Darters Delight

Britain's heat wave continues and it was almost too hot for comfort today as I took a stroll down to Gretton weir. Even insects seem to be suffering and numbers of both butterflies and dragonflies seemed down.

Small Copper and female Common Blue.

Plenty of Common Blues at Willowbrook Industrial Estate with over fifty being seen though my highlight was a single Small Copper which I managed to photograph. Other species included three each of both Brown Argus and Small Heath. The outward walk through Brookfield Plantation was not too productive as the rides were still for the most part in shade though Speckled Woods and Common Darters made the most of any sunny spots. I caught a brief view of a small party of Fallow Deer which included a couple of fawns but they disappeared almost as quickly as they had appeared.

Green-veined and Small White.

The walk towards Gretton was a bit uneventful, the white butterflies remain common but numbers of the browns are much decreased since their peak of a fortnight or so. Very few of the larger species seem about at the moment and I'm not sure if they're sitting out the hottest parts of the day or just plain absent.

Ringlet variations.



Gretton weir was rather disappointing as it has been for most of this summer. White-legged Damsel's season appears to be over as none were seen and Banded Demoiselles were very scarce indeed. A single Migrant Hawker was holding station over the Welland while several Brown Hawkers were actively hunting. This latter species seems to be the only one of the largest species that seems to be in anything like their usual numbers, perhaps they deal with the heat more efficiently? A pleasing sighting here was of a large flock of Lapwings in a field next to the river, at least a hundred birds.

The Welland and a juvenile Robin.

On the return through Brookfield I saw half a dozen Ringlets, their numbers always seem to plummet once July has finished but they did include one with an interesting variation. This butterfly had much reduced ring markings on its underwing and appeared rather plain when compared to its relatives. Also present but I small numbers were Gatekeepers and Meadow Browns.

Meadow Brown.

With little of interest on view I took some time to take some photographs of the many Ruddy and Common Darters which frequented the rides, they really are obliging little creatures!

Common and Ruddy Darters.

Dipping at Stanwick

A sighting, confirmed by photos, of a Lesser Emperor at Stanwick Lakes yesterday was enough to have a group of people out this morning hoping to catch a sighting of this rare visitor. Unhappily for our intrepid band the target managed to evade everybody, is the collective name for a group of dippers a despondency?

Stanwick Lakes and Emperor, shame it wasn't a Lesser!

Despite my second dragonfly dip of the week it was not a total loss as I finally caught up my county first for the year Migrant Hawkers as quite a lot were zipping about. Other dragons included the two darters as well as Emperor and Brown Hawkers. Not much variety in the way of damselflies either but plenty of Banded Demoiselles and at least one Red-eyed were seen. Only a few butterflies were seen but they included Small Tortoiseshell and Brimstone.

Small Tortoiseshell and Brimstone.

Having returned to Corby and been dropped off at Weldon by a couple of friends I wandered over to Priors Hall. The heat was building by now and it was something of an effort to walk around. Despite this I did find a few things of interest mainly dragonflies though not exclusively so. An ovipositing Emperor looked very brown and seemed to have something of a blue saddle which made me think that I'd found a Lesser but examinations of the pictures showed that this was not the case. Several Brown Hawkers were seen ovipositing too while I also saw a fine male Southern Hawker and more Migrants. A large number of Bandeds, by Priors standards at least, were present though I couldn't find any Emeralds on their usual ponds.

Ruddy Darters and Brown Hawker.

Pick of the butterflies was a female Silver-washed Fritillary feeding on water mint, it's getting towards the end of their season so you have to appreciate every view. Still many Common Blues and also rather a lot of Brown Argus while numbers of Small Heaths are starting to build.

Another Emperor and Silver-washed Fritillary.

For the second trip in a row a decent bird made the list when an immature Marsh Harrier, only my second here, was seen drifting eastwards. Finally a Brown Hare was seen all too briefly as it shot off over the quarry and out of sight.

Priors rarity, a Banded Demoiselle.

Yankee Doodle Dandies.

