Nature Notes

[ErrolTheDragon]

There's a gardening thread which may overlap with this one but I thought people might like to share nature sightings as the season changes. What we see if we can get out for a walk, plants coming into leaf and bloom, creatures in the garden, birds flying overhead - whatever.

Yesterday along the canal: busy wrens, 3 butterflies (tortoiseshell I think). Lots of Lords and Ladies arrow-shaped leaves. A little bank of primroses, lots of celandines and some wood anemones. Yellow iris leaves starting to shoot up in the edge of the canal.

I saw my first butterfly of the year on Monday and today in the same park there were multiple specimens of two varieties - peacock and small white - and a solitary male brimstone. The multiples were doing that dance - Are you the opposite sex to me? Nope? No problem, mate!

There's hardly any traffic so the usual motorway hum is silenced and the woods are full of birdsong.

Just remembered I saw a grey wagtail as well.

Saw a pair of kingfishers by the canal for the first time this year

Rollerbird, I'm jealous! I've only every seen two, not together, and they zipped past like a bit of turquoise lightning.

turquoise lightning

Perfect description!
The best view I've had of a perching kingfisher was on the canal at the end nearest town, quite an urban environment. I guess canals may be quite good for them because the water level is constant and so there's no risk of nest holes getting flooded.

Yeah, normally there is one very territorial one one a specific section of canal in a cutting with woodland and no path on one side. I've not seen 2 before. Sign of spring

Saw a hare last week too

It was gorgeous today. The butterflies were out in force-23 peacock, 12 small tortoiseshell. There’s been a sm tortoiseshell hibernating in the bathroom (in the corner of the ver high ceiling) all winter, it woke up today. The cat is watching it intently, the little shit.
Loads of chiff chaff, gold crest an the first black cap.

You all get such a variety of birds. We get blackbirds, sparrows, robins and blue tits and that's about it. Down the road get gold finches but they never come to us - I put niger seed out for 2-3 years and they never did find it.

We get a sparrow hawk from time to time, he sits on the back fence just out of sight from where I sit in the lounge but I know when to look out for him as all the other birds stop. I swear he glares at me because our bird feeders are positioned in the middle of the buddleia and our trees next to the hedge so he can't fly in and scoop up birds when they are on the feeders - they just dive into the hedge.

He took out a pigeon on the road last summer though and then sat there on our drive eating it. Made a right mess!

There's a chimney pot on next doors roof I can see when lying in bed. A seagull always perches on it and I like that

Had a lovely walk out round the lanes today. Rabbits in the field. Tractor out. Buzzards X 5, and a kestrel too.

Was beautiful out.

As I write, I'm watching a hedgehog scoffing the food we put down for the foxes on our patio. There have been 2 foxes so far this evening and actually a third has just arrived.

Today there were several pairs of Red Admirals flying about the garden, and we saw a pair of Chaffinches mating.

Cherry trees seem to have burst into flower overnight.

We walked a bit further today, past a lovely group of some sort of willow stems thick with the furriest of catkins. Also a heron, a kestrel overhead and a pair of swans on the opposite bank, she on a nest, he standing guard.

Less pleasingly, Himalayan balsam seedlings. I might make it my mission to eradicate those. I usually volunteer a couple of times a month on a local nature reserve, one of the main summer tasks is balsam bashing. We were getting areas under control but you have to keep at it as the seeds live a few years.

Oh, and some small white flowers which may be wild strawberry.

I’m in the city, so less to report, but here’s a picture of “my” squirrel.

We saw the kite again! DH got his binoculars and we’re as sure as we can be that’s what it was. It has something in its talons and was eating it in midair, it looked like. Amazing birds.

I’m currently working from home for some reason I can’t remember.

From my dining room table/office I can see 2 pigeons making a nest in the ivy on my garden wall. They did it in the same place last year. The ivy is massive btw, must be about 3ft deep! They disappear completely from view. The dog is fascinated.

Kites and buzzards look very similar but for the tail shape. Buzzard tails are fan shaped and kite tails are slightly forked.

Nope, it’s not a buzzard. I see them all the time. This one had the classic kite tail - see those all the time when we visit BiL as they have loads around them (they live in the Chilterns).

Kites are bigger than buzzards. Forked tail.
Buzzards have rounded tails.

We get the occasional kite round here, they're spreading up from a stronghold in Oxfordshire but there's loads of buzzards.

Yep. The only thing that gives me slight, slight pause is that we’re close to a zoo with birds of prey which they do fly. But the only resident we’ve seen coming over is the bald eagle (which was amazing, it came over my head while I was running!) - the others stay closer to home. And I don’t think they have anything that would resemble a kite, thinking about it.

But nope, it absolutely was not a buzzard and too big to be anything else, like the sparrowhawk that hangs out around here or anything else. And it was doing that kite sort of swoop and soar thing - not the same as buzzards, if you know what I mean?

I’m really excited to see one here - hope it finds a friend and they come to stay (though the local gamekeepers won’t be so keen...)

I keep seeing a kestril in the field next to the garden. It's gorgeous. I'm hoping it might come closer.

There is some lovely blackthorn blossom out atm too.

Buzzards wheel, quite often in pairs. There's loads more in recent years, I think they were one of the top predators/scavengers which were hit in the past by pesticide accumulation.

I've not been out very much but have seen my first mining bees and heard first singing chiffchaffs this week :)

We have bees going into the eaves... 😕☹️