At last, Scarce Chaser!

A fourth visit to the Marsh in the Waveney valley, finally reaped dividends when I was lucky enough to photograph several Norfolk Hawker dragonflies including an oviposting (egg laying) female around the dykes bordering the track. I finally spotted the much sought after Scarce Chaser perched on the sword like leaf of a Yellow Flag Iris, it was a mature male with black tipped blue abdomen brownish tinge on the edge of the wings and the all important black smudge on the base of the wings. Unfortunately it was perched on the middle of the dyke and was partially obscured by foliage but I was able to get some reasonable shots.

Elsewhere. the local cow herd disturbed a young family of Pheasants and a distant Cuckoo called.

Orchid Extravaganza!

June is one of the best months to see many of our Orchid species.

Several hundred enigmatic Bee Orchid plants are currently out in flower at a nearby supermarket. Their sepal flowers look like a Bumblebee and designed to attract male Bees to pollinate the flowers. They are very attractive Orchid but are very nomadic and can disappear from sites where they were previously flowering. This is true of Lowestoft currently and it is very sadly a negative return for several sites I have checked for this species.

At a very local site several hundred and maybe several thousand Southern Marsh Orchids are starting to come into flower at a local field. Also out in flower at this time, in the same field are a few Spotted orchids too. Enjoy them while you can!

Swallowtails!

Saturday 13th June was Butterfly day at the excellent RSPB Strumpshaw Fen near Norwich and there was one particular sought after butterfly which can only be seen in the Norfolk Broads in late May & June. (There is a later flight period in August but fewer are on the wing then.) 

The butterfly is our largest and is of course, the beautiful Swallowtail butterfly.

At reception I was told there were not many about. On the way to reception we were able to see about 5 Bee Orchid plants. On our walk around the fen we managed to see several Norfolk hawker dragonflies which were duly photographed, we heard a Cuckoo and saw 2 very hairy black and brown caterpillars.

We are particularly fortunate that there is a garden bordering the reserve which is superbly managed to attract visiting butterflies and other wildlife including Large Skipper, Painted Ladies and most importantly it regularly attracts visiting Swallowtails. they are particularly attracted to the Sweet William plants. The very genial and accommodating owner allows Swallowtail enthusiasts to enter the garden if they see a Swallowtail and photograph.

On the way back, first one & then 2 Swallowtail butterflies actively fed from the Sweet William plants, with their wings almost constantly flapping. These butterflies are supposed to fed exclusively from the Milk Parsley plant but the Sweet Williams are an exotic aside for them.

Occasionally, the Swallowtails would momentarily relax and a whole plethora of Camera lens simultaneously clicked as the visiting photographers obtained their shots like a crowd of papparazi snapping a visiting celebrity.

All this would not be possible without the very kind and generous permission of the garden owner to allow us to enter his land, I am greatly indebted to you kind sir. 

Extremely Scarce Chasers!

An early evening return visit to the Marshes in the Waveney Valley on Friday 12 June resulted in us not seeing the Chasers again, however the windy conditions were against us and Jenny & I did see a pair of Norfolk Hawker dragonflies chasing after prey items.

Tree Rat!

A lot of young birds have been seen in the garden in recent days with families of Blue Tit picking up grubs from the Wisteria, a Great Tit family (2 adults & 3 youngsters) feeding on the peanut feeders, a young Starling family was seen around the roof top too.

With all this activity, it has inevitably caught the attention of the local Sparrowhawk and a grey backed male whizzed low over the garden first thing this morning. His mate, the female repeated this aerial feet an hour later.

The local Green Woodpecker was also for a time perched on in one of our trees at the back calling but by the time I retrieved my camera it had buried itself deeper into the foliage of the opposite tree.

A Tree Rat, sorry Grey Squirrel, spent over an hour perched on the apex of our garage roof and performed nicely for the camera before I shot it (photographically)!

Grey squirrels are, in my opinion vermin and should be eradicated from this country.

They were originally introduced from America, their original country of origin.

