And now the Aconites are Crazy Early

Thought I'd take a nice long walk out to the Two Lakes today to check on the snowdrops and see if the goosander were still around.

Indeed the goosander were there, unheard of before the New Year, and in good numbers too. About 12 of them on the water, ducks and the magnificently elegant drakes, diving about and staying well out of mobile camera range, as ever. There was even another pair on London Road pond.

It's been an active looking day for the town, lots of families out walking, playing football on the park, trying to bed in their new bicycles and scooters. I enjoy seeing it, I enjoy seeing open space used.

On an inkling, I extended my walk out to Friary Gardens, just on the off chance that there was any aconite in bloom. I wasn't expecting any given that its still December, but lo and behold, there was a fair few in flower under their favourite trees. Couldn't believe it!

I do wonder what is going on, because we seem to be about two weeks ahead of normal seasonality. This hasn't been a cold winter so far, but its not been an unusual one, although I'd have expected a bit more frost. Last year the snowdrops were out on 27th December - which is early enough as it is - but this year it was the 16th!

Maybe I need to call Greta Thunderg.

Si

All text and images copyright CreamCrackeredNature 28.12.19

Winter Thrushes on the Bicycle

I'm writing this while listening to "Starless"  by King Crimson which is an awesome piece of music...

So after an exhausted day of nothing yesterday - My Black Friday duties totally wiped me out - I decided I needed to make a good go at today, cold or not.

So in the morning I made my way to  the park for a cup of tea on my trusty Rockrider, and then in the afternoon managed to get out for a sunset 25km ride, with a gentle breeze it seemed like a bloody nice thing  to  do.

And I worry I'll get very fat indeed if I don't do it.

So out I went along the cycle path with the low sun lighting up the turbines of the wind farm and reflecting off the solar panel plant. It even made the rubbish tip glow in gold. Rather oddly I thought, the gulls and crows feasting  off the rubbish were flushed by my presence from about 100 metres away, silly feathery things!

It was on this cycle path that I saw my first winter thrushes of the year, flushed from the berry laden hawthorns alongside. Trouble is, with the sun behind them they just looked like black shapes, until they flew past me and I caught a glimpse of pale bellies and grey rumps; fieldfares.

Odd that I should see fieldfare before redwing. Normally the latter are easier to come across just outside of  town in early winter.

So I kept on riding as the sun set, and re-murmarised a flock of about 50 starling who thought they were going to have a peaceful roost in a tree next to the road to Thorpe village.

It was a good ride, and I took a bit of pride in myself for  doing it.

Si

All text and images copyright CreamCrackeredNature 24.11.18

Kehaar and his Noisy Friends

Well today I took to two wheels rather than two legs and cycled out to RSPB Langford for the first time in ages.

Today the heat was blistering. And suncream tends to rub off while cycling. And now I look like a lobster.

But a happy crustacean, one who has seen his first orange tip and Holly Blue butterflies today, one who spotted his first mediterranean gulls out on the water, and one who took some nice songbird shots. Reed bunting and yellowhammer. Yay!

The most striking thing, however, was the most ordinary. A colony of black headed gulls has nested on Phase 2 of the site, and the constant noise and aggro in this town of several hundred birds is shocking! I've never seen a gull nest site, sheesh I bet it's filthy as hell in there.

One bird however remained aloof from it all for a preen.

Si

All text and images copyright CreamCrackeredNature 19.04.18

The Egret and the Rubbish Tip

Today, I decided to rest my achey legs, and with bright skies and no wind for once, I thought it might be good to jump on the bike and go somewhere.

I decided to go the long way round - the endless blockage to the Sustrans 64 is really annoying everyone - and ride to Cotham rubbish tip. What I was after were some shots of the huge numbers of gulls that are often found there, gulls that experienced birdwatchers of my acquaintance are able to identify at a range of 200 metres, when there are thousands of them.

