DAINTY DEMOISELLE

It threatened rain at various times during Wednesday 18th but the wind kept the clouds moving along. The wind whipped up the sea, creating choppy conditions for the one or two boats including the restored fishing smack Pioneer, as they sailed out of the river Colne, photo above.

The most unusual wildlife sighting was a very colourful male banded demoiselle damselfly near the East Mersea Point. The insect was taking refuge from the wind behind the seawall and each time it beat its dainty looking dark-blue banded wings, it got blown back again. It had to make do with sheltering amongst the shrubby sea-blite bushes beside the seawall.

These male banded demoiselles appear to have quite an urge to travel a few miles in search of new waterways as they don't breed anywhere near Mersea Island and yet this is now the third record for the park in the last 8 years. They normally require the moving waters of rivers for egg-laying and the nearest regular colony is along the Roman river about 5 miles to the north of the Island.

Dragonflies seen over a sunny park yesterday included the large emperor, one or two black-tailed skimmers and a female broad-bodied chaser. Although not specifically looking, the only butterfly noted were a couple of meadow browns. One of the notorious Harlequin ladybirds was found for the second week running at the park, so they seem to be well established here.

The moth trap was run through Tuesday night and the haul resulted in about 30 moths of 12 species. Four elephant hawkmoths were the main colourful sight inside the trap. Other moths included the first grey dagger of the season, pictured above, also spectacle, latticed heath, lots of marbled minors and shuttle shaped darts, dark arches, heart and darts and hebrew character.

The white-point moth pictured below displaying the a white dot on each wing, used to be regarded as quite scarce but in recent years it has become more widespread in Essex.


Haven't had much of an opportunity to look for birds in the park in recent days and it has just been the regular residents on show. On the grazing fields a little egret and grey heron were out stalking the ditches, lapwing, tufted duck, reed bunting and three reed warblers were noted.
Over the main park, the kestrel was seen, a few swifts passed over, 20 of the resident sand martins, skylarks singing and meadow pipits calling.

On Tuesday night the little owl perched on top of a roadside pole near Bromans Lane while a brown hare jogged along the road in front of the car at dusk.

Despite several visits by local birders to the Reeveshall pool over the last week, the garganey have not been seen again. Birds of note here have included 5 green sandpipers, 2 spotted redshank and a couple of greenshank as well as 70 black-tailed godwits.