Bluebells and Opening Times

NWT Foxley Wood, Bluebell Fence

May has been a poor month for me. It started badly with one of the worst colds that I can remember, going round the office and my family and just as I recovered from that the wind got stuck in the north and we have shivered through most of the month. So it was a joy to get out in the sunshine with the family today and visit the Norfolk Wildlife Trusts Foxley Wood nature reserve to see a few Bluebells.

It had been a few years since we last visited late on a spring afternoon, then we were greeted with a sign that explained that the reserve shut at 5pm and that we and our car would be locked in after that time. The sign was still there along with a more welcome one pointing out the direction to go for the Foxley Wood Bluebell trail. Reassured that we would be directed to the best part of this large wood for Bluebells we set off pushing the pram in four wheel drive mode and toting a restrained amount of camera gear.

It was great to hear even quite late in the morning [you can't access the site before 9 am or on a Thursday, Why?] a great deal of bird song including Blackcap, Garden Warbler Chiff-Chaff, Willow Warbler and Turtle Dove. At the first junction it become apparent that the only helpful Bluebell Trail signs were in the car park and from here on in we would just have to explore the wood by following our noses, something I enjoy doing normally but by now I had raised expectations of being taken to the best Bluebell areas of the wood.

After a pleasant half hour stroll in which the Little Fella pointed out lots of trees and a Ladybird [a talented naturalist at thirteen months] we finally came to a patch of Bluebells which we were excluded from going anywhere near by a temporary fence. There was no interpretation by this barrier to explain why it had been erected and I came away with the impression that it was there purely to keep visitors to the woods away from the Bluebells that they had come to see.

All in all our visit seemed a great example of how through careless signage and a antagonistic approach to the visitor experience, an organisation was able to put a gap in a visitors mind between the enjoyable parts of our visit and its role in providing them. Very frustrating.

An afternoon visit on my own to RSPB Titchwell Marsh had a very different feel to it. A special event was being held attempting to see how many species could be seen on the reserve in one day [the list stood at 113 species in mid afternoon] and there were wardens and volunteers positioned along the West Bank path to point out birds if you wanted them to. This was both fun and really helpful and enabled me to see the two Wood Sandpipers and two Temminks Stints which skulked half hidden on the Fresh Marsh. These along with Little Terns and Common Terns and a warm sun on my back gave the reserve a real feel of summer and the helpful wardens and signage gave it a real welcoming feel.

Early Spring Butterflies

Male Orangetip [sorry haven't got a Green Hairstreak picture - yet]

The warm weather of the past week has brought out the early spring butterflies in NW Norfolk. Last weekend I saw my first Orangetips at Courtyard Farm near Ringstead. These fast flying white butterflies with their citrus orange wing tips are a real sign of spring emerging in mid / late April with the first warm weather and all but gone for another year by the end of May. Go and look for them now and get your annual fix.

Yesterday another walk at Courtyard Farm with a definite butterfly 'target' in mind, the Green Hairstreak. I have seen these elusive butterflies here in most recent springs and with the air temperature hitting 20 C yesterday thought it worth a punt.

So late afternoon my wife, small child and I walked up a ride coming off the Ringstead road and around Wharton's belt. Initially it didn't look promising with very few butterflies on the wing, but then at the top of the ride where it joins the end of a narrow belt of woodland, butterflies started to appear. A Speckled Wood first and then a lovely male Orangetip.

Then above us high up a pair of small butterflies who were either having an aerial duel or dancing a wonderful duet. Eventually these came lower and for a second I had them in my binoculars and they looked to me like wafer thin slivers of emerald each given life by the early spring sunshine - a pair of Green Hairstreaks and cause for a little celebratory dance.

We also saw a splendid Red Admiral here and our first Holly Blues of the year.

Birds were good with a single Common Buzzard, about a dozen Whimbrel and singing Willow Warbler, Chiff Chaff and Blackcap.

Lakenheath Magic

Mute Swan, Lakenheath Fen

I ended this Easter Weekend down in the Brecks at one of my favourite places Lakenheath Fen RSPB nature reserve.

Lakenheath is special, not just because it is an amazing place to experience some of the UK's most special wildlife including our only nesting Golden Orioles and the first Cranes to nest in the Fens in four centuries. It is also special because it is a landscape restored. Hundreds of years ago the Fens here would have supported a wonderful array of wildlife and a local community, then gradually over time they were drained for agriculture, until today only a small remnant remains.