A juvenile glaucous gull, seemingly the size of a turkey, has had a lot of attention there lately.

Sadly, there weren't many gulls on view today, as it turned out they were all hiding on the other side of the ridge. But I could still see a few greater black backed gulls mooching around, and there were plenty of rooks looking on, perched on the fences and the edge of the tip "crater".

But not, on the whole, a pretty place.

So I carried on cycling, on my Cotham - Thorpe - Home route, and was just crossing over one of the numerous small rivers you find around here - this one was the oddly named Car Dyke, which flows into the Devon - when a beautiful white bird caught my attention and made me stand on my brakes.

It was a gorgeous egret, barely 15 metres away, standing on the edge of the water.

I approached oh so slowly, oh so stealthily, with my camera, but the bird still sensed my approach and took off with its mate. Pah, an egret at that range would have made for a stunning photograph!

Still a gorgeous bird though. But a pesky one!

Si

All text and images copyright CreamCrackeredNature 11.02.16

Kestrel bird scarer

Crows on a wire

Crows on a mountain

Crows on a crater

Digger

Two diggers

Greater black backed gull

More gulls

Echelon gulls

Egrets in flight

Following my Own Advice

Today has been a day of days.

The first thing I did upon waking up this morning at about 7:45am was to pick up my mobile phone. The moment it was in my hand there was a bleep, and a vibration.

A message? A twitter notification? No, it was a Guardian news headline, informing me that David Bowie had died of cancer at the age of 69, a mere two days after his birthday and the release of his latest, and now last, album.

As a David Bowie fan since the age of zero, the news was a terrific shock, and saddened me greatly. As a teenage kid growing up weird with undiagnosed Tourettes, he made it OK to be different, a sentiment shared by many LGBTG folk on twitter today who probably had a much rougher time than I did.

His music played non-stop on Radio 6, it was time to follow my own advice, and treat my sadness with a dose of the open air, looking for goosander on the two lakes - and finding none - and winter thrushes on the Coddington pastures.

None there either.

Still, it was a good 13km run, with Bowie music in my ears the whole way, and it at least was a positive way to end the day. I'm not sure David himself would have enjoyed a run like that; it's hard to light a Gitane on the move - but I hope he knows how much me and many many other people have enjoyed listening to his music today, before, and forever.

Si

Everything was a feeding frenzy today

Ducks are at it too

A glorious sunset duly ensued

"YARK!!!" cried Kehaar

Well today was far better, I got out of the house much earlier, and freezing though the day was, the wind had dropped and the two hour walk I had was most pleasant.

I ambled by the lake and photographed the mature and juvenile black headed gulls, admiring the subtle differences between each birds head and wing markings. A young looking heron was strangely sat in the field at the back of Grange Road, while long tailed tits zupped through the hedgerow, again avoiding my camera.

Same for the great tits a little further along.

Sadly although winter berries were plentiful, there were no winter thrushes to be seen eating them. Instead it was chacking blackbirds scolding me as I walked by, perhaps afraid I wanted to drive them away from their bounty.

Back into town, and I found goldfinches at a garden feeder! At last, good shots of a pretty songbird!

But the most memorable bird I encountered was a very noisy gull of some kind - a yellow bill making me think it is a common gull - strutting around making a tremendous racket on the Sconce playing field. "Yark!!!" it kept crying, reminding me of Kehaar the gill from Watership Down. Which is ironic really as Kehaar was a black-headed gull, but they are all as quiet as mice.

I had a rabbit called Captain Campion. Nicked his name from Watership Down. Makes a change from Bigwig.

Si

All text and images copyright CreamCrackeredNature 23.11.15

Obligatory squirrel shot, from the cemetery this time

Black headed gull on the water

And another, less prominent head markings

Juvenile

A more juvenile youngster

Female mallard loving it!

Field heron

In the air

Goldfinches

Looks like he's saying something!

Busy eating!

Kehaar the strutting common gull

Macro moss treat