THE KITES AND BUNTING ARE OUT........

....FOR A SPECIAL CELEBRATION.

Reed Bunting


 

This is where it all started...in the front bedroom of a small two up two down terraced cottage located in a small South Cambridgeshire village close to the Hertfordshire border...

 

Red Kite




....65 years ago on the 27th. April 1951 a small bundle of joy was brought into the world.
 

 (I'm glad that I soon grew out of the dress wearing phase!)

 Celebrating Corn Bunting and Reed Bunting.

The blonde hair didn't last long either, although during the last decade it does (what's left of it) appear to have once again reverted towards a lighter shade...of grey! 

 

Red Kite

65 years is a good amount of time to perfect your own style and persona to present to the world....

 

...how do you think I've done?

 

Corn Bunting


Now I find that some days trying to keep up the standard is just sooo tiring!....

 

 

LOCAL BIRDS

I made the most of the warm and sunny weather (it’s raining now!) that we’ve had over the last few days and managed to get out and about and photograph some of the local birds.


A Corn Bunting glowing in the early morning sunshine.

I found this pair of very confiding Stonechats…

The male




The female




I was very lucky to catch up with, what was a lifer and the highlight of the show for me, a reasonably rare (although there have been quite a few reported around the country just recently) Great Grey Shrike.

Distant views at first…


It was very flighty but I did manage to get a little closer…


Over four days of ‘local’ birding I managed to see fifty two different species of bird, all within a twelve mile radius of home. It was a good and enjoyable few days birding.

A WEEK IN THE HOT SUN......PART ONE.

No,  it's not what you're thinking, I've not been spending time lounging on a sun baked tropical island  somewhere in the South Pacific. No, it was last week here, in good ol' England, when we had some 'proper' summer  weather with (mostly) wall to wall sunshine and temperatures up to 30 degrees Celsius.

So, if you can stick with it, here is my account (mostly photographic, I took over 1500 pictures during the week...and I'm still sorting through them!!) of my week in the hot sun...

Day one...Pitstone Hill and Incombe Hole in Buckinghamshire.

The day started at 5am when I met Keith at the Ivinghoe Beacon car park, our quest for the day was to see if we could find Corn Buntings and the Dark Green Fritillary Butterfly. after a quick coffee, (thanks Keith, our catering  manager for the day!) we set of for the walk to Pitstone Hill.

These two, along with their recently shorn compatriots, looked rather bemused to see a couple of strange looking beings traipsing through their field at such an early hour!

 

As we arrived at the base of Pitstone Hill the sun was up and the temperature had started to rise. It wasn't long before we heard the jangling call (it's been likened to the jangling of a bunch of keys) of the bird we had come to see...a Corn Bunting was singing from the overhead power lines, our first objective soon achieved!

And now the butterflies had started to appear from their overnight resting spots.

Gatekeeper

Meadow Brown

After a couple of hours watching the Corn Buntings along with the numerous other birds that had  put in an appearance (18 species in total) we started to make our way back to the car for breakfast. Again we heard that jangling call and soon spotted a Corn Bunting sitting on a fence post.

 

After breakfast,  no sooner than we had started to make our way to Incombe Hole,  we came across our second objective of the day... a pair of Dark Green Fritillaries were feeding on some thistles.

Female

Male

 

Satisfied that we had easily found  our objectives for the day we continued our walk taking in the sight of the butterflies and wild flowers along the way. 

Marbled White

Large Skipper

Comma

Cut-leaved Selfheal (apparently quite rare!)

Clustered Bellflower

I thought I knew what this was but cannot find any reference for it. can anyone help?

Field Scabious

                                          ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 Day Two.....Hitchin Lavender in Hertfordshire.

Again I met up with Keith, athough this time not so early!!..10am, for a trip to Hitchin Lavender where I'd previously found Essex Skipper Butterflies. The temperature had already reached the high 20's when we arrived.

The rows of lavender looked stunning in the sunshine...

.....and were 'humming' with the sound of lots (and I mean LOTS!!) of Honey Bees and  various types of Bumble Bee.

