Mark Lawlor's Nature Blog

Glanville Fritillary - Mont Herault, 31 May 20

The second half of May and the transition from birding to insect-hunting, with the hope of a nice rarity always in mind. It was disappointing that a couple more trips to the Track Marais didn’t produce anything new and perhaps the under-watched area isn’t hiding quality birds after all. But, it may just be an access issue, as even with the increased effort on my part, it can be a right pain getting in there! Nevertheless the male Marsh Harrier from there started appearing more often over the house which I am hoping means that chicks have appeared.

Male Marsh Harrier - over the garden, 18 May 20

Evening at the Track Marais with a field full of Hemlock Water-Dropwort

On 20th May conditions were quite promising for perhaps some late migrants at Pleinmont, so I gave it a wee bash. There wasn’t a great deal but I had singles of Wheatear, Whinchat, Yellow and White Wagtail, plus a nice Cuckoo that I watched in flight on two occasions. I also extracted my scope from the car - for the first time all spring! - to look at the shearwater flock which was already starting to build up off the headland. As last time, they were so distant but I felt that they were more or less all Manx Shearwaters, with none suggesting to my eyes that they were Balearic, but it was impossible to know for sure. A ten by ten estimate of about 450 birds was made.

Bird-wise, that was it for the month apart from a lone Spotted Flycatcher at Pleinmont on 27th. So no rarities seen and a couple of dips which I shall quickly gloss over and pretend never happened.

No doubt due to the lockdown and working at home a lot, I have been more observant about the local breeding birds than I usually am. A pair of Collared Doves decided to make a nest on next-door’s outside lights which I thought was a daft place since it had no protection at all from predators. And so it transpired when, one morning, I saw a Carrion Crow chase the dove off the nest and fly off with an egg. The birds soon abandoned the site. I wonder why some individual birds are so much smarter than others? Maybe it is just a the way these creatures learn.

One day I saw that some of the local House Sparrows were taking the odd bit of Willow’s fluff from the garden for their nests. So after the next groom, I collected the fur into a box and put it into the gap of the trellis. They couldn’t get enough of it! There was an almost constant procession of sparrows taking the fur away for home-improvements, our garden became the avian IKEA. A Great Tit also joined in.

Collared Dove - next door neighbour’s, 20 May 20

Pheasant with chicks - Grand Pre, 18 May 20

The moth trap did not produce anything out of the ordinary during this time, although a tiny Poplar Hawk-moth was very strange - it only had about a 6cm wingspan including body.

Miniature Poplar Hawk-moth - garden, 28 May 20

During the last week of the month, since it was half-term and didn’t have to work from home, I visited the south coast three times for some quality walks and insect hunting. I walked west from Les Tielles on 25th, did the area above Petit Port on 29th and the cliff-top at Mont Herault on 31st. The highlights were the Glanville Fritillaries, with 3 at the usual Tielles quarry, plus the one below from a bit further west near the Long Cavaleux. At Mont Herault I had 3 individuals including one which fed on an umbellifer for ages without flying away which is unusual for this flighty species. With my arm at full extension, I managed some great macro shots. The Glanvilles appear to be decreasing at the moment so it was great to see them in three different locations.

Glanville Fritillary - West of Les Tielles, 25 May 20

Wasp Beetle - Les Tielles, 25 May 20 - good numbers noted during the week.

Melanocoryphus superbus - Les Tielles, 25 May 20 - a new species of bug for me and very distinctive. This is a continental species which does not occur in the UK. Continental bugs seem to be increasing year on year here with many new heteroptera bei… — Melanocoryphus superbus - Les Tielles, 25 May 20 - a new species of bug for me and very distinctive. This is a continental species which does not occur in the UK. Continental bugs seem to be increasing year on year here with many new heteroptera being found. (note the strange asymmetry on this one)

Sibinia arenariae - Les Tielles, 25 May 20 - a tiny weevil, but luckily quite easy to identify due to the ‘keyhole’ mark on the top. Apparently quite common in Sea-spurrey clumps (where this one was) but a new species for me.

Adela Croesella - Petit Port, 29 May 20 - there seemed to be a lot of these on the cliffs this year.

Mont Herault, 31 May 20 - by the end of the month with practically no rain, the short vegetation on the cliff tops was very dry.

