GROVE AT DUSK

After a mixed day with sunshine and showers, Thursday 30th ended at the country park with a clear sky and a golden glow just after sunset. An evening walk around Cudmore Grove produced the usual selection of interesting birds, although the high tide meant there was nothing offshore.


At the park pond a new brood of tufted ducklings have appeared with three little brown balls joining the first brood now about 6 weeks old. Three pochard, 10 mallard, little grebe chick, mute swans with 3 cygnets, coots and moorhens were the other waterfowl seen.


A fox in the grazing fields was the only mammal seen other than lots of rabbits. No sign of any badgers for the second night running although 8 were noted on Tuesday and 5 seen on Saturday 25th.


The colour-ringed black-tailed godwit was still present in the fields along with about ten others and 2 lapwing, also 2 teal and 4 mallard. Earlier in the day 11 whimbrel flew over the fields, heading to the mudflats, while 2 green sandpipers flew over the day before.

A group of 25 sand martins were flying over this cliff-top path in the evening with several pairs still with families to raise. The young sparrowhawks are still very noisy in the clifftop trees and green woodpeckers have also been very vocal too. The nightingale was heard calling late in the evening near the park entrance while just to the north of the park a pair of little owls called to each other. A marsh harrier glided over the car park earlier in the evening as it headed east.

The butterflies enjoying the sun earlier in the day included lots of painted ladies and peacocks, both enjoying the buddleia bushes. Also large white, small white, comma, red admiral, small white, large white, speckled wood and a couple of common blues. Several six-spot burnet moths were on thistle heads in the park.

Dragonflies hunting around the park included southern hawker, migrant hawker and ruddy darter while the emperor was seen over the pond, along with azure and blue-tailed damselflies.
An adder was noted resting under a sheet of tin, while another one had been seen on the seawall on Wednesday afternoon.

Alongside Chapmans Lane on the edge of West Mersea the first mistle thrush flock of the summer was seen with 10 birds noted in a horse paddock. No sign of the small flock of 25 house sparrows seen the previous week here, feeding on the ripening wheat crop.