Peter Jones Wildlife blog

Originally shared by Peter Jones Plenty of Orchids this week, with hundreds of Common Spotted and a few Chalk Fragrant on Pewsey Downs, and a nice assortment of Bee, Common Spotted, Pyramidal, and Greater Butterfly at Collard Hill. https://photos.app.goo.gl/PvSiS6XtFHfGPAb39

Originally shared by Peter Jones Plenty of Orchids around, a few hundred Heath Spotted in the New Forest during my Reptile Survey a week or so ago.

I've renamed this collection to include wild flowers and plants seen in Hampshire and the UK mainly. This should breathe some new life into the collection as I see a lot more flowers than fungi!

Spent a hot Sunday afternoon on a Nature reserve near Alton, which was packed with Orchids. Common Spotted and Pyramidal were most numerous, plus a small number of Fragrant Orchids. New species for me were Common Twayblade, which were in decent numbers, a Fly OPrchid which was sadly just past it's best, plus the tiny Musk Orchid, which is about 2 inches high, and the similarly diminutive Frog Orchid. Two other Orchid watchers kindly showed me the Fly and the Frog. I'd have never found them on my own! https://photos.app.goo.gl/zRZ6SVWNtNuY3GCi9

Ventured into Devon through the week to hopefully catch up with three new Butterfly species for me. All so rare, that realistically you have to travel to known colonies to see them. Heddon Valley, is managed for High Brown Fritillary, and I eventually saw a handful. Difficult at first to nail the key features, but managed to get photos verifying the extra row of underwing spots, and the off-centre dot on the upperwing. Very smart Butterflies. I also saw a Small Pearl Bordered Fritillary, Smal Copper, and Green Hairstreak. On to Haddon Hill, where the Heath Fritillaries were quite abundant, managed 1 cracking photo of a pretty smart individual, which was lucky, as they weren't the easiest to photrograph. Finished off at Collard Hill. Plenty of Large Blues at this introduction site, and also Common Blue (Beware!), Painted Lady, and Small Tortoiseshell. Not often you get a 100% success rate when "twitching"! https://photos.app.goo.gl/GoGwrJfWcm1CJC957

A failed attempt for Common Clubtail Dragonfly on the River Thames, but I was treated to nice views of a Little Owl hunting. Don't see many in the Test Valley, they are about, but not often as blatant as this one.

A Narrow-bordered five-spot Burnet Moth, in Brittany

The most memorable New Forest Reptile survey I have done so far, this morning. An Adder on top of one of the survey refuge sheets gave me good photos, while I decided how I'm supposed to look underneath the sheet! Fortunately, the snake moved on. Also, my first Smooth Snake, a young one only about 15 cm long, and a first for the survey area, which was a big surprise. 3 Grass Snake, Common Lizard and Slow Worm too, so 5 out of the 6 native Reptile species seen in one morning. Also Dartford Warblers and Nightjar.

A nice surprise in the garden yesterday as a female Demoiselle landed briefly in our small apple tree, before flying up into Wysteria where I got the photo. Unlike the males, female Demoiselles are pretty difficult to identify. I'm pretty sure, with the brown wings, that this is a Female Beautiful Demoiselle. Nearest population of this species, that I know of is about a mile down the stream which runs past the house. They would be more than welcome to colonise the stream outside our house! Also, two Large Red Damselflies were in the garden yesterday.

Water Vole in a small stream in Campsite, Brittany https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WL9vcv0A_Ek&feature=share

Have just returned from a family holiday in Carantec, Brittany. Spent some time searching for wildlife around the campsite, which was fairly intensely farmed, with a couple of small lakes, streams, and seashore. The weather was also pretty changeable which made things difficult, but I found a small selection of birds and insects throughout the week. Actually, the best of the wildlife was seen on the round trip to and from France.. a Nightjar over the car park at Newhaven just after dusk was a super start to the week, and Bottlenose Dolphins on the return ferry (out of St. Malo were also pretty good) Best of the birds in Brittany were Serin, Turtle Dove, Med Gulls, and Cetti's Warbler. Butterflies were fairly thin on the ground with Red Admiral, Painted Lady and Speckled Wood the most numerous. A stream running thru the fairly large campsite had a family of Water Voles. I think we were the only people who saw them out of the dozens of other tourists! The nearby lake had both Marsh F...

Another Reptile survey in the New Forest, my license runs for the 1st half of the month, so I get a break now until June. Today's survey was quiet sadly, with just a fleeting glimpse of a Common Lizard. Hot days perhaps not the best for surveys. I did, however, find a couple of nice insects: a Pine Ladybird, which is a fairly small species, with comma shaped red marks; and also a Dor Beetle.

