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A big THANK YOU to all of you who have used this site, hopefully enjoyed it and/or found useful information here. I have now made some big changes. All the posts from this site have now been moved to one of two new sites, so I’d really appreciate it if you would subscribe to either or both of them instead. Nature-watching diaries is more of a personal blog site – the ramblings and photographs…

Larks                                 March 6 For a change of scenery, we decided to explore one of the big open pasture fields along the road to Almonte.  There was little to be seen from the van so Jim went for a long walk across the field, returning with reports of about a hundred calandra larks. They were very intolerant of his approach, flying from 150 metres away, but he managed good views…

March 7 We had a look over the Madre from the promen­ade first thing this morning and found about a thousand sand martins lined up on the power-lines overhead.  They were spaced at about 10 cm intervals, preening and stretching in the sun.  They didn’t mind people walking below but took flight when large noisy vehicles went past, then returned to ranks within a few minutes. House martins and…

             March 8 Gus had told us that the road past ‘sandgrouse bend’ could be followed for about twenty‑five kilometres.  Beyond the reedswamp where we had watched the purple heron, the fields on one side of the road were drained and growing crops of cereals. It was strange to see barley in head in March but here the growing season starts in October‑Nov­ember with the autumn rains, and…

             March 9 Market day in Matalascañas again and as we were in the area it was a good excuse to look at the coastal dunes.  These dunes stretch for some fifty kilometres from the mouth of the Rio Tinto in the west, to the Guadalquivir in the east.  The eastern-most dunes are the youngest, they vary in size from about five metres high behind the beach to thirty metres inland.  They are…

             March 4 When we went out along the Camino del Rey in Gus’s van the other day, Jim felt the that track might just be dry enough to get our van through.  I was doubtful but he volunteered to take full respons­ibility.  By following well used tracks through the wetter areas, and keeping to first and second gear, we got through OK, eventually stopping where we had seen the sandgrouse ‑…

First thing this morning was a spotted redshank calling as it flew overhead.  A red squirrel was busy foraging on the woodland floor.  I walked through the woods but found nothing new.  Jim went to the tower hide and saw four sparrowhawks (2 male and 2 female) wheeling and soaring over the damp woodlands, a ferruginous duck on the marsh, and a bullfinch near the hide. We went for a last look at…

25th August 1989 A rather large weasel ran across the road in front of us – it didn’t have a black tip to its tail and stoats don’t occur this far south anyway.  For some reason, weasels bet bigger the further south they are, and this one would have been a good size for a stoat. There are three tower hides along the road, so we thought we’d take a look at the others.  The middle hide is away…

24th August 1989 From the tower this morning we added blackcap, wood-warbler, lesser whitethroat, wryneck and the eastern race of the long-tail tit to the list.  Then Jim found a raptor sitting in a small tree across the arable land on the other side of the road.  The bird took to the air and was quickly identified as an adult lesser-spotted eagle – our previous experience of the species at…

23rd August, 1989 We pulled off the road next to a large and overgrown drainage canal last night and were relieved to find the mosquito coils we bought in France also worked against the beasties here. An early morning walk revealed the usual marshy and scrub passerines, including blackcaps and lesser whitethroats feeding avidly and chasing around an elderberry bush, and two young nightingales…

The Third European Mammal Congress (in 1999) was held in the university town of Jyväskylä and lasted for five days.   Jyväskylä  is in the Finnish Lake district and is surrounded by forests and water.  It’s about a twenty-minute flight north of Helsinki.  Finnish towns are quite unlike those I have seen anywhere else.  From the air they look quite small.  But on the ground they actually consist…

New Year, new hopes

Somehow we’ve been rather too wrapped up with other projects lately, and have not done much in the way of actual nature-watching lately. So, hopefully, we’re off to a good start by getting out on New Year’s Day. Mind you, other people were also out on New Year’s Day but they weren’t birdwatching. We arrived at Kilpaison (east end of Angle Bay) to find a large party of windsurfers just packing up…

Landshipping Quay in December

Another hard frost this morning – that’s three in a row, and with temperatures having dipped to -6C overnight, the idea of driving anywhere did not appeal. Driving anywhere would mean at least four miles of unsalted, winding and undulating roads. We decided to put safety first, and not do all of our Wetland Bird Survey counts today. We’d stick to the easy one at Landshipping Quay, one that we…

A visit to the Westfield Pill nature reserve in Pembrokeshire

Westfield Pill was a tidal inlet on the Milford Haven Waterway until the 1980s when bunds were constructed across the mouth of the upper part and it became a freshwater lake. The lower part was developed as the Neyland Marina – a place full of expensive-looking boats. The upper part became a nature reserve, looked after by the local Wildlife Trust – an organisation that has gone through a…

Memories of #woodchat shrikes @naturewatchingineurope

Back in June, a woodchat shrike turned up in Pembrokeshire.  A few appear in Britain every – in spring they are often birds that have overshot (flown far beyond their breeding ground) during their spring migration, and in autumn they may be young birds doing a bit of exploring before migrating south for the winter.  Two or three are seen in Pembrokeshire most years. This one prompted me to look…

Even a cold drizzly day can be productive #rushmoorphotos #pembrokeshire-nature

Saturdays start with emptying the moth trap in the garden. March was disappointing, but today we did have a handful of moths – despite the rain. Early moth The Early Moth is usually on the wing in January and February, though a few seem to hang around into March and even early April. This one is a male – the females are almost wingless. It’s quite common in England, Wales, Ireland and the south…

A walk to Beacon Hill Back in 1995, our first spring here, we discovered the lichen Usnea articulate in these oak trees. I usually check that I can still find it here. And it provided something else to try the new lens on. The lichens are quite high up, and the photo is cropped, but it did a reasonable job. The Usnea is a straggly one on the right. I have no idea what the others are.