Dragons....And Some Other Interest.

I was off to Birk Bank on Friday, to find the barrier down and the traditional notice posted to let us know gunslingers were out and about. 

Ignoring the notice, I went under the barrier and on to the track to the bog to try to establish the state of play on the dragonfly front heading towards the end of August. To be honest, I thought perhaps the Four-spotted Chaser and Golden-ringed Dragonfly would be things of the past for another year, though last year I found one of the latter here on the very same date as this visit on 26 August, quite late for this species.

Keeled Skimmer Male. Pete Woodruff.

Today, I was pleased to find 2 Keeled Skimmer male, one of which I noted as a bright pruinose individual, this brought about the comment from a contact, of a feeling we now have a healthy population established at Birk Bank.

Black Darter Male/Female. Pete Woodruff.

The darters don't make accurate counting easy, they were most obliging coming to rest on the boardwalk during the time spent there, so for the several sightings of the species, my records read 'at least', 4 Black Darter male and a female. Also seen, 8 Common Darter male, and a female.

  

Common Darter Male. Pete Woodruff.

Other Interest.

One of the reliably seen Common Lizard was at rest on the boardwalk at Birk Bank, it barely moved for a couple of hours until it eventually disappeared.

Common Lizard. Pete Woodruff.

Mesembrina meridian. Pete Woodruff.

Easily recognised by its black body and yellow wing bases, I thought the Noon Fly was a cool looking creature basking on the boardwalk.

 
Harmonia axyridis. Pete Woodruff.

In the garden yesterday and initially had me guessing, Harlequin Ladybird larva.

Conder Pool 2022.

I'm not at liberty to publish numbers of breeding at Conder Pool, but I'm aware of excellent results for the Common Tern, by far the best year ever. Also successes for waders, Avocet, Little Ringed Plover, and Redshank.

Kittewake. Howard Stockdale.

There has also recently been some excellent goodies on and around the pool, with this Kittewake juvenile in the creeks 21 August, to follow 3 Black Tern juvenile 19 August, all preceded by the Temminck's Stint just sneaking in at the end of July to keep birders from near and far very happy for a few days during early August....Conder Pool Rules OK!     

Butterfly Bonanza....

But first....Steve Graham and myself entered the world of twitchers at Conder Green where we went on the circuit and relocated the Temminck's Stint in the creeks below River Winds. A smart little adult stint still wearing some brown, buff and grey mottled breeding plumage.

Med Gulls Conder Pool 1 August. Silent Video

Some other casual records included, at least 8 Mediterranean Gull on Conder Pool, also uncounted Avocet including 4 young seen in the creeks, 12 Greenshank was a good count, as was 11 Little Grebe , both seen as current peak counts. It was also good to see 2 Common Tern juvenile with uncounted adults, 4 Black-tailed Godwit, 3 Common Sandpiper, and up to 40 House Martin seen lingering around River Winds.

Butterfly Bonanza.

The butterfly bonanza soon took off when we came to the canal towpath at The Mill at Conder Green to walk the section of the canal to Galgate. The results from the walk, was to log an impressive 51 Gatekeeper, followed at the top of the list by 40 Meadow Brown. Runners up consisted of 13 Green-veined White, the 7 Red Admiral and 5 Painted Lady seen, were all noted to be very fresh. Also 5 Small Tortoiseshell, 4 Small White, 3 Holly Blue, and 2 Peacock.

Large Skipper. Pete Woodruff.

I didn't ask Steve for comments, but personally thought just one Large Skipper, a Large White and Speckled Wood, came as surprising and disappointing low numbers, and included no Ringlet or Small Skipper seen.

Odonata sightings came in fine style, when we stepped on to the towpath at the lock by The Mill we found our first five of 13 Banded Demoiselle at four locations, they were seen as 9 male and 4 female. An excellent count of 13 Emperor Dragonfly and 10 Brown Hawker.

Shaded Broad-bar. Pete Woodruff.

Moths seen, 3 Shaded Broad-bar and 6 Silver Y, also up to 40 Red-tailed Bumblebee were seen along the way. A Buzzard and 2 Raven were all seen a little distance to the north, and a Kingfisher seen briefly as it rounded the corner and lost to view on the canal at Galgate.

Thanks to Ian once again, for the excellent header shot of the equally excellent Small Copper, as one of the species not seen at Mondays Butterfly Bonanza.

Postscript.

Gatekeeper on Regale Lily. Pete Woodruff.

After finding 51 Gatekeeper on Monday, our first one ever in the garden paid a visit this afternoon.    

Spring Butterflies.

This year lots of butterflies emerged weeks later than they normally do due to the spring having the coldest start for a half century, the month of March was the second coldest since records began, with snow on the ground in some areas into April.

 Grizzled Skipper Butterfly Conservation  

The typical delay for the emergence of rare spring butterflies was of two weeks, beyond the typical was the case of the Grizzled Skipper which emerged four weeks later than last year.

