Tuesday 25th August

Not so much going on this week...

I did get out fishing last Wednesday to Wydon Water, an attractive venue at Hexham that took me a while to find.

Apparently it has been fishing well but on the day in question was distinctly 'off'.  Two anglers in the end swims did OK in an easterly breeze but everyone else was scratching around.  Slightly further along, my swim basically livened up for an hour around lunchtime when I caught five small roach and a small male tench on more or less in succession but that was about it for the day.  I gambled for more tench in the margins on sweetcorn but didn't get a touch and could see the bait lying untouched when I packed up in drizzle a bit after 5.00 p.m.  The roach were on double maggot and the tench on maggot and caster.  It seemed to me the roach were taking from midwater but nothing happened when I reduced the depth from 6.5' to 4'.

Tench

My initial impression is that Wydon is a small fish water.  Everyone seems to measure success in terms of weight and even the tench I got was nowhere near 1lb.  Still it was the first I've had since the two seven pounders I got at Kelhead Quarry, predating this blog.  And as far as I gathered there were only two caught on the day, so still worthy of minor celebration.  Quite pretty too.

A bike ride followed on Wednesday, when I rested at Ebchester watching several swallows hunting in the fields below.  It struck me how few I've seen this year.  Also it sort of had the feeling they were getting ready to migrate.  I didn't notice much more as I was feeling slightly unwell and headed for home a bit earlier than planned.  Still there were a few peacocks, small tortoiseshells and small whites around.

Small tortoiseshells were in the garden this week too but I haven't seen peacocks for a few days.  Large whites have been around a fair bit, mainly males.  In fact it struck me that I wasn't sure if I was misidentifying the females.  I noticed one in particular and saw it was a bit different to the small whites.  A little research showed it was indeed a female.

Female Large White

One rare gardening side note is that I seem to have rescued  the rhodedendron I was given two years ago.  It was struggling when planted out and getting heavily bitten.  The solution has been to repot it in compost dowsed in vinegar to remove the alkaline content.

I'm afraid though that I'm going to have to give up feeding the birds for a while.  The titbits they leave behind are attracting rats too frequently and I think they must be breeding nearby.

Tuesday 18th August

Expectations are often disappointed but occasionally exceeded and sometimes you get a nice surprise.

Looking for a walk last Monday, I decided to try Whittle Dene, which is pleasant early in the summer, for butterflies.  However it was all a bit overgrown and dry and there wasn't much to see - some whites, a few peacocks and a single pair of speckled wood.  It only served to pose the question where all the speckled woods have got to this year, though I've seen a small number since.  And no meadow butterflies at all.

So on the Tuesday I decided to be more targetted and headed to the heathland area at Havannah, thinking I should easily be able to see some common blues, dingy skippers and some burnet moths plus a few others.  In fact after a single burnet it was the others that made the time worthwhile as blues and skippers were absent, leaving me without a single one this summer.

After thinking there may be no butterflies at all, I started to see some small heath and, after some foraging, three or four small copper.  The latter were particularly pleasing as I didn't see any last year when I looked and, come to think of it, I'm not too sure when I last saw a small heath either.  I was also treated to the sight of two small coppers chasing each other around crazily, presumably in some sort of mating ritual.  I hadn't seen them do that before.

Small Heath

Small Copper

The back end of the week was spent in Dumfries, where the temperature was about 6' higher.  We made a little trip out to Mossdale to walk the Paddy Line track briefly.  Unfortunately it had been rather spoiled as the Forestry Commission have put down a roughcast road on top of it and the rocks have spilled over onto the roadside vegetation.  Target was the scotch argus and there were a few about, if somewhat unsettled.  In the end we saw about six, along with a dozen more peacocks and a few red admirals. So it was one expectation achieved.  I also had an eye out for the wall butterfly and may have seen a couple but couldn't prove it.