They do untold damage to trees stripping the bark off mature trees, they take birds eggs (leading to the decline of woodland species where the Greys are prevalent) and they not only out compete our lovely native Red Squirrel but they have also forced out the Reds from many areas where they used to live. They also carry a virus which quickly kills off our native Reds.

To some people they make look nice and cuddly in our local parks but they have done untold damage to our native wildlife.

I fully support and endorse the recent comments made by Prince Charles about the problem of Grey Squirrels. 

NOT A Suffolk tick!

A "burn" down the A12 (makes a change from the A47!) resulted in me visiting Felixstowe Ferry, in the company of Andrew & Rob, visiting Felixstowe Ferry in order to see a newly found American Golden Plover. We were told it was distant but when we eventually reached the spot, it was on the near muddy bank bordering the river giving reasonable views through the telescope. A 1st summer bird, it appeared to be an AGP because  compared to Golden Plover, it was a greyer bird lacking the goldish- buff tinge on the neck and breast and sporting a distinct wide whitish supercilium but still showing some golden plumage. The greyer part of the plumage was even more readily apparent when it walked in front of the blue keel of a moored boat nearby. Stucturally, compared to Golden Plover AGP's are slightly smaller, with a more attenuated rear end and are slightly longer legged, although these features were difficult to ascertain on this bird, (appearing the same size as a Golden Plover) as the only other waders present were Common Redshank. It spent some of its time with its feathers puffed out to insulate it from the biting east wind, making it look rather plump compared to an AGP. Again there are no pictures because it wasn't that close and we observed the bird quite poorly in very windy conditions.

POSTSCRIPT Having seen photo's of this bird, I am now not convinced and have come to the conclusion it is a grey 1st year Golden Plover, I'll have to wait a little longer to add AGP to my

Suffolk list! 

An excellent Yellow Wagtail called and flew past as we walked back.

Third sight of Black- winged Pratincole

A one hundred and forty mile round trip, to some arable fields just inland of Thornham in North west Norfolk was required this evening after work in order to see my third ever Black- winged Pratincole. The exact site was viewed from a small road, looking through a gap in the hedge into an arable field sporting nesting Lapwing and even nesting Avocet too! Looking closer, I could see the dark Bourneville chocolate- coloured back of the Black- winged Pratincole and compared to Collared it showed more black on its bill with the red restricted just to the base of the bill. It also showed noticeably more black on its lores than Collared. The pale cream throat bordered by a thin black line did not stand out so much against its whitish breast. The Black- Winged Pratincole is a very rare vagrant to these shores, which was almost definately blown across by the strong easterly winds we experienced in May. It is only my second Norfolk record of this species and my first sighting of this species since I saw one at Titchwell in July 1999 & Livermere in West Suffolk, 16 years ago in September 1993. Its breeding range is restricted to the steppes of south-east Europe and southern Russia. This bird is almost surely the same bird that commuted between 2 sites of Grove Ferry and Stodmarsh in Kent, earlier in May. This bird is also following the same pattern commuting mainly between Titchwell RSPB reserve and the arable fields at Thornham and occasionally visiting Holme too.

The bird sat for most of the time during the evening, situated just a metre left of the Lapwing. It then walked around from time to time once flicking its wings showing its distinctive black underwings and repeated this action several time before sitting down again, occasionally disappearing from sight behind a clod of earth (its back was a much darker brown than the colour of the clods of earth around it)

It then crouched right down looking for the world it was roosting before it suddenly stood up again. A wonderful bird which sadly didn't hawk for insects due to the cold weather and overcast conditions, a real contrast to the weather from a week ago. No photos I'm afraid as the bird was too far away to photograph but reasonable views were obtained through the telescope. At the back of the field, a Hare ran and a male Marsh harrier patrolled the edge of the field.

Back at a supermarket site neat Great Yarmouth, the first Bee Orchids were starting to flower today.

Yesterday morning I also noticed Spotted Orchids starting to flower near Corton woods.