Friday 30 September 2011

Ouse Estuary birds

Robin
This morning I called in at Mill Hill, but only saw a few Meadow Browns and a mushroom. I then headed for Newhaven where I met Mark who was following a female Wall. The old rubbish tip area where I had seen my first Clouded Yellow two years ago is about to be developed as a superstore. An ecology team has been busy since my last visit a week ago. They have constructed polythene walls dividing the whole area into segments to capture Great Crested Newts. Collecting containers will trap the newts that try to find a way around the barriers. They will be translocated into the adjacent Ouse Estuary Reserve, which is ringed by a newt-proof wall. I then spent some time at the nearby Tide Mills.
Mushroom at Mill Hill
Next to the Ouse Estuary Reserve on land marked for development:
Shaggy Ink Cap mushroom Coprinus comatus
Roman Snail
Roman Snail




Tide Mills:
House Sparrow
Dunnock
Dunnock
House Sparrow
Mill Pond

Happy hound
Pampus Grass

Thursday 29 September 2011

Small Coppers at Cissbury Ring

Small Copper
This afternoon I visited Cissbury Ring. The commonest butterfly was the Small Copper, with the largest numbers I have ever seen on the ground covering brambles on the north east area of the top. I also saw Whites, 2 Common Blues, Red Admirals, many Speckled Woods and two Silver Y moths.
mating Meadow Browns
Common Blue
Common Blue



Small Copper

Small Copper
mating Craneflies
Speckled Wood
Meadow Brown
female Common Blue

Southern Hawker and Fly agarics

 male Southern Hawker
Yesterday morning visited Pulborough Brooks and joined the RSPB. We had a lovely walk around part of the reserve, but the highlight was stopping to watch two Southern Hawkers patrolling a pond. One hovered invitingly near me and after many attempts I managed to get some half decent shots at one thousandth of a second. Every so often the two males would meet and have a territorial dispute before returning to their respective parts of the pond.







Chicken of the woods

Later I found some Fly agarics at Iping Common.
Fly agaric Amanita muscaria
This beautiful mushroom is poisonous



Tuesday 27 September 2011

Autumn fret at the Tide Mills

After lunch we motored to Newhaven to visit the Tide Mills again. There was a sea fret over Newhaven when we arrived, but this lifted after a while. We sat at the spot where I had seen the weasel a few days before, then walked around the area of the Tide Mills and the beach.
"I have an itch"
"that's better"

Common Garden Spider Araneus diadematus



Little Egret


Yellow horned poppy Glaucium flavum
Viper's Bugloss Echium vulgare
Pampas Grass Cortaderia selloana
Rose hips