THE FLY AGARIC

My colleague at the country park, David Nicholls, drew my attention on Sunday 2nd to this very colourful fly agaric toadstool growing in the car park. On such a dull winter's day, this small toadstool added an unexpected splash of colour to the park. This one pictured above was quite a small one at about 6cms wide but a larger decaying one nearby had managed to flourish undetected in recent days. There haven't been any previous fly agarics in the park and I've not heard of any others growing on the Island.

It seems rather timely to see the fly agaric in December as this toadstool has been linked with Santa Claus. Fly agaric is probably man's oldest hallucinogenic and the history of Siberian folk using the fly agaric is thought to have helped develop the legend of Santa Claus and his flying reindeer!

The weather was blustery with showers during the morning and not many visitors to the park. However one group of 20 fieldfares flew over the car park a couple of times. Another small flock of 10 fieldfares were seen along the East Mersea road.

Whilst looking at the flock of 300 wigeon busy feeding in the grazing fields, the tranquility was rudely disturbed by something that sent all the birds scattering. I was lucky to quickly glance upwards to see a male peregrine hurtling overhead in a very determined hunting mode. It rapidly passed over the fields, ignoring all the ducks and confusion beneath as it made a bee-line for the waders on the mud near the Point.

It swooped sharply down twice before climbing back up with a small bird in its talons. Having caught probably a dunlin, it flew around and appeared to be trying to feed on the bird in mid-air. Three times it dropped the bird and each time it successfully re-caught it well before it hit the river. The peregrine then raced eastwards over to Point Clear.

The tide in front of the park was coming back in during the afternoon and the bright sunshine seemed to highlight all the oystercatchers. There was a sizeable gathering on the mud with nearly 300 birds having one last feed before heading over the river to roost.

Had a quick walk along Coast Road on Sunday morning before the rain set in. Looking over to Packing Marsh Island, pictured above, I noticed lots of golden plovers gathered on the mud. When a large gull disturbed the flock of about 500 birds, there was the wonderfully musical chorus as they all settled back down.

A short while later I glanced over and saw huge flocks of the plovers in the air. A presumed bird of prey was in the area and sent 2000 golden plovers and 1000 lapwing from surrounding marshes high into the sky. It was quite a spectacle seeing all these birds flying around in several large groups, with the two species staying in their own separate flocks as they flew around.

In and also near the entrance of the Mersea Quarters there was a female / immature eider, female common scoter, 7 red-breasted mergansers, 4 great crested grebes and four little grebes.

A sign of the mildness of the winter was the sight of a hedgehog trundling slowly across City Road in the early evening. In the good old days, hedgehogs would've been well into their hibernation by early December.
On the topic of mammals a weasel was seen by Firs Chase on Friday morning carrying a mouse.