But wait, there's more...

...to share on our Norfolk holiday which has probably been our best break wildlife-wise. This should (fingers crossed) be my final posting on our holiday encounters. Before I go any further, I must mention that I did write another post earlier today. Please click here if you'd like to read it. It was about the various plants we saw there. But moving on, I think its the perfect time to talk about the leftover stuff from my Norfolk story, or "The final chapter which wraps everything up"!

Perhaps the best thing about the spring countryside in Norfolk is the large variety of butterflies and bees that can be seen around the wild flowers seen in my last post. On one particular walk during the week, I came across a Painted Lady butterfly which had landed on the edge of a quiet country road taking in some sun. It was there for a good 2 minutes, so I was able to take a good few photos of it, including some close-up shots taken at ground level. My favourite of the lot is seen below.

Taken slightly further away from the butterfly...
And the view from above:
At the beginning of the week, we were told by the cottage owners that Adders could be seen in the grounds of the house. Specifically,they said they were seen on some dry grass patches near the boat house on the lake. The boathouse area is pictured below. Even from the picture, you can tell that the area is quite overgrown. I was very interested by the news and was determined to see them at some point during the week.

Towards the end of the week, sure enough I did spot a snake bathing in the sun on the dry grass. My first impressions were that it was an Adder, but with a closer look, I concluded it was in fact a Grass Snake. When it saw me it moved to the edge of the lake and sat there while I took a couple of photos. It then swam a small distance across the lake to a small island nearby. I was very happy with the sighting, and it was only the second time I had seen one. It was great to see it, if a little unexpected.

Whilst we were out on a walk, we saw these sheep who must have been extremely hot in the sun. Phew... I'm finished with the Norfolk holiday postings now. All in all a great holiday in terms of wildlife. Thanks to the wildlife for, well, being there whilst I watched, and also to family who made the trip so fun. Off to bed now!

Out and about plants in Norfolk

Wow, going through my photos of our Norfolk holiday is quite a challenge. Many of the photos in this posting are of the various plants I saw throughout the week. They were definitely one of the best parts of the Norfolk holiday. Whilst plant ID's are still new to me, it didn't stop me from enjoying the amazing range of plant life in Norfolk.

National Trust properties with gardens are often great places to observe plants. As mentioned in the previous post, they are also often great places for wildlife too, especially bees and butterflies. In the Walled Garden at the National Trust property, Felbrigg Hall, I enjoyed the extremely well kept and neat patches of colourful plants and shrubs. The photo below shows a small section of the garden.

The photo montage below shows a selection of some of my favourites from the garden. It was raining lightly when we were there on Wednesday so the visit was quite short. Still, I managed to get photos of the plants I particularly liked. Actually, when it comes to plants, my camera seems to cope better when the sun isn't shining brightly.

The next selection of photos are also taken at Felbrigg Hall apart from the main picture which was taken at the garden at Blickling Hall- another great place to observe plants. The main photo is of a Siberian Iris.

The great part about going on holiday in May half term is that many of the flowers have just burst into flower. See Wisteria in flower below:

On countryside walks, wild flowers were everywhere. As we walked alongside a small steam railway line, we spotted lots of flowers in the banks of the cutting. Colourful campions were the most common flowers seen along the walk. Hmm... because the flowers were on the side of the railway, a picture of a passing steam train would be appropriate, wouldn't it?


And the long line of flowers beside the railway:
And a close-up of the campions:

Poppies are a great sight in the countryside. They are so delicate and thin- its amazing how they can withstand strong winds. We saw the one in the photo below beside the road on a walk in the sun.

I'm not sure of the ID of the flower in the photo below. If you know, feel free to leave a comment. One of the best things about a blog is that you can share thoughts and knowledge so easily.

Its great to compare the flowers you see out and about with the ones which I see in our garden and other people's gardens. My final posting on our Norfolk holiday will either be written tonight or tomorrow. I'm really snowed under with posting subjects at the moment with June just around the corner.

