Birdwatcher’s Diary No.65

Published on: 4 Jul, 2014
Updated on: 4 Jul, 2014

By Malcolm Fincham

I had barely found time to sit down and take my boots off after my whirlwind tour of the Scottish Highlands, when I received a call from manically keen wildlife enthusiast Dougal.

He informed me that the rare vagrant short-toed eagle that had been spotted a few weeks back in Wareham, Dorset, had moved up to Ashdown Forest in Sussex. For details click here.

Although Dougal had already seen the only other twitch-able sighting in the UK on the Scilly Isles, he was keen to see this one, now it had moved nearer to Surrey.

Arriving at a parking area called Gills Lap, I found to my amusement overlooking an area known as 500 Acre Wood – better known as 100 Acre Wood in the popular stories by A.A Milne, where he based, what I’ve recently been told, were his fictional tales about Winnie the Pooh.

Having spent a good four hours or more scanning the horizon with more than a score of other keen birding enthusiasts, I must confess I was starting to become a tad disillusioned and started to feel I would probably have a better chance in my imagination of spotting the dejected face of Eeyore through my binoculars in his ”Sad and Gloomy place”.

Short-toed eagle over Ashdown Forest.

Then at just after 3pm it appeared – distant, but without doubt a short-toed eagle. Hovering at times just like a kestrel but far larger, It spent a good 30 minutes or more hunting over the heathland occasionally stopping to rest in a tall pine.

Short-toed eagle perches in a pine tree.

Snakes are the main diet of short-toed eagles, although they will take small mammals so one hopes Piglet and Roo were keeping a low profile. Click here for more details about this area of Ashdown Forest.

Back in the Guildford area for the last week or so of June, I was able to catch up on a few walks around my local patch on the Riverside Reserve and discover what was new there.

Little egret.

On my first visit a little egret could be seen once again on the flooded scrape near to Stoke Lock.

Reed warbler fledgling.

Along the boardwalk plenty of newly fledged birds could be seen, often not so easy to recognise as the adults. These including what looked to be a young reed warbler as it bobbed around in the tall vegetation.

One of a young family of wrens.

I was also able to pick out a family of wrens near the area of the boardwalk overlooking the small pond.

Sedge warbler catching food for its young by the boardwalk at Stoke Reserve.

At the pond I got a nice picture of a sedge warbler as it caught a damselfly to take back to feed its young.

Great crested grebe with chick.

Moving on to the lake, the great crested grebes were still closely attending to their young.

Adult coot with cute coot chick.

A pair of coots were attending to theirs and a young moorhen could also be seen with its parents.

One good tern deserves another as another meal arrives.

Through my binoculars, the pair of common terns nesting on Stoke Lake could now been seen to have three chicks.

Fluffy common tern chick.

These were scurrying around the raft awaiting the next delivery of fish, while an adult sat close by protecting them from possible predators such as gulls and corvids, Click to see short video.

Common tern takes a dive for a fish.

Adult common tern returns to nest site with a fish.

Taking a trip out to Thursley Common on a pleasant afternoon on June 23, gave me the opportunity to take a few more up-date photos.

Thursley Common – heather just starting to flower.

Dragonfly Thursley Common.

Along the boardwalk leading out to the heathland, common lizards were out basking in the warm sun, while various types of dragonfly and damselfly skimmed over the marsh.

Curlew on Thursley Common.

At Pudmore Pond a curlew could be seen.

Redstart on Thursley common.

Redstarts could also be viewed with some still actively feeding their young.

Tree pipit on Thursley Common.

Tree pipits and common whitethroat could also be heard singing.

Common whitethroat singing on Thursley common.

Male stonechat on Thursley Common.

An adult male stonechat allowed me some close-up pictures while it kept a watchful eye on its young.

Sillver studded blue on flowering heather.

Out on the drier sandy heathland in some areas heather was now starting to come into flower attracting silver-studded blue butterfly to feed on the pollen.

Purple emperor.

Nearing the end of June is a key time to start looking out for some of our rarer butterfly species and none more so than the purple emperor. It is only seen at a few select sites these days, usually in the last week of June and the first week of July and only usually high in the canopy of mature oaks.

It was on June 29 that with great delight I was invited to place near Oaken Wood at Chiddingfold by Dougal and his friend John, where if we were lucky, purple emperors can be viewed.

Purple emperor.

My luck was certainly with me that day. Not only was it the first time I had ever seen one, but the first time any of us had the privilege of seeing one so close.

I was mostly fascinated by how the colour of their wings changed from shades of brown to blues and purple depending on the angle viewed and light shed upon them. Click for more.

Purple emperor.

From a photographic aspect, the only downside to such fortune, and returning to a pooh story of another kind, is that when they do get tempted down to the ground it’s nearly always to feed on the minerals of what mammals have left behind. And even trying to crop the pictures as best I can, it hardly helps to make them images to win any competitions!

White admiral.

With what turned out to be a reasonably warm day, it was a good for several other species of butterfly tempted out by occasional sunny spells including several white admirals.

Large skipper.

Making it a day for butterfly spotting, we decided to stop off at Box Hill near Dorking on our homeward journey.

Marbled white on Box Hill.

Here we were able to add marbled white and large skipper (of which there were plenty of both) and dark green fritillary could also be seen in the grassland close to the top of the hill.

Dark green fritillary on Box Hill.

While-letter hairstreak.

Another first for me was the sighting of the elusive white-letter hairstreak. I managed to zoom in and get a reasonable record shot of it as it sat perched on a leaf high in an elm tree.

For more details click here.

This brought an end to another wonderful month of wildlife watching.

For slide shows of pictures, some of which may not have made my three June reports:
Report 63.
Report 64.
Report 65.