More Purple Hairstreaks and Sea-Watching.... at Wembury!

August 2nd and I headed off for a walk at Wembury. It was sunny, and warm when sheltered from the strong breeze, and I had a pleasant walk along the coast path.

2 whimbrel, 3 curlew and 4 little egrets were roosting on the rocks at The Point with oystercatchers at high tide and for a change there wasn't too much disturbance from walkers and dogs along the beach.

Scanning offshore and there were lots of gannets swirling around, mostly adults with a few dark juveniles. I managed to pick out a distant feeding flock of around 50 Manx shearwaters beneath a group of gannets, they were resting on the sea before flying up in a group and then splashing down on the water.

On land and blackcap and whitethroat were seen with 2 cirl buntings flying over. A sparrowhawk was mobbed by some swallows, a juvenile kestrel was presumably practising hunting by swooping down and grabbing horse turds in the horse field before dropping them and a peregrine flew over with a small bird in its talons.

Plenty of butterflies on the wing - meadow brown, gatekeeper, large white, red admiral, holly blue, common blue, comma, green veined white, small skipper and wall. A few faded six-spot burnet were feeding on the thistle flowers and a small and dark common lizard was basking in the sun on the wooden fencing.

Holly Blue, Wembury

Heading home after a pasty and coffee for lunch and I decided to have a walk around Efford Marsh again to have a look for purple hairstreaks. I checked out the oak trees around the pond and quickly found 1 flitting around the canopy (or fidgeting as it is described in my field guide). Scanning around and I found at least another 5 individuals but they were all brief and obscured views up amongst the leaves - I didn't bother with trying to get any photos although I did get a good but brief view of 1 individual.

A visit to the Garden House near Yelverton on August 3rd and I found 2 speckled bush crickets amongst the flower heads along with a red admiral and a few meadow brown in the cool, cloudy and breezey conditions. The gardens looked stunning though and are really developing well, it has been quite a few years now since we last visited here.

 Speckled Bush Cricket, The Garden House - female with ovipositor

Speckled Bush Cricket, The Garden House - male



August 4th and I headed off to Wembury again. It was cloudy and very windy with a strong south westerly breeze and the waves were crashing up the main beach at the high tide where a flock of black headed gulls and a few herring gulls were feeding in the churned up surf. Scanning through and I found an adult and 4 juvenile Mediterranean gulls amongst the flock, 1 juvenile had a green plastic leg ring but I couldn't get any details on it as it flew amongst the waves or rested on the sea. It was interesting to see the size differences of the juvenile Meds when 3 of them rested on the sea together - presumably the smallest bird was a female.  A leucistic black headed gull amongst the flock was most unusual looking.

 Juvenile Mediterranean Gulls, Wembury

Juvenile Mediterranean Gulls - smaller individual on the left



Heading off towards the sewage pipe and hoping that there hadn't been any disturbance from walkers along the beach and I was pleased to see a flock of gulls roosting on the tideline. I found another adult Mediterranean gull amongst the black headed gulls and what I thought was a juvenile yellow legged gull before it flew off towards Plymouth and out of sight (yes, it's that time of year when I frustrate the hell out of myself trying to ID large juvenile gulls) - however it appears to have been a juvenile herring gull after all.

Adult Mediterranean Gull

Juvenile Herring Gull

Offshore and again there were lots of gannets swirling around and so I decided to set up my telescope for a proper sea watch, hunkering down out of the wind on the beach near the old swimming pool. I scanned from The Mewstone towards Plymouth and being low down and almost at sea level I had some lovely views of Manx shearwaters as they banked up out of the wave troughs and showed well against the sky line. I counted 20-30 per minute heading west although a few were also seen heading east, and they tended to appear in pulses with the odd single bird flying past and then a little group of up to 20 birds. There must have been higher numbers passing by than I counted as my position low down to the water meant restricted viewing, and after an hours watching the sun appeared, the wind dropped slightly and the Manxies dried up entirely.

The highlight though were at least 2 great skua - single birds were briefly seen but 2 birds together showed very well if a little distantly above the waves. They were chasing each other with 1 bird having larger and brighter white wing flashes, presumably an older bird, and their short tails and bulky build were also noticeable.

A singing cirl bunting showed well and 4 juvenile whitethroats were skulking together in a sloe bush, presumably a recently fledged family. The juvenile kestrel was still around but wasn't interested in horse turds this time and on the rocks with the oystercatchers were 2 whimbrels again along with 2 little egrets and 1 curlew. 

I did a 15 minute Big Butterfly Count as well, seeing a male common blue, 10 gatekeeper, 1 red admiral, 1 peacock, 1 painted lady, 8 meadow brown and 2 large white on my 15 minute wander around Wembury Point.

