Although there have been some lockdown easing, I have largely continued with the doctors letter to stay at home as much as possible, apart from shopping and the daily walk. However last Wednesday I paid a visit to Sarah and Ed, this being the first time I have left the Stevenage environs since early April, and the first long drive since then. I last filled up with petrol in late March and I still have well over half a tank left.
It was nice to see them again, and it was good to have a change of scenery as well. Naturally I took the opportunity to offload some plants, but somehow managed to bring back a lot more. Still I have lots of time to sort them out. Their garden was very good for butterflies as they were still getting Brimstone, Orange Tips as well as various whites, a Holly Blue or tow and my first Common Blue. Birdwise the only thing of note was a flyover Hobby.
Fairlands Valley is getting busier as the temperature increases, and it was rather crowded on the bank holiday weekend. Migration has largely ceased now and most of the birds are settling down so its getting a bit quieter. There seem to be two pairs of Great Crested Grebes at the moment but otherwise the only notable sightings seem to be the ever increasing Canada geese flock which has at times passed 100. One or two Coot and Moorhens have chicks, but the wildfowl don't appear to be nesting.
Aston End has also got a bit quiet now, though I am still seeing decent numbers of Yellowhammer, Linnets and larks. I tend to go out early to miss the heat as it is quite a long walk, and so haven't seen many butterflies and insects yet. There are a few Swallows and Swifts around, but I haven't seen a Martin out here at all.
Yesterday I tried something a bit different and went out in the evening, in fact I didn't get home until 1015pm well after sunset.
One thing I noticed was a completely different set of results with my counts. More Blackbirds and Song Thrushes singing-not surprising really, and lots of vocal Robins and Wrens, but of course far lower numbers of Skylarks singing, and apart from Blackcaps most warblers, finches and buntings were hard to locate.
The first surprise was a singing Corn Bunting in a weedy field near the ford. This is the first I have heard here for at least five years. The second was nearly being run over by a Badger along the Walkern Road. I was walking along the footpath, hidden from the road when a car suddenly appeared, presumably just as the Badger was crossing the road, it shot through the hedge only ten feet from me into the wheat field.
Thinking that would be it I carried on heading north towards a rather fine sun set. The Little Owls were out around the paddocks and sheep fields and two showed well, though one was being chased by a Blackbird so I didn't see it for long, but the other spent some time on an old barn.
A bit later on as I headed up towards Chells Manor, the light had really dropped so I dug out the bat detector and connected it to the phone. There were several bats flying around, with several Common Pipistrelles and I got two consecutive hits which came up initially as Lesser Noctule, which isn't a British species and then moments later it came up with the much more likely and very common Noctule. I haven't yet checked to see what if any the differences are between the two, or whether the detector made a mistake.
At Christmas, I received a tuber of Dranunculus vulgaris from Sarah. It flowered today. I had to move it to the bottom of the garden as like many of the arums it is a bit pungent, but it certainly attracted the flies. In the pot, the spathe is almost at nose hight and the musky rotting meat scent was certainly noticeable!
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