Tuesday 23 June 2009

At last some of the sunshine we had been promised came our way, it was warm and sunny all day! Lots of butterflies were on the wing, Large and Small Skipper, Small white, Meadow Brown and painted ladies were all seen along the the boundaries of the tree nursery, where a WHITETHROAT was seen taking food back to its young. A pair of STOCK DOVES and a single TURTLE DOVE flew up from between the Laurel shrubs, and the usual GREEN WOODPECKER joined them a few moments later. A quick sit down in the shade to scan the sky was rewarded with the acrobatic performances of SWIFTS, SWALLOWS, and just a few HOUSE MARTINS, with a lone LESSER BLACK BACKED GULL heading west.

I next ventured over to the scrub at Migrant alley, where More Butterflies were seen, a few SPECKLED WOODS were here, but nothing more exciting than that. As I went round to take my skywatching seat, I saw that the grass field had been cut, and the cuttings lay in neat parallel lines ready to be collected. A pair of MAGPIES were there feeding there youngster, and as I watched I heard a LAPWING call, I scanned the field and sure enough up flew four of them, quite something for this species to be on my patch during June. I spent a hot 45 minutes watching the azure blue sky, but only saw a SPARROWHAWK and two KESTRELS, the latter interacted briefly before going their separate ways.

There were no new species for the month recorded, I think last years record of 67 will hold for another year. I had a look at what I had seen last June, but not this - Mandarin Duck, Kingfisher, Barn Owl, Greylag Goose, Little Egret, and Willow Warbler were seen last year, but this year I have seen Med. Gull and Red Kite that were not on last junes list!


Despite all the butterflies about, I failed to get a decent pic. of any. So I took some photo's of the birds visiting my garden pond when I got back. they were taken through the shed window so aren't too clear!
Above is a Juv. ROBIN and Below is one of the dozens of Juv. BLUE TITS using the pond.

Below is one of the Kestrels that was seen during my skywatch
Lastly the cut grass field, where the Lapwings were. This view looks north




6 comments:

Ken. said...

Hi Warren
How poetic 'The Azure Blue Sky'.I can see it now, a Sparrowhawk soaring around up in the blue yonder.How nice.
Don't give up on beating last years total just yet Warren.

This Is My Blog - fishing guy said...

Warren: Nice captures along the garden, they are such nice birds.

swatson said...

beautiful photos of the robin and blue tit babies.Gorgeous......
Sheila

ShySongbird said...

That sounded like a very nice peaceful walk Warren on a lovely day, we have had sunshine too today.
Nice photos of the garden birds.
Well done on the Lapwings and thank you very much for answering my question, I knew you were the man to ask :)

Kelly said...

...sounds like a lovely day...and your photos are lovely as well. I like the two in your garden...like you were peaking deep into a tree to find them!

Chris said...

Hi Warren
your windows pictures are great. It's difficult to get a good picutre through windows and galss but you managed well. Lucky you that the sun came back... Here it is still cloudy although the rain stopped....