16 May 22

Priorslee Lake and The Flash

12.0°C > 15.0°C: A low overcast with intermittent and mostly light rain. Calm start with light ESE wind developing. Moderate visibility, even poor at times.

Sunrise: 05:12 BST

* = a photo today

Priorslee Lake: 04:35 – 05:50 // 06:40 – 09:30

(112th visit of the year)

Bird notes:
- The Mute Swans have eight cygnets. They probably hatched Saturday. It is possible there were more as it is quite usual for one or two to perish at or soon after hatching.
- Rain affected count of both adult and juvenile Coots.
- I noted my first juvenile Great Tit this morning. It had obviously been fledged some days as it seemed to be fully independent.
- No Willow Warbler heard today.
- The only Sedge Warbler this morning was singing from the Ricoh hedge. No sedges there!
- There were certainly four singing Garden Warblers this morning with another heard calling.
- I heard no Common Whitethroat. Possibly because it was raining hard as I passed its usual singing area.
- Much noise from several Tree Creepers along the N side suggested successful breeding. Too gloomy to peer in the trees and see.

Birds noted flying over here:

Not much in poor conditions.
- 3 Greylag Geese: outbound together
- 3 Wood Pigeons
- 1 Herring Gull: (near) adult
- 1 Jackdaw only

Hirundines etc. noted:
- 2 Barn Swallows

Warblers noted (figures in brackets relate to singing birds):

** numbers likely somewhat affected by wet conditions
- 1 (1) Cetti's Warbler
- 16 (13) Chiffchaffs
- 1 (1) Sedge Warbler
- 7 (7) Reed Warblers
- 15 (13) Blackcaps
- 5 (4) Garden Warblers
- no Common Whitethroat

Counts from the lake area:
- 4 + 2 (1 brood) Canada Geese: goslings still surviving: of these a pair flew off
- 2 + 8 (1 brood) Mute Swans
- 7 (5♂) Mallard
- 3 (2) Tufted Duck: arrived together and departed as a pair and a single drake after a few minutes
- 3 Moorhens
- 13 + 1 (brood) Coots only
- 6 Great Crested Grebes
- 1 Grey Heron: arrived

Noted on / around the street lamp poles pre-dawn:
- *1 small green gnat
- *1 Lesser Earwig (Labia minor)
- *1 Cucumber Green Orb Spider-type (possibly Araniella cucurbitina)

Noted later in mainly cloudy conditions:

Butterflies:

None

Moths
- Common Roller (Ancylis badiana)
- *Drinker caterpillars (Euthrix potatoria)

Bees / wasps etc.

None

Hoverflies:

None

Dragon- / damsel- flies:

None

Flies:
- Scorpion Fly (Panorpa sp.)
- plus the usual many other flies of many species

Bugs etc.:
- *Harlequin Ladybird (Harmonia axyridis)
- *soldier beetle of the Cantharis group, most likely C. lateralis
- Red-and-Black Froghopper (Cercopis vulnerata)
- Common European Earwig (Forficula dentata)
- *a possible cricket nymph
- White-lipped Snail (Cepaea hortensis)
- Garden Snail (Cornu aspersum aka Helix aspersa)

Spiders
- Tetragnatha sp. stretch spider

New flowers:
- *Yellow Flag (Iris pseudacorus)

I noted on Saturday that the cob Mute Swan had become particularly attentive at the nest and here is why. Eight cygnets. During the time I was there they moved around almost the complete lake. That is a long way for the little cygnets to paddle with their little feet.

It is coming to the end of the breeding season for ducks and the drake Mallard on the left is looking decidedly scruffy. Mind you I can talk...

I am not sure what this Great Crested Grebe was up to. It was repeatedly picking this item up, dropping it in the water, and then diving to...

... re-emerge with it. Often they do this to manoeuvre fish so the can swallow them head-first and avoid the spines. But is this a fish? It does not look like one. So?

After last week's juvenile Pied Wagtails on the dam it is now the turn of a juvenile Grey Wagtail. This one was constantly preening and hard to photo. Note the spread tail.