So when a dozen or so years ago the RSPB purchased some rather large carrot fields with the expressed intention of turning them into a world class wetland, it was a inspiring statement of hope. Today the Fen is a wonderful landscape to walk in. Later this month the sound-scape will pick up pace as hundreds of pairs of Sedge and Reed Warblers take up their summer home in this new wetland and the wonderful fluting song of the Golden Oriole will echo around the Poplar plantations.

Today though it was cold and grey and windy. But still you could tell what a special place this is, Marsh Harriers quartered the new reedbeds, a bird of prey which is still rarer in the UK than the Golden Eagle.

But best of all the Craniac in me was given a fix as, three times I saw a single Common Crane get up from in amongst the tawny reeds and fly around, it even did a circuit over the river, in the process placing itself on my Norfolk year list. This bird has some smudgy brown feathers on its back, so an immature bird, so probably the young bird that fledged last summer the first to do so in the Fens in 400 years. Never mind the weather pleased to make your acquaintance.

Wild Crocuses, Norwich's best kept secret

Crocuses, Rosary Cemetery, Norwich

The short amble around the Rosary Cemetery in Norwich is one of my favourite walks, not only because it is close to the office and offers me a chance to get away from the computer at lunchtime but primarily it is a great place for wildlife. You need to take your time and look for the details on the gravestone's where White Lipped Snails come out after rain, or in the summer months search for the gold and black Hoverflies.

But it is the early spring that I think the cemetery is at its most wild and alive. In the small pond Common Frogs and Smooth Newts return to breed in an enthusiastic amphibian orgy. But best of all are the Crocuses, thousands of them gone wild and growing not where any gardener wants them but wherever they find conditions that are suitable. Each spring I try and capture this display and never feel that I have done it justice. the picture above is one attempt to do so this spring and I will make many more lunchtime attempts before the crocuses turnover and fade back into the earth.

You can see more Rosary Cemetery pictures on my Flickr page at
http://www.flickr.com/photos/bullofthebog/

Baited Buntings

Snow Bunting at bait, north Norfolk

Snow Buntings are a classic winter bird in north Norfolk, their flocks are often described as looking like a flurry of snow flakes as they take flight. Normally you would need to walk some of the quieter stretches of coastline to find a flock [Holme has been good this winter]. However at Salthouse the birds come to seed, I believe that this was originally put down by ringers so that they could catch and ring birds as part of a scientific study. I'm less clear as to who feeds them these days, certainly this afternoon a couple of photographers looked as if they had been putting out some millet.

You would think that this might be considered a harmless, even beneficial activity by all birdwatchers, however some concerns have been raised that not only are the Snow Buntings being fed but that local birds of prey will also notice the concentration of prey items in this one spot and that this will lead to increased predation of wintering Snow Buntings. As far as I am aware this has not happened and the Snow Buntings have become something of an attraction in their own right.

I managed half an hour with these lovely little birds today under a cloudy grey sky with low light and so didn't manage any amazing shots, nonetheless it was a fun experience and I'll see if I can get back before the Snow Buntings disappear in the spring.

I wonder what other birds it would be appropriate to bait in like this, there are plenty of traditional peanut feeders hanging up around nature reserves and gardens along the coast to attract Blue Tits, Greenfinches etc, what else could we responsibly bait in, Water Rails with fish, Bearded Tits at Grit trays?

Hare Today?

Brown Hare near Anmer

So far this early spring I have seen very few Brown Hare's compared to last year, perhaps the cold weather has dampened their ardour and they are just being less conspicuous of perhaps the cold winter weather has knocked the population back. I know also that one or two local shoots refrained from shooting Hares in the first part of the winter as their numbers were low following a disease outbreak.

This individual was feeding by the side of a quiet back road near Anmer and allowed me to take just one picture.

An Orwellian view of Spring

Naturalised Crocuses, Norwich

Took the baby for a walk this morning, lovely blue sky with two Common Buzzards wheeling over the woods behind Hunstanton and a Dunnock singing in a garden at the end of our road. Spring is coming and these words written by George Orwell 70 or so years ago feel appropriate.

"So long as you are not actually ill, hungry, frightened or immured in a prison or holiday camp, spring is still spring. The atom bombs are piling up in factories, the police are prowling through the cities, the lies are streaming from the loudspeakers, but the earth is still going round the sun, and neither dictators nor the bureaucrats, deeply though they disapprove of the process, are able to prevent it." George Orwell

With acknowledgment to Richard Mabey quoting this passage in the March issue of BBC Wildlife magazine.