Frogs are back

It's spawning time again. Due to the severe drought we have had here for the last year most of the usual spawning places are dry. The frogs are spawning in the main part of the moat where I guess the spawn is going to be a lot more available to be eaten. No doubt some will survive and keep the population going.

Pheasants competing

Two years ago we had a male pheasant here pretty much every day. Last year we had a pair of pheasants and I even caught sight of some pheasant chicks. This year it has gone one stage further and we have two male pheasants going through some competitive posturing, presumably competing for the territory. It didn't seem particularly aggressive posturing but it might be that this is just the warm-up stage.

Brimstone

I regard the first Brimstone as the opening of the butterfly season and so the season opened today. As usual I did not get a picture of this fast flying butterfly that never seems to hang around long enough for me to snap it. I see that it has arrived 12 days ahead of the first Brimstone of last year. Normally by now there should also be spawning frogs but with water levels so very low I am not quite sure where they are going to spawn this year as the normal places in the reeds are dry.

Sparrowhawk

I have at last captured a sparrowhawk on camera. It's not a good picture but I took advantage of an unusually static sparrowhawk to get the camera and long lens out. I don't know if this is part of the same family of sparrowhawks that fledged on the site last Augustbut I am hoping that it doesn't hang around too long and frighten off the smaller songbirds.

Great Garden Birdwatch 2012

I just managed to complete this year's RSPB birdwatch after getting back from holiday. It is a great discipline because it forces you to pay attention for a whole hour and having binos at the ready you get to spot birds you would otherwise miss. There was a increase to 14 species from only 10 last year and that was without either mallards or moorhens who are round about the moat most days at this time of year but not during the hour of birdwatch. The theme was probably corvids as there were significant numbers of jackdaws and rooks around and of course the usual pair of crows. Other species seen were blackbirds, wren, robin, a selection of tits (great, blue, long-tailed and coal), starling, wood pigeon, house sparrow and goldfinch. Surprising ommissions apart from the water birds were chaffinch, magpie, collared dove and stock dove. Not so surprising was the lack of greenfinches which seem rare these days.

Grey Wagtail

Not a common visitor to the Moat House. It was hopping around in what little water remains in the moat in this very very dry year.

Sparrowhawks

I like sparrowhawks as much as the next man but I resented the presence of a family of sparrowhawks which hung around for a couple of weeks. The main problem was that they were predating moorhens which had just built their numbers up after last winter's 'fox on the ice' incident. All the normal songbirds just made themselves scarce once the fledgling sparrowhawks and their industrious parent set themselves up in the trees around the moat but the moorhens had to stay. The sparrowhawks were also predating other birds but I know they took at least five moorhens. The adult sparrowhawk would return from a hunting trip, prey in its talons and would call out the young who would fly out from the trees. In an aerial ballet the adult would then hover and release the prey for the youngster to catch it in mid air. Pretty impressive stuff except for the thought that the prey might be a moorhen. I probably should have been taking award winning photographs of their activity but instead I just climbed trees and made noise to try and frighten them away. It didn't work but having been away for a few days I finds that peace has broken out and the sparrowhawks seem to have moved on.