Today I decided on a follow-up visit to a tetrad I had birded in during early April. The attraction was that fieldwork for the Birds of Warwickshire which is still an ongoing project led by Jonathan Bowley had left this tetrad untouched until this year.
It was a nice sunny morning and I had a pleasant mooch through HOEF woodlands, some more mature woods, and some arable farmland. Inevitably there were few surprises, but a Shelduck which flew over was somewhat odd. I also logged seven singing Garden Warblers mainly in the dense HOEF young woodland, and a singing Sedge Warbler in a field of oilseed rape. One of a pair of Ravens was carrying a prey item towards its nest, and many other species were confirmed to be breeding.
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| Mistle Thrush about to stick a beakful of craneflies down its youngster's gob |
Plenty of spring butterflies were on the wing, including my first Small Whites and Large White of the year.
An interesting weedy field contained some remarkably bright plants which caught my eye. They turned out to be Crimson Clovers, a species I had never heard of, let alone seen.
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| Crimson Clover |
For a short while I thought I must have found something really good. Then I bumped into the owner of the field who told me she had sown the field with a wild flower mix, which rather explained it. She also mentioned having seen a "Woopoo". Hoopoe? I asked. "That's it" she said "on my lawn and in the apple trees. It was lovely." "When was this?" I enquired. "Oh about ten years ago" came the reply.
Another one that's got away. I wonder how many other rarities slip through the recorder's fingers.
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