And so a bit of sea watching at Wembury of all places, a quite enjoyable hours watching although tiring on the eyes scanning through a telescope. And great skua takes my year list to 171.





Purple Hairstreaks and a Bottlenose Dolphin

It's been quiet the past 2 weeks since our return from Bude, I have been busy with work and other commitments and the weather has been quite mixed with some unusually cold nights for July.

I had the moth box out in the backyard on July 21st and had my first four spotted footman of the year (a male) along with a nice buff arches amongst the more usual species for the time of year.

A walk at Wembury later that day and 2 whimbrels on the rocks with oystercatchers and an adult Mediterranean gull with 6 juveniles flying close inshore towards Plymouth were a sign that summer has now peaked, although a whitethroat and a cirl bunting were still singing away.

Short-winged Conehead, Wembury



July 26th and the weather was awful - wet, windy and cool - and my plan to get out for a walk went out of the window. However despite the forecast the rain stopped at around 1pm and so I headed off to Efford Marsh near Marsh Mills in Plymouth, a small nature reserve owned and managed by Plymouth City Council. I have visited the reserve many years ago in the winter to see a Siberian chiffchaff but didn't really explore the area and having read on the internet that purple hairstreaks are found here I thought I would go and have a look. I wasn't expecting to see any as it was still cloudy and windy and I wasn't disappointed but I did get to suss out the site for a future visit in better weather conditions. I did get soaking wet walking through the long grass and I slipped over 4 (!) times in the mud but at least I got out of the house.

Despite the weather there were quite a few butterflies around in the humid conditions in more sheltered areas - gatekeeper, meadow brown, ringlet, red admiral, large white and comma - but no purple hairstreaks. I did find the oak trees around the ponds where the hairstreaks are seen and so I decided I would return on a better day.

July 30th was warm and sunny so we headed off to the beach at Cawsands for the day, catching the ferry across from The Barbican. Sandwich terns and Mediterranean gulls were seen flying around on the crossing and later the odd single bird of both species were seen flying along the beach.

It was very pleasent sitting on the beach despite an altercation with the owners of 2 unruly dogs (not the dogs fault, its the fault of the dog-shit-for-brains owners), and being stung on my finger by a small bee (I'm allergic to bee stings but it didn't appear to inject any venom into me, I didn't get any swelling and it flew off with its sting intact).

Long-winged Conehead, Cawsand



The highlight was a bottlenose dolphin very close to shore interacting with a passing yacht before it moved off and just disappeared. I noticed people on the beach standing up and pointing and thought they were watching a Navy ship coming in to Plymouth but I caught sight of a fin breaking the surface and had some nice views as it swam around the yacht. It had a very distinct dorsal fin which was split into 2 at the tip and is probably the individual, most likely a lone male, that I saw at Wembury a few months ago and the individual that has been reported around Drakes Island a few times - I didn't notice the dorsal fin being split on the Wembury sighting due to the distance I watched it from.

On the walk back to Cremyll to catch the ferry back to Plymouth there were plenty of butterflies flitting about including a holly blue and a comma. It was a very pleasent evening, warm and sunny and still, and I decided to check out all the oak trees we passed by for purple hairstreaks which I had read were more active after 5pm. I eventually found one flitting about the top of a small oak tree by the footpath near The Folly and eventually saw around 6 individuals as they sparred with each other over the canopy. They were very active and mobile but I managed some nice views through my binoculars when they settled on the oak leaves. Unfortunately access around the tree was restricted and the hairstreaks were sitting with their wings open to the sun at the wrong angle for me to get good views but I did get a few photos.

Purple Hairstreak - well I didn't say I got some "good" photos!



Purple Hairstreak - some damage to lower left wing



They are the first purple hairstreaks I have seen for many years, I have only seen them at Minsmere in Suffolk as a young boy and I wasn't particularly impressed with the small dots I saw flying around in the tree tops -  I still haven't seen them well but at least the views were better this time.

July 31st and it was off to the caravan in Bude for the day with the Outlaws. It was sunny and warm and we had a pleasent time enjoying the weather. I took a walk down to Maer Lake in the afternoon where the water levels were lower than in July and there were a few waders busily feeding - 2 black tailed godwit (1 summer plumaged, 1 winter plumaged), 1 snipe, 5 dunlin (2 still with the black belly of summer plumage), 2 curlew, a juvenile ringed plover and a green sandpiper. Also seen were a juvenile shelduck and 2 teal with the mallards and moorhens while swallows, sand martins and house martins swooped over the water.

And so a nice selection of sightings with the green sandpiper bringing my UK bird year list to 170.