GEMS IN THE GLOOM

Once the breeze had blown away the morning mist and gloom, the afternoon of Sunday 20th turned into a sunny and very spring-like day. This small tortoiseshell was one of at least six, flying around the sheltered area of St Peters Meadow. There were also 3 peacocks, small white and a green-veined white butterflies in the same area.
The birds of interest here were a singing blackcap and a subdued reed warbler singing from the scrub, also some cheery house sparrows and a couple of linnets.

The main bird interest today centred around the garden of Martin Cock who had found a nice male redstart during the morning. The bird was seen perched up in some of the trees as well as coming down to the lawn. This is the second male to have stopped off on Mersea this spring. Also in the garden was a willow warbler and the male sparrowhawk.

Martin also did well to locate a grasshopper warbler singing briefly at the country park in the morning. The first common whitethroat was also seen by him on his walk past the Oyster Fishery, also whimbrel and blackcap noted.

Also in East Mersea today, Richard Brown reported seeing 2 short-eared owls and 2 whitethroats at Rewsalls, while Michael Thorley saw 2 wheatears and a lesser whitethroat at the Youth Camp.


Decided to join Richard Hull and Andy Field on one of their walks around the nearby army ranges of Langenhoe, just to the north of Mersea Island. The area is normally out of bounds but Richard has a permit to visit, as long as the army aren't firing.

The four and a half hour visit was very productive despite the gloomy conditions with several summer migrants newly arrived. The session got off to a good start with a male wheatear noted near the entrance. At the western end where there are some pools and reedbed, we noted one bearded tit pinging, reed warbler singing, two cuckoos, male yellow wagtail, little egret, singing snipe, spotted redshank, pair of avocets, 4 female pintail, 3 swallows and a peregrine sitting on a post on the saltmarsh.

In the wooded and scrubby section at the western end, close views of a short-eared owl were had perched up alongside a track. It was seen several times both perched up and in flight, the latter carried out with the slow deliberate wing-beats of a display flight. A little owl was also seen but no sign of any barn owls.

Of the migrants a brief purr of a turtle dove, two lesser whitethroats rattled, while blackcap and chiffchaff sang. A few yellowhammers and linnets were also seen .
The loud and distinctive songs of two Cetti's warblers were heard in their regular south-west corner amongst the scattering of scrub and reeds.


The lagoon at the eastern end of Langenhoe was holding lots of water, so only a few wildfowl but no waders. Ninety brent geese dropped in, four shoveler, two wigeon passed over as well as five red-breasted mergansers flew over. At least 20 pochard were seen during the walk as well as a handful of gadwall.

There was a group of 70 summer plumaged black-tailed godwits feeding in the Geedon Channel along with 3 bar-tailed godwits. Nearby Rat Island was alive with the nesting colony of a few thousand black-headed gulls, along with some herring and lesser-black backed gulls too.

Marsh harriers were everywhere with at least ten birds seen, several males and several females all very active. One male performed a dramatic display flight by stooping rapidly with wings tucked in, down to the reedbed below. In other places the weak call of some of the females were heard.

Also noted on the walk were a stonechat, 4 singing sedge warblers, 2 more reed warblers, green sandpiper, whimbrel and at least fifty reed buntings being the commonest small bird.

A few of these mink monitoring rafts were seen along some of the ditches. Inside the small box is some wet clay that animals such as mink can walk across, leaving their footprints as they pass through. The rafts are part of an Essex campaign to establish if mink are present in an area and if they are, then mink traps can be set up to capture them.

Back on Mersea, had a report that a muntjac deer was seen about a week ago near Shop Lane. It will be interesting to see how many other sightings there are of this muntjac in the coming weeks.