Welcome to my birding blog - first launched 12th March 2012...
5th-6th August
North-east of Kettlewell...
...will have to wait until I've told you about our trip to Saltholme with my grand-daughter [aged 2]. We had a good time and enjoyed the Meadow Trail. In the Wildlife Watchpoint we were told there were three grasshopper warblers. Being very deaf at the moment there was no chance of me hearing them but my wife soon did. At least three near the beginning of the Meadow Trail I spotted two of them. Photos with Sheila's 200mm zoom.
Ok. Most people know about Scotch argus butterflies in England in the Arnside and Smardale areas to the west but the Yorkshire site seems to be less well-known or not well publicised. It's north-east of Kettlewell....
![Park Gill Beck [Scotch argus site]](https://chrisdownesbirds.com/img/s/v-10/p2005532232-5.jpg)
![Park Gill Beck [Scotch argus site]](https://chrisdownesbirds.com/img/s/v-10/p2055269150-5.jpg)
Here's a view of the site - it faces south-east and east. I saw the butterflies last year but they wouldn't pose for me as they crash down in the long grass if the sun goes in. In flight they look black. You won't see them without sunshine - preferably sunshine that lasts, say, half an hour! I saw 6 this time. One was very cooperative. I even knelt down and photographed it with my phone:
Camera shots:
Lots of wild flowers plus common blue, red admiral, ringlet and a dark green frit. Here's a few flowers: harebell and carline thistle. Butterworts seen but photos were blurred!
I saw a mole wriggling along the path. It froze when it sensed my footsteps. I nudged it with my foot and it vanished down a hole [as they do!]. I got a rear view!
I then had a wonderful drive via Wensley, the A1 and A19 to Saltholme. No gropper to be seen but a greenshank on Phil Stead's and a spoonbill performing at Dorman's. A grand day out!
Thinks it's a swan!
27th - 31st July
In the doldrums!
First of all, after the problems with the gull at North Cave I felt there was nothing for it but to go back [27th July] and have another careful look at the silt lagoon. Reckon I struck lucky this time: yellow-legged gull.
I saw a basking meadow brown with its wings nicely spread. I noticed later double white eye spots.
On Friday 29th July we went to photograph Rievaulx Abbey as we had been asked for a photo for a forthcoming book on important archaeological finds in Yorkshire. Sheila took this one: I played around with it!
Saturday at Blacktoft was not a good idea. Only image worth including was this one of a few lapwings.
Sunday we went to Wingate Quarry to see the little owls. On arrival we immediately saw lots of orchids: fragrant orchids. Some years since I'd seen any, I got down on my hands and knees to sniff them: very scented, reminiscent of daphne bholua in our garden. Nice spikes too!
The field scabious were pretty as well.
One owl seen up on the old quarry face.
There was a baby donkey by the car park.
On then to Saltholme to get some peanuts for our greedy tits. Plenty of common tern action and we enjoyed the new Meadow Trail - worth a slow walk. Here's just a few tern shots.
That's it for now. Year list ran aground at 233.
21st-23rd July 2016
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.
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.
Guess what happened.
Nothing!
Common blue damselfly. A couple of commas were about.
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!
Red Admiral
Teasel
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.
Meadow browns and small skippers were relatively plentiful.
A reed warbler entertained me at North Marsh along with a few young moorhens.
I assumed wrongly this was a common hawker [but I do find dragonflies very tricky!] Nigel also explained that this is a Southern 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.
Kittiwake juv
As I walked the cliff top to Staple Newk a skylark flew quite close.
Finally the obligatory gannet. I find the immatures quite attractive.
16th-18th July 2016
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
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...
Above: green-veined white
If you've had a stiff drink you might want a chaser...
It was a warm afternoon. These two had flaked out in the new workings.
Mystery bird: assumed to be a juvenile reed bunting in the North Hedge.
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.
Also seen: ringlet pair; female common blue and small skippers.
See male sex brand like a lightning strike!
Large white I think.
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!
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!]
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.
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.
An almost hidden speckled wood.
I decided to make South Gare our last stop. We struck lucky by immediately finding good numbers of 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.
14.07.16
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.
And here's the Sabine's gull.
I think that will do for now!