Psilos
Bird Journal |
Friday August
29th 2008 |
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"All
at once" |
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If you want to increase your
chances of seeing anything interesting happen in the wild you have to
spend many hours watching. I have spent many hundreds of hours just
sitting and observing, hoping something will fly by or magically appear
in front of me. More often then not nothing very spectacular happens
unless you go looking for it but just occasionally nature surprises
you when you have almost stopped looking and sometimes more than one
thing happens at once. |
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Previously I had
been watching the Great crested grebes sparring out on the water. Heads
down low in the water they growled at each other but never got into
a fight. They were too far away to photograph so I just sat and enjoyed
them. Nothing much had been happening and so I took my eye off the ball.
Big mistake! Quite by chance I happened to look up to see a very small
bird go swimming passed. Instantly I knew this was something different.
I was very excited as I thought I had found a Red necked grebe. Sadly
it turned out to be a juvenile Little Grebe. Not so rare but never mind
as I have never seen one on here before. |
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As I chased what I then thought
was a Red necked grebe to the other side of the lake my attention was
suddenly grabbed by the beating of many wings. From behind me a large
group of Tufted ducks flew in. It is rare to see this number of tufties
up in the air at this time of day.. They must have been spooked up from
a nearby resevoir. Frantically they wheeled and flew around. Breaking
up in to small groups before finally landing on the water. I know winter
is approaching as the numbers of Tufted duck start to increase. When
all was settled I went back to looking for the grebe but maybe the bird
was spooked too as I never found it again. |
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The Common terns
plus the final chick have all gone now hopefully for somewhere much
warmer than here. There was still some signs of new life though. Across
the water a Great crested grebe was sitting on a nest. This is the pair
that produced the one surviving chick this year so maybe they will produce
some more though it is getting rather late in the season. At the other
end of the lake there were some Mallard ducklings. As ever I looked
for a photographic opportunity but it didnt last as they were disturbed
by people throwing bread. Oh well another time... |
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The summer has been so very
wet that I have seen very few butterflies around. Was delighted today
to see a beautiful Peacock butterfly. |
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The hedgerows and meadows now
are starting to look very worn and are dieing back. Everywhere you go
there is the sickly sweet smell of the invasive and non native Indian
balm. How many of us as children loved to pop their seeds and watch
them explode. A beautiful plant but a real menance in our countryside. |
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Walking along I was also struck
by the thistles that were also dieing down. There was still some colour
left in some of the flowers and I thought they made a terrific composition.
It just goes to show that you can find inspiration in all kinds of places. |
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