Scotch Argus

Nothing new to report in the garden apart from a young wood pigeon but I have enjoyed watching the juvenile robin gradually acquire his red breast.  It's not quite there yet so he's more of a chaffinchy colour just now.

Young Wood Pigeon (n.b. lack of markings)

Monday 10th August

I went fishing at Dissington again last Wednesday.  Technical problems ensured a poor start when the pole bung came loose on catching an early perch, necessitating a return to waggler tactics.  Further delays resulted through tackle tangles and when it rained and I discovered I couldn't get the brolley up.

In the end it turned out ok.  Using fine tackle. I got two roach and another perch on maggot before things went quiet.  I switched to worm and got a strong run only for the hook to fail.  I suspected a tench but the next cast resulted in a small but hard-fighting crucian carp of perhaps 5oz.  After another perch bites on worm went back.  So I gambled, scaled up to a larger hook with double sweetcorn and caught technically a better fish - a roach of going on a pound.  However the wee crucian was a first for me, so also worthy of note.

Wee Crucian

Decent Roach

It's interesting that changing baits seemed to produce results.  There was a guy who fished at Brooms who reckoned it was an idea to change bait every time he caught a fish, something I've never considered seriously but crossed my mind on the day.  I'm also sure I got a few shot bites even though there was no more than crushed hemp in the groundbait.

The new buddleia bush I put in the back lawn finally produced some noteworthy results in the sun last Thursday.  I counted a total of around 30 small whites, one large white, one comma. four peacocks, three red admirals and three small tortoiseshells.

However the first visitor of the day proved to be the most interesting.  I had to check with an expert (Caroline of Northumberland Natural History Society) to confirm it was a buff-tailed bumblebee.  What I didn't spot was that it is a queen.

Small White	Large White
Comma	Peacock
Red Admiral	Queen Buff-tailed Bumblebee

Since then there has been a single appearance of a green-veined white and, as last year, two flypasts by holly blues.

Sunday 2nd August

I got out fishing on Killingworth Lake on Wednesday.  I enjoyed the experience of fishing a waggler for the first time in many years, though incompetence through lack of practice meant success was limited.  I managed to land three roach in the course of the afternoon when I should probably have had at least double that.  Several fish were missed or lost on the way to the net.  Barbless hooks seem to make it easy for smaller fish and the size I started with was probably also too small.

Unfortunately the lake is shallow where fishing is allowed and after teatime the swim was heavily invaded by swans happily eating up all the bait and I gave up earlier than planned.

The Catch

I got talking to a lad who was there for the night carp fishing and told me he had once caught a terrapin there.  There is photographic evidence to prove his claim is believable.

Terrapin

The weather forecast was that summer was due to take place on Friday so after slogging around the tennis court in 28 degree heat, I decided to have another run to Hamsterley Mill to see if I could get a better view of the purple hairstreaks.

Typically the weather had turned back to murk by the evening but the warmth was still there and there was a good deal of activity in the 'hotspot' at the second bridge.  This time there were about twenty sightings as they whirled around like mad things.  One settled momentarily on an ash right next to the bridge but did not open its wings and moved on pronto.

I don't think I used it at the time but this video I took last year shows what it's like trying to spot them in flight:

i checked out another spot and saw one more, by which time it started to rain. Once again I came ohome early.

There was a bit of rain again and precious little sun yesterday when I rode to check the meadows at Elswick and Derwenthaugh for commom blues and burnet moths.  No success, but equally interesting to note that bird's foot trefoil has disappeared at Elswick when there was plenty of it last year.  At Derwenthaugh there was none where it was last year but plenty of it further up the field.  I'm a bit puzzled as to why that should be.

It's still slim pickings on the garden buddleia.  A couple of small tortoiseshells have shown up, as did a rather ragged little comma.

Comma

As well as an increasingly bold grey squirrel, the woodpeckers continue to feast on the peanut feeder, in the most recent case a juvenile, judging by its extensive red pate.

Woodpecker