Survey note
17 Apr 2015
Our first survey training session today. Eight stalwart surveyors duly caught some bank voles and wood mice, inspected a range of small mammal skulls, played with traps and tracking devices, and cautiously sniffed some otter spraints (quite a sweet smell actually, and wonderful to think we have otters in our midst). This could be addictive. Reptiles next week!
Jeremy
Visitor note
02 Apr 2015
We flushed a jack snipe and brown hare from the grassland next to the coastal lagoons to the south of the Martello tower. There were also signs of life in the lagoons themselves...caddisfly larvae in their cases were seen foraging within the flowing water.
Rosie Jackson via Jeremy
Jeremy
Alex message 1
10 Mar 2015
We have a Mahonia just outside our five bar gate, a common hardy garden shrub with hollylike leaves and sprays of scented yellow flowers, it is humming, literally!
I was attracted by the noise and found many honey bees and a couple of bumble bees. Certainly the Bumbles were there the other day because every time i go out i see them. So brave because it is still fairly chilly, but the flowers do put out a most wonderful smell and there isnt much else to attract at this time of year.
Spring is here!
Our bird feeder has at least fourteen gold finches, lots of starlings, sparrows, blackbirds, blue tits and there is a wren in the woodpile, a cock pheasant that visits regularly and a brace of partridges. Pigeons come, naturally, and a pair of collar doves.
More later.
Alex Williams
Butterflies
09 Jan 2015
Amazingly warm for the time of year (up to 13 degrees C). Things are already sprouting in the back garden and if we get a day of sun it wouldn’t surprise me to see the first butterfly of the year emerging from hibernation (probably a small tortoiseshell, brimstone or possibly even a peacock) – please look out everyone. There are certainly a few moths out at night (not sure which ones until I get my moth trap out again).
Jeremy Mynott
Curlew
08 Jan 2015
Lots of curlew feeding in the fields, which are now very sodden after all this rain. Also a few redshank probing for worms and a couple of common snipe. Would be great if the snipe stayed to breed in one of the marshy areas between the dykes.
Jeremy Mynott
Buzzards
05 Feb 2015
There was also a buzzard over the fields – another bird that has moved eastwards in recent years and is now well established locally.
Jeremy Mynott
Ravens
04 Jan 2015
A raven flew over calling in its deep bass voice. Ravens used to be common in East Anglia in the nineteenth century but they were hunted out by gamekeepers. They are now slowly spreading back from the West Country but this one is the first I’ve recorded in Shingle St. Ravens have always been regarded as birds of great omen and I’m taking this as a positive one for our Survey!
Jeremy Mynott
Stonechats
01 Jan 2015
A dull, raw day. There were two stonechats near the Tennis Court, a flight of about 100 golden plover over Oxley Dairy and about 50 mute swans on the fields from the sea-wall walk to East Lane.
Jeremy Mynott