Norfolk birds

So, here I am posting about our family holiday to Norfolk which I have just come home from. We stayed in a nice cottage in northern Norfolk (rather near where Springwatch is currently being filmed at Pensthorpe Nature Reserve this week). The variety of wildlife seen around the garden and grounds of the cottage was amazing. I think I will share my Norfolk wildlife and plant sightings over at least 2 posts. The grounds of the cottage were amazing. My favourite part of the grounds was the small lake pictured below.

Pretty much as soon as we went into the back garden of the cottage for the first time, we saw Blue Tits were nesting in a small hole in a wall. The adults were seen flying in and out of the hole with insects all the time and it was difficult to follow. This activity was constant until later on in the week when the Blue Tits stopped feeding the young. We think that they must have fledged, although we have not seen any fledglings around. Of course it is possible that the nest was predated but the hole was too small for anything large to get in and take the young. The picture below shows the hole.

Also nesting nearby, but in the grounds of the cottage rather than the back garden were Goldcrests. In a conifer tree, a pair of Goldcrests were rearing young in a tiny nest on the end of the branch. The young looked very close to fledgling when I saw them on the first day of the holiday. It looked like there were 2 or 3 chicks crowded inside the nest. One of them decided to exercise his/her wings outside the nest, before returning to the nest cup. I just managed to get a picture before it hopped back inside the nest, which is seen in the top left image of the photo montage below. The nest was empty the next day so I am assuming they have fledged.

Other fledglings that were seen around were Great Tit (main picture in montage) and Coal Tit (bottom left photo in montage).

Also nesting in the garden of the cottage were Blackbirds who had built a nest high up in a shrub. Unfortunately, while the male was around, it only appeared to be the female who was feeding the chicks. Nevertheless, the female came in frequently with mouthfulls of insects.

The first picture below is of the female perched on the garden wall about to fly into the nest. The second photo is of the nest, which I managed to take a quickly and quietly. If you look carefully, you should be able to see the beaks of a couple of chicks. Maybe they will fledge next week. The photos were taken this morning before we left.

A flock of 15-20 Long-tailed Tits visited the garden twice and were very entertaining. They always look busy and never seem to stop. These little birds were flitting around the branches of a tree in the garden. I love the way they follow each other around. The biggest flock we have seen in our garden at home was made up of around 10 or 11 birds, so I was impressed to see such large numbers in Norfolk. I got a few photos of the tiny birds in action.

In the lake in the grounds of the cottage were Mute Swan cygnets and Egyptian Goose goslings. The cygnets were very closely watched by the adults and any threats to the cygnets were scared away very quickly. Also on the lake were Tufted Ducks and Mallards. The Egyptian Geese were often seen sat on the edge of the lake in the sun. The goslings were still quite small and were seen huddled together looking like a pile of feathers.

My highlight bird-wise in the grounds has to be the Barn and Tawny Owls that were seen flying around in the evening. A few evenings during the week, we walked to the barn near the lake to watch the Barn Owls. I think the Barn Owl must be roosting in the barn at the moment. We have seen it come out of the barn in the evening to hunt over the surrounding fields. I don't think they have young yet as they didn't return to the barn with any food.

Barn Owls are such incredible creatures and it was fantastic to see such good views of them as they hunted silently in the dark. We only saw the Tawny Owl once, but heard it much more often. They could well be roosting or nesting nearby too. Also seen near the barn were bats in large numbers. We also saw a Treecreeper one evening just as it was going dark on a tree near the barn.

Away from the cottage, we saw plenty of other birds. National Trust properties often have gardens that are fantastic for birds. We went to Felbrigg Hall, a National Trust property near the cottage. Click here for the link to the website. As I was looking around the gardens, I came across a House Sparrow terrace nestbox in use by a Great Tit. It was seen bringing food into one of the holes.

A Chaffinch was seen singing on a tree.

And Jackdaws were seen at another NT property, Blickling Hall. Click here for more information on the property.

Many other birds were seen on various walks throughout the week. On the beach near a town called Sheringham, Little Tern were seen at the shore. I had to check the bird book to make sure they weren't Common or Sandwich Tern. They certainly were little and were struggling to fly against the wind. Just slightly further along the coast near some cliffs, I saw a species of pipit. This bird, I was unable to identify even with the bird book. I am guessing it was either a Rock Pipit, or more likely due to its brighter outer tail feathers, a Meadow Pipit.

