Its trying.

 Spring that is. Spring keeps trying, but ultimately failing. The other day the news hollered on about 25 degrees somewhere or other while on the North Northumberland coast we achieved the sweltering heights of 12.5 ⁰ . Still between cooler cloudy times there have been bright pleasant sunny windows of opportunity too.  I forgot to add that I have my annual heavy cold this week, but Peggy needs walked so I have been around the village too in the sunny spells.

Some spring migrants are back now with Swallows, Sand Martins, Willow Warblers in village wood. On 10th  Blackcaps arrived in numbers. We were pleased to see 4 or 5 of them eating the few remaining Ivy berries opposite our kitchen window .

The kitchen window Ivy over the stone wall.

Various Blackcaps, with a minimum of 3 females and a male on Saturday, poss 2 males on Sunday.

On 8th April, the moth trap had a migrant influx. Unfortunately no Small Mottled Willows that have inundated the country this week but a big count ( for here) of 92 Diamond backed Moths. Pine Beauty and Muslin Moth also added to the interest that night too while a Hedgehog has been around the garden for a few nights too.

On one sunny interlude, a few butterflies were out, Peacocks, Small Tortoiseshells, Commas and a Green veined White. Still awaiting Orange Tip and wondering how Holly Blue will fare this season?

Comma.

Industrial Oyks and the (Not so) Secret Wood.

 This post is another all-over-the-shop cornucopia of wildlife sightings locally.

Lesser Redpolls.

In April I like to keep an even closer eye on my bird feeders than usual because there is always the chance of a Brambling or Mealy Redpoll on its return migration. Who knows, even a Hawfinch is a possibility. 

To keep up the Mealy hopes I make sure the niger is filled each morning. This has attracted up to 20 Goldfinches at a time and a couple of Siskins on some days. The other day two Redpolls appeared, both Lessers and one was injured with a broken leg. That didn't seem to hamper it as it fed well for a couple of days before departure.

While it was sunny in the garden on Saturday a Holly Blue kept me company. A second was along the road by the Village Hall. The slow moth trapping continues with a nice Chamomile Shark being the highlight. This is only my 3rd here in 15 yrs.

Chamomile Shark

The ever present ( in spring anyway) Hairy Footed Flower Bee males.

Above - Holly Blue butterfly. Still earlier that usual...

This Pale Mottled Willow is the county earliest by 3 weeks. Maybe a migrant?

Industrial Oystercatchers.

On Sunday we visited a new spot, a little bit further than usual but not much. You might have seen me mention our severe lack of decent woodland up here, well this spot had a quite a large area and some of it quite mature too. Mature enough to hold a single singing male Redstart that was typically camera shy as they often are.. The whole area looks good for plants and insects too when the weather warms up a bit.

Today we found a couple of pairs of Marsh Tit, including one at a nest site. This is the best year I've had for these for a decade. Long may it be so. 

Marsh Tits prospecting a likely nest site.

Also around the area were good numbers of Blackcaps, Chiffchaffs and Willow Warblers with 3 Buzzards, Brambling heard and Siskins singing. A carpet of Bluebells were on the cusp of opening.

It just shows, no matter how long you live in a place, there are always discoveries to be made if you only look...

Into the light.

After one of the worst late winters of my lifetime, it is so good to get rid of it and into some sunshine. As a consequence, birds seem to have taken a back seat and the moths have taken over.

Red Chestnut

Early Grey

Small Quaker

Clouded Drab

Agonopterix alstromeriana

Diurnea fagella

Early Tooth striped

Shoulder Stripe

Pale Pinion

Early Thorn

Acleris literana

Water Carpet

Xenolechia aethiops

I have saved the small black obscurity until last for a reason. Just because it looks like a fly, doesnt mean its boring. I struggled to identify this from our Northumberland Moths website, then Alan Fairclough came up with the solution. A new species for me and the garden so I was pleased, then our moth recorder, Tom Tams sent me this link that shows how rare this species really is. This one is only the 6th found in the UK since 1999! Oddly enough I get a few heather feeders in the garden despite the nearest moor being 10 miles to the west.

My patch, where the house has become the 'obs' has been interesting bird wise too with migrant warblers moving through the garden on a daily basis. A Lesser Whitethroat was very early for here on 14th showing down to 4 feet while the camera was in the house, 3 Blackcaps arrived together to fight over an apple, Willow Warblers and Chiffchaffs can be heards singing daily and yesterday a Grasshopper Warbler was in full 'reel' behind our shed for 10 minutes. After that it wasnt seen or heard again, a migrant continuing his journey...

One of 2 male Blackcaps and a female.

Imm Smooth Newt visiting the moth trap the other night.

And finally, we have adopted 5 Hedgehogs for release in the garden from a rescue scheme. They didnt hang around either, open the boxes and they were off...

I must do more blog updates now the nights are lighter to get out and actually see stuff...

Technicolour....

I'll split this post in two halves, firstly I started out here at home for an hour, then popped down to Warkworth to meet John, then back here to loiter around the garden again as yesterday. A lovely sunny day, a bit cooler, but a cracker of an autumn day all the same.

Howick.

