Frog Orchids

This evening, Jenny & I travelled to the other side of Bungay in search of the Wink's Meadow Suffolk Wildlife trust reserve. walking along a tarmac track, the area must have been a former airfield, ahead of us a Hare sped away. Winks Meadow is a wildflower meadow where several rare Frog Orchid plants can be seen at this time of the year. I located 4 small frog Orchid plants which had just finished flowering and around 40 Pyramidial Orchid plants which were also just past their best. Why they were named Frog Orchids is anybody's guess, apart from double lobed lip of the flower being green in colour resembling the coloration of a Frog! 

Mediocre Minsmere

An afternoon off work for all the extra evenings I am working this week, saw me finally visit Minsmere in the hope of seeing firstly, Roseate tern/s which has been reported every day there for the last 2 weeks. Needless to say, today was the first day when they weren't reported, I certainly didn't see any. I secondly wanted to photograph what i assumed must be a close Spoonbill on the Scrape, it wasn't there, it had gone. 

Indeed I have never seen virtually the whole of the east Scrape completely dry. It was nice to see 2 of the former "islands" colonised by Sandwich Terns with some 120 birds counted.

About 40 Black- tailed Godwits were in evidence mostly around the West & North Scrape areas which still held some water.

On looking out from the open air public hide I counted 25 splendid dusky Spotted Redshanks, lovely birds, but sadly too far away to properly photograph.

At the sluice adult and immature Swallows posed quite well in poor light conditions. Whilst walking around to the South Hide, I encountered a Peacock butterfly larvae crawling purposefully across the path. More Godwits were seen from the South Hide, whilst the cacophony of Black- headed Gulls drowned out virtually everything else from West Hide.

Around 10 Avocets were busy feeding in the water (often close to the hide) busy swaying their distinctive upturned bills from side to side in the water to locate their invertebrate food in the water. An interesting spectacle was of a Grass Snake swimming in the water (they are rather good swimmers rivalling Michael Thelps for speed and dexterity!) and the closest adult Avocets and Black- headed Gulls surrounded it, because naturally the Snake could easily prey on their young chicks and the parent birds headed it off as it swam north to the nearest bank, with the chicks left unmolested.

On the way back a slight diversion to a top secret site I discovered last year, I managed to hear the all too rarely heard soft "purrrr" of a Turtle Dove from a nearby hedge I tried to view the bird but I didn't want to disturb it so I eventually left having not seen it. So sad this species has had such a catastrophic decline in numbers during the past decade or so.

Meagre Pickings!

On Saturday, a visit to Leathes Ham, Normanston Park in the hope of  seeing a Ring necked Parakeet were dashed when I didn't see it. The last one I saw in Lowestoft was in July 2007 which flew over the back garden! It was nice to see single plants of Common Spotted and Southern Marsh orchid at this site. Lets hope more flower next year. A visit to a Waveney Valley site on the Sunday revealed little save for a Grass Snake crossing the path and safely entering the dyke running parallel to it, without any mishap.

Hearing hot news from Colin on the location of some Slow Worms, a Snake-like legless Lizard that I had always wanted to see in the UK, I followed his excellent directions. Which were to walk along the path by the dyke and near the railway cutting I soon located the tin lifted it up and (drum roll.....) underneath it was...nothing! Disappointing to say the least!

On popping in to Tesco Express near Carlton Marshes, I saw a rather unfortunate squashed Pine Hawk Moth on the floor (it wasn't me that had trodden on it!) I've never seen a live one of this species and it would make a nice picture, needless to say I didn't take a picture of the corpse.

Chasing the Dragons!

A very pleasant early evening walk today at Carlton Marshes finally enabled me to take the pictures I wanted of Scarce Chaser dragonflies. The usual male was along the dyke north of the car park, whilst 3 individuals, reasonably showing males perched on vegetation at the side of the dyke running down to Spratt's water. Where have all the females gone, hopefully they are busy oviposting? (egg laying) The Southern Marsh Orchids were flowering here also but not in the numbers of my more local Orchid meadow.

Along the pathway, A Norfolk Hawker was busy hunting "hoovering" up small flies along the path, before it's inquisitiveness got the better of it and it checked me out flying within inches of my face, a marvellous sight! (the Norfolk Hawker at such close range and definitely not my face!) 

A Cuckoo was calling constantly from the direction of Fisher Row, whilst a male Reed Bunting called frequently from a nearby bush.

A Day at the Races?

On Sunday, I drove across the county to Newmarket on the western edge of Suffolk by the edge of the Racecourse, to visit the Devil's Dyke nature reserve in the hope of seeing and photographing Lizard Orchids.

After a very pleasant walk, where I noted Pyramidial Orchids just starting to come into flower and singing birds including Blackcap and Lesser Whitethroats giving their distinctive "scoulding" call. I eventually came across 1 Lizard Orchid which was slightly past its best, but then there were a further 4 plants in peak condition. I eventually counted an incredible 79 Lizard Orchids. 

The Lizard Orchid is so named because the long central lobe of the lip resembles the back end and tail of a Lizard and the shorter side lobes also resemble the hind legs of a Lizard giving a very unusual and unique looking flower.

The flowers also have a strong slightly unpleasant smell, which some authors claims smell of billy goats, I couldn't comment on this as I haven't gone round sniffing goats!! 

The tall spikes can grow up to around a foot and a half tall (almost a metre in height) and one particularly tall plant really did stink in the warm sunshine.

This odour was a smell worth enduring as I got to work setting up my camera and tripod to get the range of pictures I wanted. 

Roseates no show

A very welcome call from Rob at 7pm Saturday evening to say that Andrew was watching 2 Roseate Terns which were perched on a yellow buoy off Ness Point, soon found me at Ness Point. But sadly for the 4th year running I was to be thwarted yet again in seeing my first ever Roseate Terns in Lowestoft. They had just flown, and they didn't return, same old story!

Late June and July can often be a good time to check the Terns on the groynes in the hope of a Roseate, especially if they have been sighted at Minsmere & Breydon which they had been seen during this time.

We did enjoy good views of a close Harbour Porpoise just 100 yards out from the Point and a group of 12 Common Scoters and a few Gannets flying North.

Orchid Meadow bites the dust?

Yesterday, I conducted a survey of a small area of land in North Lowestoft of just 1.62 hectares of "waste ground" which last year held incredible numbers of over 3,000 Southern Marsh Orchids and also 20 or so Spotted Orchid for good measure too.

To see these many orchids out in flower with their gorgeous deep purple flowers providing a feast for the eye in the middle of June is truly a sight to behold.

It is one of the many wonders of nature and was recently voted no.17 in a recent BBC poll of top wildlife spectacles.

However, on conducting my survey this year it was immediately apparent that there were far fewer spikes this year, 2/3 less to be precise.

I counted 868 spikes of Southern Marsh orchid with 24 Spotted Orchid and around 30 hybrid Southern Marsh X Spotted Orchid.

Why is this? There are two reasons firstly, the site is rapidly drying out and where there were ponds, puddles and wet patches there is just dry meadow, certainly not prime conditions for a wet loving marsh orchid. Secondly, there has been the rapid encroachment of bramble and scrub covering around a third of the area since last year.

What can be done about it? I have contacted the Suffolk Wildlife Trust in the hope that either the area can be properly managed to the benefit of wildlife and people or in the last resort the plants can be relocated to a protected area nearby.

My advice is to go and see them now why you still can. You may never again get the chance to wander through a meadow covered with Southern Marsh Orchids in North Lowestoft again.