hatch and got damaged floating into the stick.

Meanwhile a Little Egret flew past prompting a check of the area for any more but we couldn't see any 'new' ones so the day ended with a narrow but very welcome victory for Herons 11-10.

Back on the mud more lapwings were pulling out worms, through the bins it appeared there were two or maybe even three species involved - how the Lapwings saw them is another matter, they can't have been deep cos a Lapwing's beak isn't very long but when we scrutinised a particular Lapwing until it caught one we couldn't see anything on the surface that would suggest a worm  was present, the Lapwings must be able to detail down to almost individual grains of mud moving 'in the wrong direction'. They were almost 100% successful, rarely bending down for a peck without coming up with a worm.

That one with the wind-blown curly tuft is my favourite shot of the day

We finished the day with a fly-by Black Headed Gull

A reflective Oystercatcher

And a gaggle of Avocets

It was a grand day out on safari which on the face of it appeared to be a quiet day but then looking back you can't sniff at Bittern, Osprey, Marsh Harrier, 2 species of deer, egg laying dragonfly, Cetti chicks, Avocets and much much more. Add in the fresh air, craic and banter and you've got the makings of a proper good day out on safari. Big thanks to CR for sterling work behind the steering wheel too.

Where to next? We're out on safari  again tomorrow, somewhere we don't visit perhaps as often as we should.

In the meantime let us know who's the not so early bird catching all the worms in your outback.