It's my birthday today, 21 again.........
I hadn't really made any plans except to meet my good old friend, Luke Dray, as I am buying off him his old Sony camera equipment. Luke's deserting the Sony brand name for Canon, for his own good reasons.
Fewy and Scally decided during the week they were going to go to Cranford Park too, so it ended up being quite a good day. I even bumped into one of the other Cranford Birders, Tony James.
Down side is my hand is still in a splint, so it's quite awkward and painful for me to take photos yet, but I managed a few today, some with the help of a tripod which made things easier. So todays photos are all taken with a mixture of camera bodies and lenses.
In my last couple of blog posts from Cranford Park I mentioned the Swallows. I also said I wasn't going to reveal where they were nesting so they could rear their young in peace. Sadly someone has found their nest, and it's been completely destroyed......
The photo below is one I took on the 4th July......
and this is what I found today.....
I'm absolutely gutted that someone could do such a thing. Whoever done it has obviously used stones and small rocks to hit the nest until it collapsed. There was some stone debris on the floor, but no sign of the nest nor any eggs or chicks. If the nest had collapsed of its own accord, there would be some signs of the nest on the ground below but there was nothing, which just proves to me that someone very clearly didn't want to leave any trace behind of what they had done.
I have a suspicion as to who it was, but I'm not going to name names without proof.
This was one birthday surprise I didn't want.
I did see two Swallows flying nearby, but I don't know where they went.
We also had another look for the White-letter Hairstreak butterflies, but without success. There is one particular lovely wood path surrounded on both sides with Elms, the butterflies preferred habitat, but despite seeing some dark butterflies near the tree tops they didn't settle low enough for us to confirm they were the Hairstreaks. If anyone else wants to try looking for them, here are the directions. From the corner entrance from the orchard in to the woods (the orchard stile entrance, not the gate entrance), turn left and take the second path on the right. It's the narrowest of all the woodland paths and the start of it looks almost like mown grass. Good luck.....
So now for some good news.......
The young Kestrels have finally decided to move out in to the meadows. We saw at least four birds today, flying and hovering low over the long grasses. Occasionally one would land on the grass path, but by the time we could walk there, the bird was back up in the sky. There was a lot of calling and interaction going on between the birds, and every now and then they would disappear back in to the woods. My favourite bird on my birthday. It certainly made up for the sad news about the Swallows.....
We also saw two Red Kites but just like last week I could only get one in shot....
and two Hobbys were out hawking for dragonflies. Again I could only get a bad shot of one of the birds...
The ChiffChaffs were quite visible today. Fewy managed to get a lovely photo of one in the Headland area while I managed to grab a passable shot of one grooming nearby.....
After the abundance of photos of the Thick-legged Flower Beetles that have been adorning my blog posts over the last few weeks, today I found just two. Instead it's now the season for Soldier Beetles. There were loads of these gorgeous red critters around today, and they all seemed to have just one thing on their minds......
Of course the butterflies were out in force today, with lots and lots of both Small and Large Skippers, Commas, Gatekeepers, and Cinnabar moth caterpillars
I also bumped in to Allan and Steve and their gorgeous dog Bentley. I first met Bentley when he was a bouncing puppy about a year ago. Now he's 15 months old and looking rather handsome.....
I think I might have to start doing a regular 'dog blog photo' from my Cranford Park visits.
Other birds seen today by Scally and Fewy before I arrived were two Kingfishers from the Stone Bridge, and lots of Blackcaps, Common Whitethroats and juvenile Long-tailed Tits in the Headland area.
So for a more or less unplanned birthday, it turned out to be actually quite good.
Of course with both Scally and Fewy on site I had to grab at least one 'blackmail' photo. I wouldn't be 'me' if I didn't........
Finally, thank you Luke and your Mum for driving over to bring my new 'toys'.
Thank you Scally for my new tripod.
And thank you Fewy for driving me back home.
Now for a large glass of birthday wine :)
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