Thursday 7 June 2012

I had a couple of hours out this morning, mainly over at the Scrubby Woods and lake area to see if I could find any more new breeding evidence. It was humid and windless first of all, making it feel quite pleasant, but by midday the rain had set in for the afternoon, only clearing as I write this at 17:10  :-(

Whilst at the Scrubby Woods, a TURTLE DOVE sang, as did a few CHIFFCHAFFS and BLACKCAPS, but the only recently fledged young that were found were of the already noted SONGTHRUSH, ROBIN, WREN, DUNNOCK, BLUE and GREAT TIT. A bit of a surprise was seeing a Painted Lady butterfly, only the third species of butterfly recorded this month, and the 16th of the year. On the adjacent lakes there were 3 MALLARD, 2 MOORHEN, 7 CANADA GEESE and the feral BARNACLE GOOSE, just one adult COOT was seen feeding both youngsters, I wonder if the other is on eggs again ?


After failing to find any new species for the years breeding list, I walked over to the Tree Nursery, where I found some Damselfly on the wing, White-Legged and Common Blue I think,
White -Legged Damselfly - female
White-Legged Damselfly - male
Common Blue Damselfly 
Also, seen feeding amongst the vegetation and grasses were two more Turtle Doves, plus 4 STOCK DOVES, the usual 2 GREEN WOODPECKERS and a pair of WHITETHROATS that showed well.  I spent half an hour looking around the Greenhouse Grounds, where I did find a new breeding species for the year, the LINNET, both adult birds were feeding a newly fledged youngster. Flyovers whilst out today included HERRING GULL, and lots of SWIFTS, two BUZZARDS circled high, and the KESTREL was up hunting.

Depending on the the weather, which is meant to be pretty stormy tomorrow, I'll do a full patch walk first thing in the morning - until then here's a couple of photo's of a JAY that visited my garden this morning.
Jay
Jay

12 comments:

Marc Heath said...

lovely Jay shots, what I would give for a decent shot of them in good light.

Warren Baker said...

Hi Marc,
Jays are very photogenic :-) Could have done with a bit more light for these shots, and the bread looks a bit out of place too!

ShySongbird said...

Love the Jay! I haven't even seen one for ages.

This weather seems to be going from bad to worse and the threatened strong wind is starting to whip up now :-(

Greenie said...

Warren ,
You're getting good at this .
Apart from the abdominal markings on the WLD , viewed from the side as your two are , you can see the female's ovipositor , looking like a little skid on the underside of the end of her abdomen .Needless to say , the male is without .
Your female Common Blue is either a blue or drab form . So you can remove all three ?s now .
Nice Jay shots too .

Anonymous said...

Chucked it down all day here, Warren.

Cracking Moorhen chick pic in your previous post.

Warren Baker said...

Cheers Greenie, all ? removed :-)

Warren Baker said...

Hi Songbird,
The wind and rain has arrived this morning - another visit postponed :-(

Warren Baker said...

Cheers Dean,
Only a mother could love the little critter!

Millhouse Photography said...

Love Jays Warren - one of my top 5 birds I reckon.

JRandSue said...

Fantastic images,brilliant Jay captures.
Loved the WLD.
John.

Warren Baker said...

Thank you John for the kind words :-)

kirstallcreatures said...

Nice to see the White Legged Damsel, never seen one before. Super photos of the Jay Warren