Another moth trap session last night, but with fairly limited results. 1 Brimstone , a couple of worn looking pugs. Smartest moth was a Small Phoenix, photo below, and a Micro moth which I initially struggled to identify. However, shining a torch on the moth brought out all the colour, and I was able to identify it as an Esperia Sulphurella!

Mild weather recently, so I have run the moth trap in the garden a few nights. Haven't ran the trap so early in the year before, so I got a few new ones. A selection of pics below.. Satellite, Lunar Marbled Brown, Brindled Beauty, Frosted Green, Lesser Swallow Prominent, and Muslin.

A pretty good reptile survey in the New Forest this morning. My allocated survey is 3x1 km with 40 artificial refugia to look under, so it takes awhile. The weather today was furiously hot! so not ideal, and I was conscious of this when I started out. With hindsight, I started a little too early, and also spent too much time surveying into the sun. But these are little mistakes I can iron out through the season. Best of the sightings under Refugia were an Adder inches away from a Toad! and several Slow Worms. A fast moving stream had a Palmate Newt, and what I presume was an Eel!, and a nearby pond was packed with Palmate Newts. Nice to watch them under the surface. There is something relaxing about Newts! Elsewhere, a Common Heath Moth was a first for me, and plenty of birds including Dartford Warbler, Curlew, Snipe, Lapwing, Hobby, Tree Pipit and Willow Warbler.

Lots of photos from Goa

4. Cavelossim The final 3 nights of my trip were spent at the small town of Cavelossim in the South of Goa. Relatively few Birders have visited this area, although some good reference reports exist, identifying places with potential. One thing I did notice was the landscape changes quite frequently here, and areas marked as good in November, were pretty dry by March. There was however, good opportunities in a small lake on the edge of town, and the fields surrounding the town had a good assortment of birds. The large scrubby area north of the town was good, although hard work, and the beach all the way down to the River Sal estuary was productive, with the bonus of superb Humpback Dolphin sightings at the estuary on the morning I explored the area. I chose a long walk checking the fields either side of the Assolna Bridge, Lake Velim, and on to Betul Lighthouse. The plan being to mop up the common species I had missed during the week. I didn't quite make it on foot to the Lighthouse...

3. Zuari River: This was an eagerly awaited trip in the middle of the holiday. The Zuari river is home to Marsh Mugger Crocodiles, and two species of Kingfisher unlikely to be encountered elsewhere in Goa: the Collared Kingfisher and Black-capped Kingfisher. Both were seen well, although difficult to photograph. This was a relief as the Black-Capped seems to have become scare recently, and what a stunning bird this was. Crocodiles were seen well, along with Striated Heron and Western Reef Heron, plus the other common Herons and Egrets. Orange-Breasted Green Pigeon, Lesser Adjutant, and Stork-billed Kingfisher completed an enjoyable morning boat trip. Sightings: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1zJWmiNz4iIohs0nEliua325TtPfQ6nmN

2. Western Ghats: This was to be where the bulk of the exciting sightings were made. I spent 4 nights at Nature's Nest camp, and their resident guide Ramesh proved to be excellent at finding a large number of birds in the 3 days we had available. Sri Lankan Frogmouth, Indian Pitta and Malabar Trogon were seen well, and many other highlights were seen during the trips into the forests including Brown Fish Owl, Crested Hawk Eagle, Oriental Dwarf Kingfisher, and Yellow-browed Bulbul. I could go on and on. Night safari's produced good sightings of other highlights such as Jungle Nightjar, Jerdon's Nightjar, and Indian Scop's Owl. The camp area had 4 Sunbird species, plus Little Spiderhunter, Puff-throated Babbler, and Tickell's Flycatcher, plus a brief Orange-headed Thrush, and Indian Tit. Sightings: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1H_9Agx_uHA3hlIJQEXMZ1HN0djPHffa-

1. Carambolim After a long tiring trip, I spent the first morning in the Carambolim lake area. What a place this is, with some incredible wetlands south of the main lake. As the sun rose, I was seeing more and more small flocks of many species of waders, plus a stream of Herons and Egrets overhead. New Indian species for me included Blue-tailed Bee-eater, Black Drongo, White-rumped and Scaly-Breasted Munia, Wire Tailed Swallow, Stork-billed Kingfisher, and Spot-billed Duck. Many of the birds I was familiar with were species I had gone so many years without seeing. These were also big highlights, including Citrine Wagtail, Temminck's Stint, Marsh Sandpiper, and White Breasted Kingfisher. An incredible start to the week. Sightings list: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1EZ9apHl4lG3NHEP2GUENpBwgo_83wEAM