Monday 10th September

The last few weeks has produced various bits and bobs though nothing really spectacular.

Towards the end of August there was another visit from the long-tailed to the feeders tits and in fairly big numbers,  I reckon there are seven of them in the photo.

Long-tailed tits and others

Also in the last week of August I tried a bike ride to Prestwick Carr where short-eared owls can sometimes be seen.  I didn't see them but there was a peacock and a red admiral and a number of green-veined whites feeding on the remains of some thistles.  I hadn't seen any for a while and so wondered if they are double-brooded, which it seems they are.  On the next clump of thistles there were more whites but they were almost exclusively small whites, as if some sort of segregation was going on.

Sequoia

On Friday 31st there was a Naturewatch walk along the Devil's Water near Corbridge.  There wasn't much in the way of birdlife around but we got a fair view of a comma sunbathing and there were some funghi and unusual trees.  One was identified as a sequoia.  Apparently treecreepers like to roost in the crevices of the trunk, though I don't suppose they were responsible for leaving a shoe there.

Last Monday I went back to Dumfries.  I spent some time looking for salmon leaping the caul, which I never saw in all my time there and still haven't.  Waiting at the station, I was quite amused by this train-themed flower display (below).  I've no idea what the dangling maroon flowers are but they're very effective.

On Sunday at Riding Mill, my reappearance on the cricket field and early dismissal lead to me sighting a large number of lapwings flying over the fields in the distance.  You couldn't make them out properly from a photo taken on my mobile but there were moments when I reckoned there must be a couple of hundred of them in the air - a far greater number than I can remember seeing before in my adult life.

Flower Train

Today there was another Naturewatch walk from Hagg Bank to the most Eastern of the Spetchells.

Our first sighting was a couple of improbably large pumpkins in the allotment.  By the pond there were three herons resting in the same tree and a few house martins overhead.  Possibly sand martins too, but I couldn't be sure in the conditions.

On a cool, sunless day it was a bit surprising to see speckled wood butterflies out and a couple of blue dragonflies. Also more funghi.

As we got to the chalky areas, we started to find the rarer plant species.  As ever, I couldn't really keep up but there were definitely some yellow wort.  Apparently the italian alder here were frequently used to replant old mining areas as they are fast growing and resistant to noxious soils.

Walking back to the car park at Wylam, we noticed a man fishing with the assistance of a dog.  I don't suppose that it helps the catch much, and if so, that it is permitted by the local Anging Club.

Huge pumpkins

Funghi

Fishing with dog

Bulgaria Day 2

It was suggested that a forage around the hotel area before breakfast might be fruitful and several of the group ventured forth for a look. Hotel Orfei lies in a deep gorge so it was too early for butterflies but someone heard a black redstart calling and I managed to pick out the silhouette on the rock face, though I would never have managed to identify it. A black woodpecker flew over the valley briefly, plus a couple of other sightings.

Probably the main wildlife feature of Bulgaria is the large amount of unspoilt meadow land.  Things really started to take off at our first destination, following a path through just such country.  I wasted a fair bit of time trying to get a clouded yellow to settle but in the end I settled for a video as it fluttered around incessantly:

The species count quickly began to mount. We saw some of the rarer blues, including chapman's, alcon and

Apollo

amanda's. I enjoyed my first glimpse of a balkan copper as well as my first sightings of green hairstreak, grizzled and tufted marble skippers plus heath and marsh fritillaries.

We saw woodland and bright-eyed ringlets, both of which were new to me and got nice views of the red-backed shrike, often to reappear on succeeding days.

A particular star was the apollo.  After a few sightings of them, one was finally netted and persuaded to settle on a rock.

Looking back, I am a bit disappointed with some of my photographic efforts during the session, but here are a few further impressions I managed to capture, rolled into a video Nb there is a correction.  Simeon our group leader has identified that the one captioned as grizzled skipper is in fact a tufted marbled skipper.  I f you pause the video and look closely, you can see the two white hair tufts.:

Later in the day, we visited a roadside lake where we saw a number of dragonflies, including azure damselfly, white-legged damselfly and blue emperor.  Here we also saw a black-tailed skipper, of which I unfortunately have no memory, southern small white and some crag martins - amongst others it has to be stressed.