Something of a departure from recent activities in that birding occupied most of the day on Monday (30/7/18) as a trio of us headed eastwards to the wide open spaces of Norfolk. Black Darter had been one of our target species but unfortunately we did not manage to find any and so I still await my first sighting. Despite this dip related minor depression it turned out to be a very good day and anyway I can always look for the darters on another day.

Dersingham sundews.

Our day began at Dersingham bog with the failed darter hunt, the weather at this point was far from ideal though I did at least finally catch up with a year first Migrant Hawker. A single Holly Blue butterfly was seen near to the car park while several Siskins flew over.

Mud is not in short supply at Snettisham!

Having accepted that it was not going to be our day on the darter front we then moved on to Snettisham where a rare visitor from North America was the draw. Snettisham is far from being my favourite spot on this coast but as I'd never seen a Semipalmated Sandpiper before I couldn't not go. We arrived to find a fairly full car park and set out on the long walk past the row of almost shanty town type huts and past the various old gravel workings. A file of slightly dejected looking birders were traipsing back with negative reports and I began to feel just a little bit worried. Having got to the shingle it was obvious that the tide was out and providing acres of mud on which a hungry American visitor might feed.

Wall butterfly.

Stopping to scope an area of mud we did find a smaller wader feeding amongst a group of Dunlins but after some deliberation decided that it was an adult Little Stint. Ahead of us, near the RSPB reserve there was another group of birders looking out across the mud. Catching up with them produced the hoped for news, the bird was in view and furthermore a chap was good enough to let me have a squint at it through his telescope. At this point I have to admit that I would struggle to tell a Semi-P from Little or in fact any other stint but the plumage of this bird was an exact match for the bird photographed yesterday. The bird's original finder was confident that this was THE bird and so too were the other birders brave enough to venture an opinion. Result!, my first new bird of 2018 and while nothing too dramatic from an aesthetic point of view it did make up for a previous dip way back when at Boddington Reservoir here in Northants.

Ruddy Darter and Red Admiral.

Another highlight here was the sighting of a Wall butterfly which was my first in Britain for a few years. I used to see them around Corby and other areas in Northants but sadly this is a species that has retreated from most of the inland counties towards the coast or more upland areas. Not much else to report from here and we had another American wader in our sights so it was time to move on.

Titchwell RSPB reserve has been playing host to a Lesser Yellowlegs, a species that I have seen a few times before but still one that I was keen to see again. It didn't take too long to catch up with it and we enjoyed some good though fairly distant  views. Not for the first time I got a few dodgy record shots and I'm happy to share one here with you. As is often the case Titchwell had rather a lot of interesting birds and we had a decent time sorting through the waders and gulls. A scan of one of the islands resulted in the discovery of two juvenile and one adult Mediterranean and one immature Little Gull. Highlights amongst the waders included at least eighteen Curlew Sandpipers, a juvenile Little Stint, a lovely sum plum Knot and several Spotted Redshanks. A few Bearded Tits were heard pinging but not seen.

Distant Yellowlegs, closer Avocet.

I was hoping to see Willow Emeralds and we did spend a bit of time looking for them but once again failed to find an ode target today. We did manage to find a couple of Small Red-eyeds and a Brown Hawker and Emperor but apart from a few other common species not much else.

Moorhen.

There was one final stop on the itinerary and that was at a heathland area to look for Nightjars. As related in an earlier post I've already seen them this year but I will never pass up on a chance to see these excellent birds. Settling down to wait for the show to begin we watched gulls heading over towards their roosts and I also saw a C17 flying westwards. Soon after the sun had set a bird began to churr, tentatively at first but more and more as it began to darken. As colour was leeched away by the gathering gloom we began to hear the flight calls of females. In my experience the window for seeing Nightjars is in that period about quarter of an hour before nightfall and it was the same today.