Also seen in Sheringham were Starling:

And finally, on a sunny walk in the countryside, a female sparrow on the roof of a house. It's great to see the declining House Sparrow in its well-known habitat.


Other bird highlights were: Nuthatch, Marsh Harrier (seen at Blakeney Point), Reed Bunting, Whitethroat, Meadow Pipit, Yellowhammer, Chiffchaff, Cuckoo and Great Spotted Woodpecker. Blimey, isn't it amazing what you can see in a week!

Finally this posting comes to an end. I did chatter a bit didn't I?

Lizards in sunshine

A couple of weeks ago, we saw the first lizards in the garden for this year. It was great to see them again. Last year, we had at least 6 lizards in my wildlife patch at one time, plus some others elsewhere in the garden. Well, this year, I have seen 3 together at any one time, and they were certainly enjoying some afternoon sun. The weather has actually been pretty poor here over the last week or so, but the lizards in the photos in this post were seen a couple of weeks ago.

The Common Lizards which we see in our garden tend to sit in the sun near some sort of cover. In the case of these lizards, they like to keep to the little open areas of soil or wall which are surrounded by tall grasses in my patch. The first photo below shows a lizard which I was able to get quite close to. I was able to use the macro mode on my camera here.

The photo below was taken a bit further away from the lizard but seems to capture the light better.

Sometimes, when it clouded over (as in the photo below) the lizard still sat there as if it were waiting for the sun to come out again.

Two smaller lizards (probably young ones) were sat quite deep in the long grass and didn't appear to be getting much sunlight because they were shaded so much. I find it amazing how they are able to keep so still for so long. When these creatures do move, however, they really do move fast. There could well have been more lurking around in the grass, but they would have been very hard to see with the constantly growing plants covering then up.

Its always great to see lizards about the garden and it reminds me of summer. Hopefully I will be able to see 6 of them again this year. The lizards in our garden are attracted by areas that are left scruffy. So just think, you could be helping to provide a habitat for lizards by not weeding an area of your garden. Its a no-brainer really!

My first Hobby

My last posting was largely about the flowers I saw at College Lake a couple of weeks ago. The weekend after that, I went to College Lake again, but this time, I was in search of some birdlife. This time of year is certainly a busy time at the lake and it was tricky to focus on any particular bird. However, there was one bird that stood out that little bit more. This bird is a new first for me and was definitely the highlight of the visit- a Hobby!

Yep, amongst the usual birds at college lake, a Hobby was seen whizzing over the surface of the water. It was sometimes hard to pick out the bird at a distance, especially with hundreds of swifts flying in the foreground. I was amazed at the speed of the Hobby as it flew effortlessly around. Such a striking bird too, with its streaked black underside and red-brown leg feathers. It hardly stopped to rest either and was constantly speeding around.

I was unable to get any photos of it, mostly because it was too far away, but also because it was almost impossible to follow. There were plenty of nesting Canada Geese around, as well as a few waders such as Redshank. I saw some goslings too, many of which were still sticking very close to their parents, maybe because of the Hobby. How vulnerable they looked. They were tiny compared with their parents.

As we walked around into the woodland section of the reserve in the sunhine, I saw a plenty of butterflies around, especially in the quieter areas. I managed to get a few shots of a Speckled Wood Butterfly which sat on the ground as if it was sunbathing. I have to say that they are not particularly colourful compared with some of the other butterflies I saw that day, but nice to capture nevertheless.

In the tops of the trees, Chiffchaffs were heard as we walked through the dense woodland. On my last visit, I saw a Willow Warbler, so it seems that the reserve is packed full of migrating warblers at the moment. I also heard plenty of Green Woodpeckers and Pheasants. Through much difficulty, we worked out that the terns which were flying around the lake were Common Terns and not Arctic Terns, which aren't seen inland.

So, all in all, a great trip to College Lake, and another few birds to add to my year list. Hopefully I can get some more photos next time though.

