China Girl - David Bowie

 Despite the almost continuous overnight rain again, by dusk it had moderated to no more than a light drizzle which wouldn't prevent us getting to the Moth Traps. At home the first to be noticed was the

diminutive

CHINESE CHARACTER
which on a dull day could easily be overlooked for a bird-dropping.

COMMON WHITE WAVE
made up the pair of first's for year and as ever we checked out the

MUTE SWAN NEST
which has now been emblazened by natural growth and some carefully selected Reed
but not a sign of a Sygnet.

At the gateway to the Heath the DAISIES had not swung out of the hammock yet, as only 06:15 but a good start at the traps with a

COXCOMB PROMINENT

was first to be potted and added to the Year List while the now daily opportunist

female and

male
CHAFFINCH
flitted just above head height.

GREEN TIGER BEETLE

is always a welcome and eye-catching addition but not as much as the f.f.y.

and almost prehistoric

PALE TUSSOCK
We wouldn't consign the following hour to the
Boring Catagory
which might have been welcome as one of only 2 things left on the
Bucket List.
Just 10 minutes to see what it is like but roundly entertained by the blooming

ROWAN
(or Mountain Ash if you prefere)
and a presumed parent

MEADOW PIPT

which by then was fighting against the showers to sustain a

Nest Full?
During the all too brief intervals there was time to admire the now blooming

HAWTHORN

and turn a couple of the covers

to find just a single

SMOOTH SNAKE
Just out of curiosity and the fact that the heavy rain might be doing some good we started heading south but but not before checking the now wide awake

DAISIES
and finding en-route a couple of most obliging

SWALLOWs
this one facing Forward and

the other facing Aft
while across the

MAIZE FIELDs
new shoots spring eternal and while not yet quite as "high as an Elephants eye" with a little more presipitation it could well "climb clear up to the sky"!
Oh What a Beautiful Morning!

Through my own fault you may have missed the second Post of Friday 16th so would refer you back to that as well and the New Addition to the Local Bird List!

See Birds - Sea Birds

Don't know what happened to yesterday's Post but most like another all too frequent Senior Moment, idea's are being buck up as we speak! Apologies, but strange to relate the highest number of 'hits' for weeks.

From my recollection the heavy pulses of rain started just before midnight with more persistent downpours after the witching hour and continuing throughout yesterday. Despite Fire or Tempest one thing remains paramount which is to log and then release the Moths to the wild which we did during the still heavy showers.

From among a below average catch did come a very handsome First for the Year

GREEN CARPET

and just 30 minutes later bright sunshine
which preceeds the 'Cop Out'! It was Sunday last (09/05/2021) that we recieve notification from Dave Foot of a rare bird on Longham Lakes with precise detail of the area it was favouring.

Met close to the gate by the Greylag Goose Goslings, which have grown apace since hatching the week before, we spotted the crowd well before the bird.

WHISKERED TERN

has a wide distribution

so who knows where it might have come from

and which we have seen in

Great Britain

no more than a handful of times.
Great that Dave should call in the fist instance, equally to make the reacquaintance and did stimulate memories of a similar situation back on the 06/05/2017 on the same lake, across a very similar period and on the same
Depth Guage.

On that occassion and from the opposite direction

BONAPART'S GULL,

still a juvenile, must by definition have transited the

Atlantic Ocean
being in a similar scarcity bracket and seen a similar number of times on home turf as the above.
Unfortunately the Videos of the occassion refuse to upload.

Days of Future Past - Moody Blues - Part II

 Having redistributed the Moth Traps in the garden by leaving one at

Low Level

and the other placed high on the Bund in an effort to attract a few 'migrants' with the maiden voyage turning out to be a Mixed Bag to be sure. All Steaming Lights were Burning Brightly as we swung into the hammock but by dawn the one at lower level was again extinguished and the other holding not an Insect. However, the balance was redressed when finding a fairly scarce

BALSAM CARPET
clinging to the funnel. The food plant which supports this Insect

 ORANGE BALSAM

is an import from the Far East, which used to grow here readily, and considered to be how the Moth got here in the first place with this being one of the only sites in the county.

Additionally, there was also another 'first for the year' within

CHAMOMILE SHARK

With the weather looking like it could change for the worst at any minute we only took time to check the Gravel Pit en-route to find just c3

TUFTED DUCK
(c2 males and a single female)
while just for once the

RARE BREED GOATs

were found doing what they are paid to do, keeping the Herbage down.
A decent little tickle from the traps there, all F.F.Y. included

GREY PINE CARPET

BROWN SILVER-LINE
(common and often a daytime flier)

along with

CLOUDED BORDER
and away from the Lepidoptera there was also a

BLACK SEXTON BEETLE

playing host to a number of

PARACITES

and a lone

PILL WOODLOUSE

not so much 'in the traps' but more clinging to the outside.

There would have been nothing in Bird-Ville had it not been for c2 feeding

WOODLARK

which were hoped to be providing for 'young' but even that and the Moths combined were outshone

by this

overly obliging

HOBBY

which has been knocking about

for 2 or 3 days now,

but always 'on the wing' so not a hope of either

CLIP or CLICK!

Trivia:-

It would seem that Inventor and avid Birdwatcher Peter Adolph of Royal Tumbridge Wells had no qualms when patenting his now world famous

Table Football Game back in 1946

Hoping for great success with his newly invented hobby he decided to name it in honour of one of his favourite birds - fittingly ‘the’ Hobby!

So what better name than

SUBBUTEO

Falco subbutteo

 being the falcons Latin name!