Middleton Lakes: Pacific golden plover

A mid summer treat for Midlands birders, a Pacific golden plover (in gorgeous breeding plumage) is currently the centre of attention on the Jubilee Wetland at Middleton Lakes.  Check out the Tame Valley Birding blog for more.  Spent a beautiful warm evening strolling around the wetland; the air filled with the calling of common terns, busy catching food for their fledged chicks.  A quick post with a couple of pics.

Pacific golden plover

...with reflection

Update Tuesday morning: this next series of pics courtesy of Colin Wilkinson

...with wing stretch, Colin Wilkinson

view of south est scrape, host to the Pacific golden plover, Colin Wilkinson

sunset across the Jubilee Wetlands, Colin Wilkinson

wetland view, Colin Wilkinson

Mike scoping the north scrape, The Lookout in the background.  Two garganey on show.  Colin Wilkinson

Other birds included about 40 adult common terns and ten juveniles, three ringed plover, two snipe, single green and common sandpipers.  Three yellow wagtails, linnets and reed buntings.  Lots of ducks, including several broods of tufted ducks, wigeon, teal, shoveler, little and great crested grebes, two little egrets (yes just two!).

Oxhouse Farm and Lobbington Hall Meadows SSSIs: brown argus and spiny restharrow

An afternoon stroll around the two SSSIs in Warwickshire, just south of Kineton, part of which is managed by Banbury Ornithological Society as the Neal Trust Nature Reserve.

Walking in along rights of way from the nearby village of Butlers Marston, the path goes through Lobbington Hall Farm Meadow, marked by signage on the gateway.  There are green-winged orchids here in spring, just now there is a good display of spiny restharrow and pepper saxifrage and plenty of other meadow flowers and grasses.  This is type of meadow is rare in the south Midlands and this is a very good example.

spiny restharrow

meadow view

Continuing on to Oxhouse Farm, I'm nearly lost in a sea of tall nettles but survive to reach the next meadow, which has quite a different character: perhaps due to a greater influence from limestone bedrock.  Here the grassland has been less intensively managed and scrub has invaded around the edges.  Large ant hills have developed too.  This is where I stand a chance of seeing Dark Green Fritillary butterfly.  I search high and low but no luck.  But there is plenty else to see.  A few marbled white butterflies and plenty of field scabious with attendant longhorn moths.

Oxhouse Farm SSSI eastern meadow

shaded broad-bar

woolley thistle

Just north of the meadow is a small arable field with a flowery field margin colonised by brown argus - dozens are very active and I manage to photograph two together.  Very smart looking.  A back-lit brimstone is also very attractive.

brown argus

brimstone

common blue nectaring on common fleabane

looks like this is an Essex skipper

Reading the rest of the SSSI citation I realise this is a place I must return to slightly earlier in June and July, when I might find white-letter hairstreak and more flowers.  Early July should be best for the dark green fritillary.

The woodland here is also very interesting with a lot of mature poplars and records of all three woodpeckers to encourage a visit it February or March.

Farthinghoe nature reserve: spotted flycatchers fledged

This morning I spent some time exploring Farthinghoe nature reserve, which is part of a former railway line, later used as a landfill site, then restored as a nature reserve.  A recycling centre next door makes it possible to combine a recycling trip with some nature watching (or a trip to Waitrose in Brackey, in this instance!).  Active management keeps the site attractive to a really good variety of birds and butterflies.  As soon as I arrive I hear spotted flycatchers calling and realise adults are feeding very recently fledged chicks.  Today is warm and sunny and many insects are on the wing, so flycatching is easy for the adults.

recently fledged spotted flycatcher chick

adult feeding the chick

Elsewhere teasel and burdock attract peacock butterflies and bright yellow flowers of perforate St John's wort and agrimony add vibrant colour.

peacock

agrimony

perforate St John's wort

Nearby, roadside verges are looking colourful in places, especially close to Upper Wardington with splashes of pale mauve field scabious.  I also identify hairy St John's wort in another verge.

field scabious

Yesterday (Friday 25th July) I ran back though the Upper Cherwell Valley stopping at Grimsbury Reservoir where there was a single little egret, then continuing along the new flood defences.  The new pool is now home to three little grebes, nearby thistly meadows attracting a flock of 70 plus goldfinches and there were five grey herons scattered along the route.  Most surprising were two snipe flushed from not particularly damp grass at the edge of the flood bank.  Purple loosestrife looks stunning too.

purple loosetrife

EA pool

Grimsbury Reservoir: redshank and little egrets

An hour spent at Grimsbury Reservoir in Banbury early evening was very rewarding, with excellent views of two birds I've not seen there before.
For some reason I usually walk around the reservoir in an anticlockwise direction, but this evening I noticed a lot of black-headed gulls around the south west corner so I decided to go there first and continue clockwise.  I soon heard the distictive "teu" call of a wader and located a redshank on the concrete shoreline.  I managed to get quite close, then it flew a short distance to roost on the floating pontoons.  I was an immature bird, judging from the slighly paler orange red legs (adults are more vivid) and well spotted wing coverts.

Further on, at the very far end of the reservoir, two little egrets were busy hunting the shallows.  They were a bit more timid than the redshank but allowed reasonably close approach. They then flew off and fished around the pontoons.

It was another lovely warm evening with butterflies, including a few peacocks, on the wing and nectaring on the last few bramble flowers.

Swifts are very noticeable at the moment with large groups screaming around Banbury - I saw about twenty a little later in the evening over the Wood Green swimming pool area.  Make the most of them, in two weeks they will be gone.