Bishop’s Mitre Shieldbug - Mont Herault, 31 May 20

Ancistrocerus parietum - Mont Herault, 31 May 20 - a wasp in the same family as normal wasps but much, much smaller. they are Difficult to identify and, since I use english guides to identify this kind of thing, there is always the possibility that … — Ancistrocerus parietum - Mont Herault, 31 May 20 - a wasp in the same family as normal wasps but much, much smaller. they are Difficult to identify and, since I use english guides to identify this kind of thing, there is always the possibility that this may be a similar continental species.

A new species of beetle for Guernsey that I identified from a specimen, Paederus fuscipes. Similar to the more familar P. littoralis but with slightly different proportions.

The morning of 8th May started painfully when I somehow managed to shut the car door on my thumb when jumping out to look at some waders on Vazon beach. However, the day improved considerably about an hour later. I was walking down the sloping field at Mont Herault in the fabulous sunshine and there was a pleasant south-easterly breeze coming off the sea, ideal conditions for something to arrive from France. I turned round to see a larger raptor appear above the fields to my left, silhouetted against the sun. Lifting my bins, the bird swooped round and I could see the wonderful fork and sooty plumage of a Black Kite. Fumbling for my camera which was not playing ball, the bird flew right past me at a very low level and did a circuit of the field in front of me - such terrific views of this rare bird. After checking me out, it continued on and disappeared off northwards over the brow of the slope. I managed to get some great pictures, despite the camera still being on settings for taking close-up pics of insects - why do I never learn?

As Black Kite has been showing a general increase in records and expanding in range, it isn’t an ‘unexpected’ species any more, but it is still properly rare here. This is only the 12th record for the island and there were no accepted sightings in the previous two years, so still a thrill to find one yourself. I had to walk up the hill a bit to get phone coverage and put the news out, by which time Mark G had already seen the bird further over the headland.

I carried on walking the fields at Mont Herault but migrant-wise I could only find a few Wheatear, to go with the single Whinchat I’d seen earlier. The next grapevine message was that the Black Kite was now circling over Trinity Cottages, and I could see it from the top of the hill by the watchhouse. As I walked back westwards it kept appearing and I eventually saw it drift inland and seemingly head off eastwards.

Because of this, the next message that came through was a surprise - there were now three Black Kites circling over the headland! I was back near the car now so I drove off to get a closer view. Parking by Vic’s field I joined Wayne and Mark and we watched all three birds soaring in the blue skies high above the headland. Superb stuff. There has never been a ‘flock’ of kites in Guernsey before - there was once a pair seen but all others have been singles. It was such a thrilling experience, highlight of the spring.

Wayne & Mark watching Black Kites whilst socially distancing.

I thought that maybe these were new birds, different from the first sighting, but looking at photos, I think the first bird was probably one of these three - they eventually drifted off inland again. I drove to Raptor Ridge in case they had settled there but there was no sign, but a Hobby went through whilst I was there. And then I saw another Hobby fly over Bailliff’s Cross Road as I drove home - a great day for raptors.

Previous to this I’d had a few good sightings in May, starting with a Hobby which flew over the garden whilst I was gardening on 2nd. Luckily, as with most birders I suspect, I was gardening with a pair of bins at arms reach. I went up Pleinmont on 3rd May as that would have been the day of the annual bird race which was of course cancelled this year due to the virus. I was dreading that the headland would be dripping with migrants and we’d missed out on a top day, but it was not, with just a male Redstart of note. In fact it was so foggy up there, we wouldn’t have been able to scan the fields. A Sedge Warbler was seen in the pines at Fort Hommet on the way home.

The highlight of my ‘lockdown walk’ on the 4th was a singing Garden Warbler out in the open in the scrub near the Track Marais, but a low-light was seeing that the Greylag Geese there had bred and no doubt the place would be soon crawling with them. On the same walk two days later I flushed a Tree Pipit from the path by Les Nicolles which was a surprise migrant sighting.

On 10th May I walked round the Grand Pre and heard two male Cetti’s singing - one in the usual spot by the pool and one right next to the car park. With these two, the ones in the Track Marais area, plus birds singing at Claire Mare, Rue des Bergers and Mark’s odd out-of-habitat one at Saints, this makes at least 9 possibly 10 singing Cetti’s this year which is a record count for the island. I had a brief Hobby buzz the hirundines over the pool and a cluster of Altar-lilies growing in the marsh (escaped from a nearby garden) brought me up to 2300 species identified in the ‘wild’ in Guernsey.

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May 2020 part ii

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