Juvenile Shelduck and Black-tailed Godwit

Further calls put us on to our first view, just a brief glimpse of a female before she dropped below the skyline and out of sight but others soon followed. Another bird flew around me several times before settling on a path. All of us saw her before she took flight again though rather than disappearing she settled further along the trail and was joined by two others! We appeared to have stumbled across a family party and while the juveniles had clearly fledged they were not yet independent. For a further ten minutes we were treated to view of a total of four birds before darkness brought the spectacle to an end. Leaving to a chorus of more churring Nightjars and the occasional calling Tawny Owl we managed to get back to the car without putting our feet in any of the cow pats that decorated the paths, all in all a very satisfactory performance.

Bullocks providing potential pat hazard and C17.

Any thoughts that our wildlife spotting day was over were to be proved wrong on our way home. A road closure in Peterborough forced a change of route and it was this that lead to a sighting of a Badger crossing the road just outside of Glapthorn village, what an end to what a day!

Come Back Summer, All is Forgiven

Yucky conditions prevailed today as our untypical summer warmth gave way to grey and wet weather. Having kept an eye on the many weather forecasts I knew that today would be far from ideal for nature spotting but I decided to have an afternoon stroll around Priors Hall.

Brown Argus and Common Blue.

Scoping the quarry lake revealed three Common Sandpipers and I also heard a Little Ringed Plover. Two juvenile Dabchicks keeping company with a parent suggests that a pair have successfully bred. Apart from a few Lapwings there was not a great deal else to report birdwise though a Brown Hare was seen racing across the muddy hills.

Common Blue and Blue-tailed Damsels.

Despite the less than ideal weather I found many Common Blue butterflies roosting amongst the grass, certainly over a hundred and perhaps even more. In with them was a far smaller number of Brown Argus with about fifteen being seen. Perhaps not surprisingly there were few other species on view but I did record sightings of three Meadow Browns, three Gatekeepers, a Small Heath and two Small Whites.

Ruddy and Common Darters.

An enjoyable feature of today's walk was the number of toadlets hopping and walking around the site, I would imagine that the damp conditions were very much to their liking. I suspect that dragons and damsels enjoyed the weather less and this was reflected in the low numbers observed. Common Blues were, rather appropriately, the most numerous species and there were rather a lot of Blue-tailed too. A single Small Red-eyed showed very well and I also found two each of Common and Ruddy Darters.

Toadlet and Six-spotted Burnet.

One final thing to mention were the three Six-spotted Burnet moths seen feeding rather sluggishly on ragwort and thistle flowers which allowed a very close approach.

Priors Pond and dragonfly exuvial case.

Showertime at Weldon.

During my after work walk around Weldon this afternoon I had my first dose of proper rain for what feels like months. I'm not talking the very light is it or isn't it? style of drizzle from Sunday either. No this was bona fide splotchy big drops that would have given me a darn good drenching had it not been for a full canopied tree providing decent shelter. Sadly it passed all too quickly but at least there is a promise that we may get some more tomorrow.

Ruddy Darter and Banded Demoiselle.

Before and after this moist interlude I had been looking out for any damsels and dragons that might be about on this the hottest day of the year so far. Banded Demoiselles remain common along the stream, in fact I think that they may be more numerous now than at any previous time this year. A solitary male White-legged Damselfly showed rather well and so too did a male Ruddy.

White-legged Damselfly and Emperor.

Around the pond a good number of Small Red-eyed and Red-eyed Damselflies were recorded and Common Blue Damsels nearly matched their number. A few Blue-taileds completed the damsel list though not quite the story. A little flicker of movement drew my attention to a Common Blue trapped in a spiders web sharing the fate of a Red-eyed caught in the same web. I didn't attempt to free it as it was out of reach and of course spiders have to eat too.

The cycle of life.

Commonest dragon today was the Emperor with several patrolling males  and an ovipositing female on site. Three Brown Hawkers were also seen and there was another Ruddy Darter.

Blue-tailed Damselfly and Ringlet.

There were not too many butterflies but at least they included a county year tick among their number, a Small Copper that moved just a tad too fast for my camera. A few Common Blues appeared to be looking for moisture at the pond's edge and were joined by the smallest Brown Argus that I've ever seen, it was about the size of a five pence piece. Other species included a few Gatekeepers and a Ringlet as well as Small and Green-veined Whites while there was a Holly Blue in Corby Village.