On south lake the Canadian pond weed is flowering prodigiously with great baulks of thick weed floating on the surface, which fooled at least two passing Lapwings to think they could safely land! However, the weed matting is attracting plenty of Coots, Pochards, Mute Swans and grebes and it was good to see a few broods of young Coots and Mallards on the water, but still no grebe chicks. A pair of Black Swans were still present on the lake behind the ponds, while around the willow swamp, Blackcap, Lesser Whitethroat and Cetti`s Warbler were in song.
A check of the bay this afternoon on an ebb tide yielded very little apart from a few Curlews and Oystercatchers, Sandwich Terns and Black-headed Gulls. The brisk wind looks as though its here for a while attracting increasing numbers of kite surfers.
"masses of grassland butterflies were on the wing" - blimey here on The Swale NNR, grassland butterflies (any butterflies even) are are almost as rare as hens teeth. My garden is the same, butterflies and bees - very rare.
ReplyDeleteI think what`s making it look more spectacular is because they`re concentrated in sheltered spots from this nagging north-easterly wind, which we`ve got for next week at least. But you`re right. the bread-and butter garden species are in short supply.
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