Spring 2009 may1st Visited Deer Park and made my way over to the large lake, beautiful spring day.
When I got there I could see that the greylag geese that I had noticed around the lake, were on the lake with their young gosling's, such a charming sight. I also spotted two coot nests, one out from the bank built on a platform of weeds just outside of the small boat house looking very exposed with the bird sitting on it and the other by the bank more or less opposite, within some low branches. I could see the eggs in this one. A coot's nest is made from dried reeds or other plant material with a softer lining and they can have two or more clutches consisting of six or more eggs.
Also there were a pair of great crested grebes swimming about but they kept their distance so photographing them was difficult. It's surprising how far they swim under the water, they dive and then you really haven't a clue where they will pop up again so you are looking in one place then they appear in another, frustrating but challenging !
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The bluebells are everywhere now, the woodland floors near the park and elsewere are a carpet of blueish purple, one of springs most beautiful of sights.
4th Went with a friend to Lydd Church on Romney Marsh, the steeple was open for visitors and you could look down on the heronry and rookery there. Just by the church in the grounds another visitor pointed out a very unusual looking daisy [ shown here]. I later found out its condition is called ' Fasciation' which is a mutation caused by insect attack, mechanical damage or bacterial infection. I have never seen this condition before, very unusual !
On entering the steeple we ascended up a very winding stone stair case, stopped off to see the room where they ring the bells and after that the belfry itself before continuing to the top. What a view from the top, you could see for miles over the marsh and of course down onto the heronry and the rookery. I have never had a view like this, rooks always nest way up above your head so this was a first for having a 'birds eye view' of them. Both the rooks and the herons were nearly fledged and ready to fly, unfortunately there were no adult herons around.
The herons were nesting in an evergreen oak and you just couldn't see the nests from ground level and that's why I didn't see them on my first visit. I got one unusual shot looking straight down at the graveyard where a dog lay asleep and one of the very long roof of the church. From Lydd we continued over to the RSPB reserve to see what else we could see.
At the reserve we had a good view of a courtship display by [ Can you identify these birds? Below right ] Try before you look! a very striking looking bird with its black and white plumage and long orange beak. The male kept following the female around, head down and calling all the time.
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A first for me was the sighting of a little gull, it was in the water near some blackheaded gulls so this showed how small it really is.
6th And at West Hythe lovely sunny day, the hawthorne is coming out and it looks like snow. By the side of the path I spotted an azure damselfly resting, unlike dragonflies damselflies close there wings along there body when at rest.
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I have included a picture of a carrion crow to show you the difference between it and a rook. You can see that the base of the beak is covered with bristly feathers were as the rook is bald and white.
By the side of the path I came across a very pretty wild flower called a common bistort.
Further down the path I heard a chaffinch singing and was lucky enough to get this picture of it.
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Towards the end of my walk I noticed this attractive small flower called a germander speedwell, lovely blue flowers.
9th West Hythe, came across this pair of froghopers [Cercopis vulnerata] in the undergrowth,this little insect spends its early life feeding on roots but still has the typical froth around it. If you look around at plants you can spot little patches of white froth on them, this is caused by the more common froghopper and if you brush away the froth you will find a small green insect which is the froghopper.
Came across this pair of mallards, they had been having a good preening session and the male has a feather stuck on its beak.
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I don't know if you have seen an oak apple on an oak tree but they are caused by a small wasp which is usually not more than about five millimetres long. The wasp lays an egg in a growing leaf and the larvae injects a chemical which causes the leaf to mutate into a oak apple as seen here. Later the adult wasp will emerge from the oak apple, in the Autumn you can find the apple now brown and hard with a tiny hole on its surface.
Further along the canal I came across a pair of mute swans with their signets, very charming.
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14th A lovely sight at West Hythe today were white water lily's on the canal, it has the biggest flower in the UK. Also here are a pair of azure damselflies mating, later the female will lay it's eggs on water plants under the water as shown here with these red-eyed damselflies.
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Nice to see lichen here as it indicates clean air in this area and another lovely sight are the yellow flags growing along the bank and another attractive flower seen is the ground ivy with its pretty blue flowers.
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Also growing near the canal were great horsetail ferns an unusual plant left over from the dinosaur period.
