Small Heath
04 Jun 2023
Along the sea-wall leading to East Lane I put up several Small Heath butterflies. A tiny, grass-loving species you often wouldn't spot until you had disturbed it. Looks rather orangey in flight and has a distinctive eye-spot on the wing when at rest on a stem.
Jeremy
Cetti’s warbler
01 Jun 2023
Cetti's warbler are more often heard than seen (so no pic provided!), but the song is unmistakeable. It's a very loud
'QUICK quickety-quick quickety-quick', usually delivered from a reedbed. There are several singing at present along the Twin Banks. If you ever glimpse them they are large chestnut-brown warblers with long rounded tails but they are very hard to spot even when singing very close to you.
Jeremy
Bird song
02 Jun 2023
Reed buntings are singing along the Twin Banks. The males are very smart birds with glossy black heads and a striking white collar and moustache, but they must have the worst song of any British bird – a sort of tuneless jangle.
Jeremy Mynott
Nightingales
31 May 2023
Two nightingales duetting in their usual spot in Bromeswell this evening. Better be quick if you want to hear them – they stop singing in mid-June.
Jeremy Mynott
Stonechats
29 May 2023
A small family of stonechats in their usual area behind the Martello.
Jeremy Mynott
Swifts
30 May 2023
Two swifts in off the sea, and to my surprise they headed south. It's been a chill N wind but surely they don't think summer's over yet!
Jeremy Mynott
Holly Blue
28 May 2023
A poor year for butterflies so far but there are some pretty little Holly Blues around, often on ivied walls. They are actually commoner than the Common Blue round here and th best way of distinguishing them is by the heavy black margin on the upper wings.
Jeremy
reed-bed warblers
27 May 2023
A walk round the Twin Banks revealed that the usual reed-bed warblers were in place and singing strongly: reed and sedge warblers chattering away in their carefully spaced territories and a few Cetti's warblers with their more explosive outbursts.
Jeremy
hirundines
26 May 2023
A mixed gathering of swallow, house and sand martins feeding over the East Lane pools. These species would normally have dispersed to their breeding sites by now, so maybe these were late arrivals or non-breeding birds?
Jeremy
May blossom
25 May 2023
Wonderful May blossom this year.
Just wish there were more butterflies to pollinate it. Their numbers seem sharply down.
Jeremy Mynott