Fledgling Starlings to come

Recently, we bought some live mealworms for the birds, thinking it would be helpful for any nesting birds to feed to their chicks. Well, we have certainly had a positive response from the local Starlings. They have been flying off with beakfulls of mealworms for a couple of weeks now. I think that there are at least 4 adult starlings flying off with food to feed chicks. With the frenzied feeding, I am sure it won't be long until we see some fledglings.

A while back, we got a couple of plastic green mealworm feeders with little covers and steep sides. Before this, we were always trying to find somewhere A) protected from the weather, and B) somewhere they couldn't simply crawl off. As a result, many of the mealworms we wasted. It seems that now, the problem has been solved and the mealworms have been disappearing fast.

The Starlings have been seen deliberately spilling the mealworms onto the lawn so that they can collect them more easily. The video below shows a Starling collecting some mealworms and flying off with them. Note how the Starling quickly flies off with the mealworms before the second starling is able to take any! I was so lucky with the way one Starling replaced the other when recording the video.



Another ineteresting sighting in the garden has been a juvenile Dunnock. I also managed to get a clip of this too, albeit a short one. After watching this clip a few times, I thought the juvenile Dunnock could in fact be a very scruffy adult Dunnock. See what you think. I must say though that the Dunnock does appear to beg for food from the parent. This "youngster" appears to be able to feed itself, so I don't think it is a recent fledgling.



Now, I also wanted to talk about a very strange encounter in the garden yesterday. In the late afternoon, I saw a small flock of Long-tailed Tits visit the garden. Fairly normal so far, then. But I then saw a pair of the little birds hanging around near our conservatory nestbox. To my surprise, they actually entered the nestbox for a short time. I have certainly not seen this kind of behaviour before from this bird, although I know that Long-tailed Tits are beginning to exploit food from a wider range of feeders. When you look at the list of birds which use an ordinary tit box, the Long-tailed Tit is not part of the list. It would be great if the little birds visited the box again at some point, and maybe even thought about a late nesting attempt there.

To finish off, below are a couple of pictures of Collared Doves seen in the garden recently They seem to have learned how to feed off our bird feeders now!

Hopefully I will see some more fluffy youngsters over the coming weeks.

Wild flowers of College Lake

Last week, I took the chance to go to College Lake Nature Reserve not far from where I live. The range of wildlife there is fantastic, mostly because of the widely varied habitats. At this time of year, the number of birds at College Lake is quite amazing. Swifts, Swallows and House Martins whizzed around overhead, and plenty of waders were around too... but even more impressive at this time of year were the wild flowers.

A picture of part of the reserve is below. The views were really spectacular. Its great to think that such an amazing habitat is on my doorstep.

Not long after arriving, we came across a small group of Bluebells around a tree. They have got to be one of my favourite plants.


Whilst I am on the theme of blue, below is a photo of a Blue Tit we saw just a bit further along the same path. College Lake had a large number of nestboxes scattered around the reserve on various trees and buildings. I saw a pair of Blue Tits pop in and out of one of these boxes as we walked. The female was taking in beakfulls of nesting material. The one in the photo below looks in remarkable condition.

I was quite surprised to see Primroses on the ground too. The little purple flowers surrounding the Primroses are Violets. I had never seen Wild Primroses before, so I was very pleased to see the ones in the photo below.

On the way around the reserve, we also saw Cowslips on the edges of the path. In the sun, the yellow flowers were very colourful. See them in the photo below:

I got a close-up picture too.

Violets were very common throughout the reserve, and I saw a good number of bees and butterflies surrounding them.

I've no idea what the flowers in the next photo are. Please forgive me if the ID is glaringly obvious, but i'm still new to flowers. The flowers hadn't come out yet but the buds were colourful anyway.

As we walked around to the woodland section of the reserve, we saw plenty of teasel swaying in the wind. It was around this point where I saw what I think was a Willow Warbler singing in the trees judging from its song and brighter plumage than the Chiffchaff. Both of these birds are apparently quite common in the spring around College Lake.

So there you have it. The flowers which I saw on the 2 mile walk around College Lake. I visited it again this weekend, and I may post on that visit soon. But my eyes have been glued to the garden birds today, as I saw a fledgling flitting around.