karen's country calendar

With a hot day forecast I thought it would be a good idea to go out early butterfly watching so I parked up at Monks Wood just after 9am. I knew that silver washed fritillaries were now flying and had read reports of plenty of these and white admirals having been seen there. It wasnt long before I saw the first white admiral and then noticed a gentleman with camera and tripod standing staring at a particular patch of bramble further up the ride.   I soon saw that there were a number of white admirals and silver washed fritillaries flying about and a few of them landed which enabled a few photographs. There were also  large skippers,  numerous meadow browns and my first ringlet sighting of the year together with one red admiral. Surprisingly I didnt see any speckled wood which in fact I have not seen much of at all this year so far. With Woodwalton Marsh being just a mile further on I drove on to see if I could achieve some photos of the marbled whites which had refused to oblige

Another warm sunny day so I decided to see what was about on Therfield Heath as it was the beginning of Marbled whites and Dark Green Fritillary emergence. Sure enough, walking up the chalky hill, it wasnt very long before I saw a few marbled whites fluttering above the grasses, however they refused to settle and I was unable to get a photograph this time.   I walked right to to the top of the hill where there were good views and was rewarded by the sight of a dark green fritillary but again it was too busy to settle.  I was resigned to just seeing not phootgraphing today. There were skylarks singing away up high and also some flying purposefully over the grassland presumably to well hidden nests. Walking back to the car park I decided to try the path going out from the other end and it was along there that I saw several more dark green fritillaries and one or two actually settled so I did manage a couple of photos. I also saw a family of immature pied wagtails running along in fro

Today was my first visit to Brampton Wood this year.  The wood has been closed all winter due to muddy footpaths, it then remained closed at the start of lockdown before opening just the wood not the carpark.  Of course that meant that only the locals (though wood is about 2 miles from nearest house) could visit but it was soon found that people were merely parking all down the grass verges so the car park was then opened to the public a couple of weeks ago. On arrival I found that there were already half a dozen cars in the car park  I had heard of one sighting of a White Admiral so was hoping maybe I would see it though not to optimistic.   There were not as many butterflies flying as I expected despite the warm sunshine,  a couple of speckled wood, small whites, large skippers, a small tortoiseshell and several meadow browns.   I went to the site where black hairstreaks are normally seen but could not find any but asking a couple who were also searching, if they had seen any they,

Following a tip off I made my way to Fen Drayton lakes this morning at 830 in the hope of seeing a red footed falcon that had been seen there for the past few days.  I parked up and walked along beside the guided busway to where it had been seen perching on the different posts around a field of sheep.  I was soon joined by other birders with the same mission and we stood in small groups scanning the field with binoculars,  nothing!!   After about 30 mins I wondered whether to make my way back but thought I had better just enquire of the other birders whether they had found it -- yes they had and pointed it out in the distance perching on on of the fence posts- I had been scanning the skies to see if it flew down but I think it must have been on the ground and flown up! I was pleased my outing hadnt been in vain and managed to take a very zoomed in photo but enough to show it was the right bird. Walking back to the car I heard purring of a turtle dove and stared through my binoculars