Humberhead Levels

I thought about heading for the coast today but my concience got the better of me and I decided to head to a place where I thought would be less crowded.

As I arrived in the car park I was pleased to see I was the only one there (just how I like it). First sighting was some distant but magnificent red deer-they soon evaporated into the background as soon as they knew I was there.

Not quite a dawn chorus more of an early morning one, still impressive all the same with blackcap, whitethroat, wren, blackbird,robin, willow warbler, chiff-chaff, yellowhammer and cuckoo all playing their part.

I headed off to the area where I thought a red-footed falcon had been seen for the last couple of days. Given that I had never been to the South Yorkshire side before it was all a bit blind, however after a good walk I saw 2 birders who had reliable information that this was the spot. A hobby had been showing distantly but no sign of the falcon.

I hung around for half an hour without any joy so filled time by photographing swifts. The 2 birders moved off leaving me to my own devices. Not long after a grey falcon cam over my right shoulder and carried on, I managed a few record shots which confirmed it was the red footed falcon. I had a wander further along the track and it was hunting over the adjacent field. It was interesting to watch it catching dragon flies-flying up when the sun came out and the temperature rose sending the dragonflies on the wing. Once it clouded over it settled down sometimes for up to three quarters of an hour.

It never came really close but put on a nice show nevertheless.

Both reserves looked in very good shape with lots of birds and insects around-the most impressive thing was the amount of cuckoos around-there must have been at least half a dozen.

I kept very socially distant and only saw about a dozen people all morning.

More From The Garden

Some nice photo opportunities in the garden just lately. A male blackbird has obviously had a close escape but has shown some great resillience in bouncing back. He has protected his territory despite what looks like a nasty injury and as of today his feathers are well on the way to growing back.

The house sparrows have been gathering small insects off the red campion so much so that they have nearly all disappeared-great to see a wildlife garden doing what it was intended to do-if it wasn’t for the red campion there’d be no insects and the sparrows would have to look elsewhere.

The goldfinches are now regular visitors and have been quite tame whilst gorging on the nyger seed. Starlings have been bathing in the pond (completely ignoring the bird bath!) and providing some nice photo opportunities-one to focus on throughout the summer.

Great to see our house martins back-they look like they are going to have another try at building a nest after it fell down the winter before last.

A cracking mint moth and holly blue gave some nice colour from the insect world and the masons bees continue to build their cavities within the bee hotel.

Up to 4 hedgehogs now but no sign of any young ones-still plenty of time yet.

Cool weather this week may slow things down a bit, but an unexpected wheatear in Beverley was nice as was the first 2 swifts of the year.

Spring Marches On

More additions to the garden list this Spring includes red mason bee and holly blue becomes the 7th species of butterfly this year. No less than 3 hedgehogs turned up one night. Breeding birds thriving. Tadpoles growing at a rapid rate.

Earlier this year we put out a small bug/bee hotel and it wasnt long before we saw a small bee heading into one of the bamboo holes. Then at the weekend a bright orange bee appeared to be digging in a bare patch of earth. Sure enough after a short while it headed off back to the bee hotel. A little bit of research on google proved that it was a red mason bee. Apparrently common in the Uk but neverless a very much welcome addition to the garden.

A pristine holly blue spent most of the afternoon in the garden on Sunday. It looked very fresh almost as though it may have hatched earlier in the day and was letting the sun dry out its wings.

The trailcam turned up a surprise when firstly 3 then (fleetingly) 3 hedgehogs appeared. I’m no expert but it is my guessthat one was a female, the other her partner and the third an amorous opportunist in search of some hedgehog fun!

It has been great watching the amount of house sparrows growing almost by the day. There has been as many as 12 in the garden and with no apparrent signs of any young ones just yet it looks like our local population is doing very well. They have been feeding on small insects around the pink campion flowers and I can only surmise that they are gathering these insects to feed their young. Hopefully should get some photos later ion the week if the weather improves. It was interesting to see a starling bring out three quarters of an eggshell the other day. It was eating part of the shell so no doubt removing the shell to deter predators but benefitting from the calcium from the eggshell to boot.

Not that I am complaining about a little bit of rain-it will do the garden the world of good. Been topping the pond up with tap water (letting it stand for a few days to let chlorine out) always better to have natural rain water though. Our tadpoles have grown quickly and they are moving much faster. Still around 40 in our small pond so nice to see that they haven’t been predated.

Until next time…