Monday 30th April

There have been some interesting appearances on the bird feeders to be noted and recently we have had jackdaw and male woodpecker.

Furtive Jackdaw

Male Woodpecker

I think this pretty much completes the photo sequence of regular visitors apart from wood pigeon who I haven't bothered with and magpie who takes fright as soon as I reach for the camera.

Over the past weeks I have been out a few times and the accent has been on nature walks and botany.  The only bike ride was last Thursday when I took a look around Gibside followed by a fairly chaotic attempt to cycle back home via Track 14 and Chopwell Woods.

For an estate Gibside has obvious potential and I did see my first willow warbler by the cycle track and the first of several plants I couldnt identify in Chopwell Woods, plus of course the inevitable grey squirrel.

On Friday I went on the Prudhoe U3A walk in Whittle Dene with no idea what to expect. It turns out the area is an ancestral forest and the botanical experts in the group could point out several specialised flowers and trees, notably wood avens, marsh marigold, spindle, wood anenome and opposite-leaved golden saxifrage.  Frankly I was well out of my depth but absorbing at least some of this knowledge and appreciating the at times stunning scenery made for a rich experience.

Wood Anenome

Wood Avens

I did however spot a lone small tortoiseshell and managed to identify the song of a small group of blackcaps that obligingly showed themselves shortly afterwards.  My other observation was that there were no fish to be seen in the burn - hopefully not another sign of successful otter preservation. It was also good to learn that one of the plants we saw (garlic mustard) occurs in my new garden and is a food plant for the orange tip caterpillar.

On Saturday, my sister and I attended a supposed drop in at Gosforth Park Nature Reserve, except that the guy who was hosting it seemed a bit surprised that anyone turned up.

On the way to Hide 2 we had good views of at least one sparrowhawk moving through the trees, saw a couple of overflying waders (common sandpipers??) and heard what we thought to be a sedge warbler.

On the lake itself there wasn't too much happening but I enjoyed watching the antics of a couple of common terns performing acrobatics and swooping to (presumably) catch flies just above the water's surface.  Amongst the commoner inhabitants (little grebe, black-headed gull, shoveler, canada goose, tufted duck) one greylag posed nicely right in front of the hide.

Greylag Goose

Saturday 21st April

A burst of nature activity recently, brought on by good weather and a scaling down of domestic activity.

On Thursday I went on a Meet Up walk along the river near Hexham. This was the hottest and sunniest day of the week and I at last saw a few butterflies - a red admiral, a peacock, an unidentified white and a couple of small tortoiseshells mating while I fumbled with the camera.  Near the road bridge to the west, there was a healthy colony of sand martins on the opposite bank.  Chiffchaffs are of course everywhere now and there was a single swallow and a couple of goosander, which also seem to be all over the place this year.

Chiffchaff from below

Roe deer

The new garden has continued to be interesting. A jay briefly alighted on the back fence as I went into the kitchen and a female woodpecker fed on the fatballs this morning.  Technically chiffchaffs have not been in the garden but they have been in the trees that overhang it, picking up insects, as above. This is the first time
I've managed to get any sort of picture of one.

Yesterday my daughter visited and we did a longish walk in Chopwell Woods to satisfy the demands of her pedometer.  It didn't result in anything spectacular apart from a few roe deer and grey squirrels.  The deer were obviously quite tame and there were a couple that were happy enough to have their photos taken even though they had clearly seen us.

Back in the garden today, a red kite circled low over the decking, the colour showing well, but another camera fumble meant the chance of a snap was gone.  This happens to me repeatedly but hopefully the abundance of opportunities in the garden will help me get slicker..

Monday 16th April

I have now been installed in my new home for three weeks and have been keeping a keen eye out to see what turned up in the garden, which is a good deal more rural than the one I had in Dumfries.

I put some fatballs out in a feeder at an early stage and attracted all three common tits, a couple of robins and a blackbird that managed to get its head through the outer cage.

Once unpacked, I started putting food out on the bird table, which attracted more or less the same plus a regular dunnock, a wood pigeon and a magpie.

Log-tailed tits

On going for a walk around the area, I saw a couple of red kites circling and on a bike ride to Newcastle, I saw a grey squirel run across the road and heard a skylark above the hills and a chiffchaff next to the Tyne near Newburn.

More recently I acquired a caged peanut feeder and, gratifyingly,  the first observed visitors were a pair of long-tailed tits that were not part of a larger flock.  Then a jackdaw turned up.

It seemed to me that the bird table was emptying rather quickly and after a couple of days, the peanut feeder was lying on the path spilling its contents, so it was getting clear that there was an intruder of some kind.  Something was also splitting open the striped sunflower seeds on the bird table and leaving the husks around.

I suspected Squireel Nutkin and was not surprised when one turned up digging in one of my pots before surrying off at speed.  The day after it turned up again, shimmied up the stem of the bird feeder and scoffed most of the food. Mystery solved!

That's where all the bird food went!

The day after I saw a red kite quite clearly from my kitchen window.  I think they like to circle over Garesfield Golf Club, which is nearby.

So far I have seen one or two bumble bees and a moth but no butterflies, though one or two small tortoiseshells have been reported on nature websites.

Sunday 25th March

Following various legal delays, I ended up staying with friends and relatives before moving in to new house.

Malcolm and did a nice inland walk along the line of the restored Alnwick railway line, where we saw a couple of youngish goosanders scooting along the Aln after a good view of a wigeon at Amble the previous day. An eider duck also sailed in on the tide at some speed.

Wigeon

Waxwing

Joining my sister Hilary at the weekend, we did a bit of twitching in the hope of catching up with some waxwings that had been showing up in the middle of Forest Hall.  They were still there alright - two of them, also juveniles apparently.  It was hard to get a decent shot and this was the best I could manage.  The colouration seemed distinctly pale and I wondered if this is typical of young birds rather than the result of low sunshine.

These birds stayed in the same location for a fortnight or so and by the end of it, local residents were complaining about them.  They certainly weren't too shy about standing in the middle of the road to get a better view.

Our attempt to see a scaup on Killingworth Lake later in the day did not work out and mostly there were just more wigeon and a more adult (I thought) goosander plus swans / canada geese and other bits and pieces.

Goosander

Saturday 10th March

After a protracted move to Geordieland, I am now playing serious catch-up as in two months' behind.

Part of the moving preparations included the delivery of a unit of furniture to my daughter and her partner, which we engineered to include a visit to Leighton Moss in Morecambe Bay as our meeting point.

Wigeon, lapwing and cormorant

We had hoped for possible exotics in the way of bearded tit, bittern (already booming apparently) and marsh harrier but in the event the last was the only one to be seen briefly.

Instead there was a ready assortment of various other species.  The signs on the way to the lakes were already good when a robin was persuaded to take a bit of banana direct from my hand (first time that's happened) and a marsh tit showed on the feeders (my first in this country).

Then we saw, roughly in order and with fair regularity: little egret, shoveler, cormorant, wigeon, teal, lapwing, tufted duck, pintail, snipe and grey heron.

I was particularly pleased to get the following snaps, the best I have add of each species but it really wasn't too hard:  The patterned underbody of the teal was something I was unaware of.

Teal

Pintail

Little Egret