All quiet on the eastern front...

Thursday 21st July: in search of a yellow-legged gull at North Cave

AMENDED VERSION!

Lazily, I drove down to Crossland hide, got out of the car and chatted with a birder about cameras. Eventually I went in the hide and set up to watch the silt lagoon. Time taken to find my YLG approx. 20 seconds. However I leapt too quickly to the wrong conclusion...Then the bird sat down on the mud for half an hour, hiding his legs and making me wait to get some photos. Eventually he stood up.

Common Gull Common Gull Common Gull As Nigel Stewart has kindly pointed out, this looks much more like a common gull and I'm sure he's right. Fooled by those yellow legs! Thanks Nigel. And more from him later!

An RAF trainer flew over. Spitfire type plane Guess what happened.

Nothing! Common Gull Common Blue Damselfly Common blue damselfly. A couple of commas were about. Comma Two began to chase furiously until they shot up into a tree. I managed to catch them 'in cop' as Matthew Oates delicately describes it! Comma

Red Admiral Red Admiral Teasel Teazel

Saturday 23rd July: Tophill Low and Bempton

A few butterflies were seen but nothing unusual. Gatekeeper, large white, green-veined whites gathering to gather minerals from a wet patch. Gatekeeper Large White Green-veined Whites Meadow browns and small skippers were relatively plentiful.

Meadow Brown Small Skipper A reed warbler entertained me at North Marsh along with a few young moorhens. Reed Warbler Moorhen I assumed wrongly this was a common hawker [but I do find dragonflies very tricky!] Nigel also explained that this is a Southern Hawker. Migrant Hawker I left for Bempton. Decided to try to photograph fulmars and juvenile kittiwakes. The latter were few and far between. Here are the fulmars. Fulmar Fulmar Gannet Fulmar Fulmar Fulmar Kittiwake juv Kittiwake

As I walked the cliff top to Staple Newk a skylark flew quite close.

Skylark Skylark Finally the obligatory gannet. I find the immatures quite attractive. Gannet Gannet Gannet Gannet

Psyche-delight

Psyche being the greek for the soul or spirit and also the word for butterfly - testament to how ephemeral life is and how butterflies hint at departing souls in their own brief lives.

Pseuds corner in Private Eye would lap it up!!

Here's a few butterflies - lapping it up too...meadow brown

Meadow Brown On July 16th Barry and I spent a half day at North Cave. All was pretty quiet but we saw a few nice things. More butterflies nectaring...small tortoiseshell...

Small Tortoiseshell Small Tortoiseshell Green-veined White Above: green-veined white

If you've had a stiff drink you might want a chaser... Common Darter

Common Darter It was a warm afternoon. These two had flaked out in the new workings. Hares? Mystery bird: assumed to be a juvenile reed bunting in the North Hedge.

Reed Bunting

July 18th - circular tour!

After a dentist imposed late start we headed for Ellerburn Bank YWT. No sign of dark green fritillary reported earlier by a woman we met but plenty of marbled whites.  Marbled White Marbled White Marbled White Marbled White Also seen: ringlet pair; female common blue and small skippers. Ringlet Common Blue See male sex brand like a lightning strike!

Small Skipper Small Skipper Large white I think. Large White

On a few miles to Fen Bog YWT. A couple of dark green fritillaries: one a bit battered the other quite smart. You'll spot the difference! Dark Green Fritillary Dark Green Fritillary Dark Green Fritillary Dark Green Fritillary Dark Green Fritillary Dark Green Fritillary Dark Green Fritillary Also seen: small heath and a lifer dragonfly for me, a keeled skimmer. Apparently the orange pterostigma are diagnostic. [Normal english: go by the orange wing marks!] Small Heath Keeled Skimmer Keeled Skimmer Finally I saw a spotted flycatcher flitting about. I wasn't quite quick enough to photograph it! A few seconds later it appeared in another tree feeding a youngster. I wasn't quite quick enough to photograph that either!! But I did catch the juvenile.

Juvenile Spotted Flycatcher Next stop: failure to find white-letter hairstreaks at Tockett's Lythe near Guisborough. We saw a few other butterflies bringing our day total to 11.

Heading north for Guisborough we called at Scaling Dam. Surprised myself by instantly spotting a mediterranean gull. Also lapwing close to hide. Mediterranean Gull Mediterranean Gull Lapwing
Small Tortoiseshell Ringlet An almost hidden speckled wood. Speckled Wood I decided to make South Gare our last stop. We struck lucky by immediately finding good numbers of grayling. Grayling Grayling Grayling

So we finished with a day's haul of 12 butterfly species - probably 13 as a fritillary at Fen bog up top towards the car park crashed down into the grass and heather and promptly disappeared. This seems to me more likely to have been a small pearl-bordered fritillary - but we'll never know for sure.

Asda used to slap the back pocket and promise: 

There's more to come!

Let's hope so.

Edward Sabine's small gull

Sadly Edward Sabine discovered this bird by shooting a few on July 25th 1818 off Cape York near some rocky islands 20 miles off the mainland - well beyond the Arctic Circle.

Yesterday I shot one at Carr Vale NR - with my Canon 1d.

Before we look at the photos here's a portrait of the Arctic Council, convened by the Admiralty some years later. James Clark Ross [of Ross's gull] is 4th from the left and Edward Sabine is 7th from the left. Edward Sabine and Ross

And here's the Sabine's gull. Sabine's Gull Sabine's Gull

Sabine's Gull Sabine's Gull Sabine's Gull Sabine's Gull Sabine's Gull Sabine's Gull Sabine's Gull Sabine's Gull Sabine's GullSabine's Gull Sabine's GullSabine's Gull Sabine's GullSabine's Gull Sabine's GullSabine's Gull Sabine's GullSabine's Gull Sabine's GullSabine's Gull Sabine's GullSabine's Gull Sabine's GullSabine's Gull Sabine's GullSabine's Gull Sabine's GullSabine's Gull Sabine's GullSabine's Gull Sabine's GullSabine's Gull Sabine's GullSabine's Gull Sabine's GullSabine's Gull I think that will do for now!