This morning was out before sunrise down to the Bathing House area just to see if there was any viz mig and to get a sunrise photo.

70 Golden Plovers were roosting in Tommy's field, while 300 Pinkfeet flew south over head. 3 Swallows, a few Skylarks and Meadow Pipits also moving south shortly after it got light.

At 7.30am I headed off to Warkworth, see below, returning at 12.30pm.

This afternoon I spent a lot of time just watching what was going on around our garden. There were loads of butterflies again as well as many Silver Y moths. As the sun was quite bright, I kept the camera handy to get some shots of the butterflies as they appeared....

Peacock

Small Tortoiseshell

Comma

Red Admiral

In addition to these four, there were Speckled Wood, Large White and Small White.

The roving party of Long tailed Tits came back, this time bringing a Treecreeper and 8 - 12 Chiffchaffs. Two Blackcaps fed in the yew and elder bushes. Still no striped sprite...

Blackcap

Warkworth.

The time spent at Warkworth was equally lazy but this time sitting at a picnic bench drinking tea and scoffing Bakewell Tarts while watching the birds pass overhead. We had a steady stream of Skylarks ( 50+), Meadow Pipits, 9 Redpolls, 6+ Pied Wagtails, 3+ Swallows, 250 Pink-footed Geese, a few Linnets, Goldfinches and Tree Sparrows. A Snipe bucked the trend by going North.

In the scrub were 4 -5 Chiffchaffs, 2+ Blackcaps, 1 Reed Warbler, 10+ Blackbirds.

Reed Warbler

  We ended down at the estuary where things seemed a bit quieter. The juv Black tailed Godwit was there but there were only 2 Knot with the masses of Redshank, Dunlin, Curlew and Lapwing. Two Little Egrets and 18 Teal were above the weir.

Post-processing....

...or the Digital Darkroom. This is the correct term for Photoshopping your photos.

To the uninitiated this is when people can take a subject and place it somewhere it has never been in the first place, or, like when celebs are made to look like gods and goddesses when really they are just like Joe public.

This isn't the method I'm talking about. There is nothing unreal or fraudulent about the images here, they are just tweaked a bit to make brighter and sharper or closer looking.

To the old school, this is frowned upon as cheating but for me its a real asset!

 It makes my best shots even better that I would imagine. So, imagine what some of my photos would be like straight off the camera....its not pretty I can assure you. If you check though the blogs, ALL of the best ones 'enhance' their images in some way. Caution is needed though, too much 'enhancing' makes the pictures look artificial and hard on the eye - 'noisy' as it is known.

What is the point of this you ask, well, this morning, patch year tick 103 arrived in the garden and was visible from a misted up kitchen window. Wanting to get a record shot, with little time to mess around two or three shots were taken that looked like this -

Male Blackcap, straight from the camera via our kitchen window.

After a few minutes mucking around the result is a bit more pleasing. Its never going to be magazine quality but it will do for the blog. The 'cropping' removes a lot of the clutter, the light balance adjustment removes the fog and the sharpen and unsharp mask, well, make it sharper.

A photoshopped male Blackcap.

103. Blackcap

A Field Day...

Rainbow over the sand flats north of the causeway.

A day off work midweek is never an opportunity to be missed so when JWR said he had to use up some annual leave before the end of the month and we should have a trip out, my flexi day was booked in pronto.

Just like the old days, we decided to have the full day out birding up the coast, rather than just grabbing at a Sunday morning, and headed off to Holy Island early doors. The morning was fine and cool with a light NW breeze, but an ominous looking front could be seen further north in to the Scottish Borders, and it was heading our way.

The island was mainly tourist free, as the crossing would be closed mid morning, so we enjoyed an uninterrupted wander around the village for a couple of hours. Chiffchaff and Blackcap with a few Redwing, Fieldfare and Blackbirds were the only migrants, probably lingering from last week. Masses of Pale bellied Brent Geese and assorted waders fed and flew around the flats either side of the causeway.   As the rain arrived we decided it was time to out run it by heading south.

A few Pale bellied Brent Geese.

Chiffchaff

Redwing

Blackcap

The Bamburgh and Seahouses area was our next stop, taking in several sites in the area. At Budle Bay the tide was almost up and had pushed thousands of birds up together. Highlights here were a powerful immature Peregrine that narrowly missed catching a Redshank before continuing south to let the birds relax until the next 'sortie'.  At Stag Rocks, there was little on the sea other than a Slavonian Grebe but a late Sandwich Tern sat on the rocks with waders was a surprise find at this time of year.

A quick check of the castle wood for migrants was quiet apart from a Woodcock flushed from the leaf litter.

A small feeding station just outside Bamburgh village held the usual woodland species including Marsh Tit, Nuthatch and Great spotted Woodpecker. 

Stag Rocks, Bamburgh

Imm Peregrine.

Marsh Tit

 A final stop at Beadnell and Low Newton where the rain was now becoming irritating turned up a single Long tailed Duck, 3 Red throated Divers, another Chiffchaff and a scattering of Goldcrests.

A quick tally showed that we had recorded 81 species of bird, not a bad total with out really trying too hard. We might start and make this a habit....