Honey Bee

Red poppies conrasted well with the purple lavender...

Long-headed Poppy (no black spots on the base of the petals)

Unfortunately we didn't find the Essex Skipper, in fact birds and butterflies were largely noticeable by their absence...the heat of the day sending them too cooler spots maybe?

One butterfly that did put in an appearance was this Ringlet.

                                          ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Day Three......RSPB The Lodge, Sandy in Bedfordshire.

This time I left Keith at home!! and instead took my wife Claire to the headquarters of The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds..her choice by the way!

Another hot, 30c and sunny day as we started our walk around the reserve and again not that many birds showing in the heat....or maybe they had 'gone to ground' at the sight of a patrolling Hobby...

Further on we found a shady spot to sit and have a drink and something to eat (thanks for carrying it Claire X X ) when I heard a 'mewing' sound coming from some distant trees...Buzzard, I thought as I saw a bird silhouetted against the sun, appear out on a branch with some prey held firmly in its grasp, which it promptly started to eat. I fired off a few hopeful shots...

However on looking at the images later and with a great deal of help from Photoshop this is what I discovered...

Hobby

Now, I don't know if there was a family of Hobbies in the trees, there was certainley lots of noise, but I ever only saw this one out in the open!

 

Further on and we came to a small pond ( famed for its breeding Natterjack Toads!) where another photographer was busy taking pictures of a lone male Banded Demoiselle, we got chatting and it turned out that we live no more than a mile away from each other! (it's a small world, as they say!!). If you're reading this 'other photographer' I'm sorry but I omitted to ask your name.

Also flying around the pond were a pair of Ruddy Darter Drangonflies.

 Ruddy Darter male

Also spotted in the vegetation was this emerging dragonfly larva... 

 ...does anyone know which dragonfly this is about to become?

Back to the visitor centre for much needed cool drinks and ice creams and a chance to take a few photographs of the Spotted Flycatcher pair that have returned to nest here for another year.

 

Also seen around the visitor centre...

A resting Rock Dove/Feral Pigeon

Small Skipper

So, a good three days out in the sun doing the thing I like best... taking pictures of our beautiful and varied wildlife.

If you've stuck with it to the end..thank you, you deserve a medal ( I hear they're giving them away at the moment just a few miles down the road, perhaps I could borrow some for you!!)

In part two of this epic I have a chance meeting with 'royalty' and get up close and personal with some dragons... as soon as I've sorted through all the photo's that is!!

BIRDING FROM MY CAR

A couple of days ago I decided to see if I could find the Corn Buntings that had been reported as showing well  about ten miles from my house. I arrived at the location, a small car park,  around mid morning. The weather was quite windy and overcast with just a few brief glimpses of the sun (so what's new!!).

I positioned the car so that I had a good view over the car park and almost immediately I saw that a few birds, Yellowhammer, Chaffinch, Meadow Pipit and Linnet  were coming down to bathe in the puddles left by the recent rain. Unfortunately they were frequently spooked by walkers crossing the car park and also by other cars arriving and leaving making photography rather difficult!

Linnet

Yellowhammer

 

It wasn't long before I heard the "little bit of bread and no cheeeese" song of a Yellowhammer coming from the overhead power lines, closely followed by a singing Corn Bunting (another tick for the list!) and after a few minutes a Dunnock started to serenade me from the bushes close by.

Corn Bunting

Dunnock

 

I also had a fascinating few minutes watching two Magpies (juveniles, I think!) as they explored, constantly chattering to each other,  all around the car park  with one spending some time interacting with a discarded yogurt pot.

 

So, without leaving the car, I'd had a couple of hours of good birding and had noted sixteen different species, apart from the above I'd also seen Jackdaw and Carrion Crows in the adjacent fields, Starling, Goldfinch and Great Tit in the bushes, a hovering Kestrel, two soaring Buzzards, as well  as overflying  Woodpigeons and Swifts.

The Videos...

 

This weekend and next week promises to be warm and sunny here (Summer at last!!) and I'm looking forwards to getting out and about in some descend weather for a change. Wherever you are I wish you all a great weekend and upcoming week.