ROUGH SUMMER SEAS

The wind whipped up the seas around the Island in the afternoon of Sunday 6th. It wasn't a typical summer's day seeing the waves crash onto the beach at the park, sending lots of spray up and over the seawall in one place.
Despite the wind, the day had started reasonably warm with patches of blue sky. Feeding out on the mudflats at low tide was a group of 112 black-tailed godwits and about 25 curlews.

Amongst the ducks at the park pond was a female ruddy duck happily diving under for food. This is the first sighting on the Island this year of a species that used to be a regular breeder in recent summers here on the pond. Also present were 5 tufted ducks and at least 20 mallard.

Hawking low over the pond and out of the wind was a group of 25 sand martins. A pair of stock doves flew past and a pair of goldfinches fed close-by on some thistles.

A couple of adders were found in their usual warm spot not far from the car park, hiding under a sheet of tin. This one is showing quite a brownish tone to its skin and after allowing a few pictures to be taken, slid off into the long grass.

The butterflies seen during the morning included comma, small white, large skipper, Essex skipper and small skipper, speckled wood and lots of meadow browns. A black-tailed skimmer was seen by the car park and on the pond, the large emperor dragonfly rested out of the wind.

Some of the moths seen over the last couple of nights in the trap have included this very distinctive and aptly named leopard moth, displaying lots of spots. Also present on Saturday morning amongst the 32 species were 3 elephant hawkmoths, the shark, swallow-tailed, bordered sallow, broad-bordered white, scorched wing, grey dagger and barred yellow.

Over Saturday night were 25 species noted, including this nationally scarce starwort, which has been recorded in previous years here. In Essex it is frequently recorded near the coastal saltmarshes. Also noted in the morning was the miller, L-album wainscot, white-point, silver-Y and the broad-bordered yellow underwing.

This summer chafer was also discovered hiding up in the light trap. Several have been seen in recent evenings flying around the tops of trees. The local black-headed gulls have been seen flying round the tree-tops at nightfall, swooping after these beetles. One chafer tracked me down the other night whilst standing on the featureless Reeveshall seawall, where it came and buzzed my telescope on the tripod and me - the only tall objects it could find in that flat area.

Also of interest was the sight of the regular brown long-eared bat resting in the toilet building at the park, just after midnight on Friday night. One of the regular visitors to the park reported seeing a brown hare close to the Point on Sunday morning.

Not sure if the sparrowhawks have bred successfully at the park this year but I had a fine view of the male bird on the ground thinking about having a bathe in a large puddle in the middle of Bromans Lane. I stopped the car about ten metres short of it, allowing the bird to fly off safely to a nearby tree.