A couple of insects seen on this day were a seven spotted ladybird and a Coreus marginatus bug a close relative of the shield bugs. Also a good view of a four-spotted chaser dragonfly.
And rounding off the visit I had a good view of an adult heron that was standing on the bank of the canal.
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17th Over at Russel Gardens Dover, the place is full of chicks, coots, moorhens and swans there was even a young heron there. The cutest was the moorhens chicks, they were hiding in the reeds but I managed to glimpse them in a gap in the reeds and got some shots of them. Of course the signets were charming clustering close to their parents. I managed to get a close up photo of a coot standing on a log and you can see its amazing feet, its surprising how different its feet are to that of the moorhens. Both birds have a similar life style and are related being both rails. The moorhens feet are long like the coot but don't have the flat projections like you can see here. Coots dive more and are better swimmers than the moorhen plus the mad dashing about the coots do, chasing each other and other birds in the spring. You will see moorehens picking their way carefully over water plants and climbing about by the bank. I noticed that a pair of coots had made a nest in the same place in some coper beach branches that touch the water as they had in 2007, you can see this on the home page.
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The young heron I mentioned was having a hard time from a very annoyed rook, the rook was beside itself, even hacking off pieces of a branch it was on above the heron. It kept repeatedly diving at the heron and eventually the heron flew off down the lake and landed under some bushes out of harms way.
Another water bird I saw was a little grebe, not easy to photograph as it kept to the middle of the lake and seemed to spend more time under the water as on top!
The horse chestnuts looked lovely by the lake with there tall columns of white and pink flowers.
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24th And over at Stodmarsh and Grove Ferry here I got one of the best views of a turtle dove so far, it was perched on top of a dead tree and just stayed there while a got quite a few shots of it. Turtle doves spend the winter in sub-tropical Africa and arrive here about the end of April and then depart late summer early autumn.
Yellow water lily can be seen on the water channels and wild rose is here and there by the path.
I have seen a lot of painted lady butterflies around this year and I have heard that more than usual have turned up from Africa. These beautiful butterflies can't take our winter so any you see around at this time of the year have travelled a very long way!
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A male marsh harrier made its appearance over at the Grove Ferry end, quartering over the reeds. A fine looking bird, much more attractive than the female.
I caught sight of a funny incidence between a heron and a coot from the first hide you come to from the Grove Ferry car park. The heron came flying in over the lake and landed and was promptly chased off by the irate coot, a much smaller bird !
Over by the river Stour that runs by the side of the reserve I heard a cuckoo calling and sounded quite close.
I found the tree it was calling from but couldn't see it until it flew off, a pity as I would have liked to have had a good look at it.
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Came across this pretty little butterfly called a common blue, there are a number of similar looking blue butterflies around so you need a good field guide to tell them apart.
On the way back to the car park I came across these two wild flowers a red clover and a birdsfoot-trefoil or bacon and eggs, you can see why !
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30th I was over at West Hythe for a brief visit and was lucky enough to see this heron on the opposite bank fishing. It had been standing motionless for a while and then moved down closer to the edge then flew a couple of meters and landed in the water and I could see later that it had caught a young pike. It held on to it until it got back to the bank and then swallowed it followed by a drink of water, obviously to wash its fishy meal down !
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31st Over at St Margrets at Cliff just after three in the afternoon, a lovely day weather warm and sunny. My first sighting was of a herring gulls nest on the cliff, the gull was sitting on the nest but I could just make out an egg, could have been two.
I then walked along the cliff top path towards Deal to the east, there were a number of down land plants the first being sainfoin a lovely flower and kidney vetch an attractive yellow variety. I got as far as the golf links and turned back and on the way I saw a field pipit land on the top of a bush with caterpillars etc in its beak so its nest was close by, I took a few shots and moved on.
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There were quite a few swallows and house martins coming in off the sea and flying in land, these were obviously late arrivals as most had arrived by now.
I took another look at the herring gulls nest and to my surprise a jackdaw came out of a hole about a meeter below, the jackdaw came and went a few times while I was there. I wouldn't have thought that both birds would have tolerated each other nesting so close together.
As I got back to the car park I heard and saw a male [ Can you identify this bird? Below right. ] Try before you look! singing from the top of a bush one of my favorite birds.
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