Duke of Burgundy Marc Heath  

This beautiful butterfly the Duke of Burgundy didn't emerge until late April, about three weeks later than last year, the Wood White which was first seen on 10 April in 2012 wasn't seen until almost a month later this year. But the late spring wasn't necessarily a bad thing for the butterflies as the host plants they rely upon will also have been delayed.

Last year was a complete washout for UK butterflies and the worst year on record for them, the majority of species having suffered declines. As I see it, and according to the forecast I just saw, things don't appear to be going to get any better, the weather needs to improve drastically, the butterflies need to be flying, mating, and laying eggs, a successful breeding season is needed to start to rebuild their populations.

Conder Green. Peter Guy. 

I found a good excuse to post this excellent photograph of the creeks at Conder Green, host to many a good bird in the past and I'm always on the lookout for the next one. The excuse being, the red building on the right is River Winds, often mentioned on Birds2blog usually referring to the House Martins which nest here every year, and which I mentioned in a recent post to record up to around ten birds having returned here once again. 

Temminck's Stint. Conder Pool. Copy Permitted.

And by the way....The Temminck's Stint turned up on Conder Pool again yesterday at 6.12pm but not seen since.

Thanks to Butterfly Conservation, Marc Heath, Peter Guy, and Copy Permitted for these excellent images. 

Please 'clik the pik' if you want to see them as they really should be seen. 

Another Compromise....

Another compromise with KT on Sunday when it was suggested we paid a visit to Fleetwood to take a look round Freeport, but - said I - only if it also includes a look in on Rossall Point....and off we went. 

 Gannet David Cookson

Well, no birds at Freeport!....but when we got to Rossall Point a Gannet was soon seen far out to sea flying south, and a Whitethroat performed nicely for us around the bushes on the perimeter of the golf course.

 

Sanderling Brian Rafferty   

But the interest was on the beach at high tide when 14 Sanderling included the very interesting sight of one carrying rings, duly and appropriately submitted. The result of this could be quite exciting and the sort of thing which fires me up no end when it comes to my birds/birding. A call at Conder Green on the way home produced a female Scaup on Conder Pool. Hardly to be called a full days front line birding, but....good enough for me, and certainly much better than no birding at all.

Temminck's Stint. Copy Permitted.

This morning I responded to an alert of a Temminck's Stint at Conder Green, but an hour spent there searching didn't have a result. The bird had been seen around 8.10am and flew over Conder Pool, landed for 5 seconds on a mud bank in the creeks, then did a disappearing act. 

Thanks to DC/BR for the excellent photographs.

An even closer look.

There's an excellent 'Closer Look' Gallery which has recently been brought up to date on the Flyde Bird Club website and the American Golden Plover, Blue-headed Wagtail, Temminck's Stint, Kentish Plover, and White Stork are all examples of what you will find HERE 

Blue-headed Wagtail.

One of the birds featured on the Fylde Bird Club website is the Blue-headed Wagtail (BHW) and I've been taking a closer look for myself at this bird.

The fact that continental Yellow Wagtails differed from the British form escaped the attentions of ornithologists until the early 1830's when the distinction was eventually noted, and in 1834 at Colchester in Essex the first British record of a continental BHW was made. This form of the continental race is the most common one to reach Britain, and breeding with the British flavissima is today recorded almost annually.

American Golden Plover.

The first record of an American Golden Plover (AGP) - a North American vagrant - in the Lancashire and North Merseyside area was of a bird with Golden Plovers at Marshside in November 1984, four years later another was found at Fleetwood in September 1988.

The next record of an AGP in Lancashire became famous for both me and for the county, in my case it was the bird I 'twitched' with my old friend and mentor the late John Leedal, and for the county it became the first long staying AGP for Lancashire. This bird was found at Fishmoor Reservoir, Blackburn on 28 October 1995, and was last seen on 11 November which was the date JL and I went to see the bird and therefore we were amongst the last birders to see this individual. Having looked up my record of the bird I found I'd made the following note....

'After a three hour wait to see if the grim weather we had traveled to Blackburn in would clear up - which it didn't - and following a further period searching for the bird in rain we discovered it with the c.200 Golden Plovers it had been in the company of for almost two weeks now, we eventually had excellent views of the AGP, also of note here was a female Common Scoter'. The note ends....'A Good Day'.

Yellow Wagtail. Simon Hawtin

The Yellow Wagtail to be found in our area of North Lancashire is that of a scarce and declining migrant breeder of probably no more than 'one or two' pairs. The most reliable site I know of for seeing this species is/was the Halforth/Heversham Moss area where I've neither heard nor seen the place mentioned this year, though I have to confess to not having been there to see for myself.  

For the record....I have been given permission to post the photographs of the BHW/AGP.