.... Eventually I engaged brain a tried a short video of its energetic display of preening.

This seems to be another caterpillar of The Drinker moth (Euthrix potatoria), one of two I spotted this morning. The hairs are doing a good job of holding the raindrops off the body.

A close-up of the munching end. Cuckoos are capable of dealing with hairy caterpillars unscathed so why are there no Cuckoos here?

About all I can say is this looks like a small green gnat. On a lamp pole pre-dawn.

Proving that beetles are waterproof is this soldier beetle of the Cantharis group, most likely C. lateralis.

My first Harlequin Ladybird (Harmonia axyridis) of the year

I'll have to open this photo up to offers. I suspect it is a nymph of a cricket – the antennae look to long for a grasshopper. I am slightly bemused by the thickness at the base of the antennae which is not a feature of any adults of this group. As to size: it is sitting at the base of a just opening grass 'flower'.

This appears to be my first-ever Lesser Earwig (Labia minor). It is less than half the size of a regular earwig with a proportionally slimmer body and pale antennae.

If I have this right this is a Cucumber Green Orb Spider-type (possibly Araniella cucurbitina). Quite what it was doing on a lamp pole is hard to understand. They normally build a small sheet-web across a concave leaf and hide upside down between the web and the leaf and wait for prey to get stuck in the web.

My first Yellow Flag (Iris pseudacorus) flower of the year.

(Ed Wilson)

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The Flash: 05:55 – 06:35

(109th visit of the year)

Bird notes:
- Seems I overlooked the Canada Goose goslings on my last visit: a brood of eight and a sizeable single gosling noted.
- No Greylag Geese goslings seen. It was reported that 'large gulls' had been seen attacking the goslings over the weekend.
- Were the three Tufted Duck the same trio that flew in to the lake later?

Birds noted flying over here:

None

Hirundines etc. noted:

None

Warblers noted (figures in brackets relate to singing birds):
- 6 (5) Chiffchaffs
- 5 (4) Blackcaps

Noted on / around the water:
- 42 + 9 (2 broods) Canada Geese
- 2 Greylag Geese
- 3 Mute Swans
- 22 (18♂) Mallard
- 1 (1♂) all-white duck (Aylesbury Duck)
- 3 (2♂) Tufted Duck
- 6 Moorhens
- 20 + heard only juvenile Coots: keeping out of the rain!
- 2 Great Crested Grebes

On / around the street lamp poles or elsewhere:
Nothing noted

(Ed Wilson)

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Between the lake and The Flash:

- single Moorhens beside each pool yet again.
- 1 Chiffchaff singing beside the upper pool
- 1 Blackcap singing between the upper pool and the academy

(Ed Wilson)

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In the Priorslee Avenue tunnel:

- 1 Common Marbled Carpet moth (Chloroclysta truncata)
- lots of plumed and other midges
- 1 White-legged Snake Millipede (Tachypodoiulus niger)

Not my best-ever photo of a Common Marbled Carpet moth (Chloroclysta truncata). The roof of the tunnel is at the wrong height for the camera. The roof is too close for me to use a long focal length and too far away for a decent-sized image and a shorter focal length. Common Marbled Carpet moths come in several colour morph and are can only reliably be separated from Dark Marbled Carpet (C. citrata) by examining the underside of the wings. Luckily this colour morph only occurs in Common Marbled Carpet.

At last! I have been seeing this tiny fly on the wall of the tunnel most mornings. Mostly it sits with one wing closed or partially closed. Today they were both akimbo. No idea as to species.

This morning's White-legged Snake Millipede (Tachypodoiulus niger). The head is top left. I am not sure whether it is responsible for the debris of insects among is 'pedes'.

(Ed Wilson)

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On this day can be found via the yearly links in the right-hand column.

Sightings from previous years without links are below

2012

Nedge Hill

10 Northern Wheatears

(Richard Camp)

2010

Priorslee Lake

Ringed Plover

(Ed Wilson)

2007

Priorslee Lake

1 Ruddy Duck

(Ed Wilson)

2006

Priorslee Lake

2 Ruddy Ducks

Cuckoo

(Ed Wilson)