#centaury

Liquid Convalescence Value ●●○○○ ; Size ●○○○○ Surprisingly invigorating but only if you drink the entire liter of potion, often requiring a trip to the bathroom afterward. Contains blessed charcoal, centaury, feverfew, horehound, rosemary, fennel seed, sage, and bitter orange peel.

Some highlights of my wild summer

It’s that interesting time of year where summer hands the baton over to autumn. The change in weather generally to more blustery stuff over the past week or so and coloured leaves and a bounty of fruit on trees tells of the meteorological season, albeit the leaves and berries brought on sooner by the prolonged hot and dry weather, yet when the glorious sun of this time of year shines the heat makes it very much summer still. I thought it’d be a good time to have a look back over key moments and themes of my summer.

Marbled White at Lakeside was one of a few summer butterflies flitting about on June 1st as we opened our month with a week off, a week in Pembrokeshire flanked by a Stone-curlew walk and bits at home in Hampshire and a brilliant day at WWT Slimbridge seeing our first ever Bluethroat and a bee orchid. The sensational week in Pembrokeshire centring on visiting Skomer Island bringing many relaxing moments enjoying exuberant Puffins and other fascinating seabirds and many absorbing Choughs and Wheaters, powerful connections with Grey Seals and pretty and intriguing flowers like sheep’s-bit, broomrape and wall pennywort. Soon after we were gripped by butterflies and seabirds again at Durlston in Dorset with excellent views of Lulworth Skippers and Guillemots and Razorbills again. Not long after in June was another annual visit we do to Knepp in Sussex where we were inspired to see gorgeous White Storks and a splendid Lesser Whitethroat and exquisite Purple Emperors and Purple Hairstreaks. Getting my first ever Hampshire sighting of Purple Emperor at West Wood a key place in June for us and enjoying Purple Hairstreaks dancing along the oak tops of Lakeside on summer evenings too made them two of my key butterflies of the year.

June brought two big surprises, our first ever Wood Warbler seen and heard at Acres Down in the New Forest and secret chicks produced by Winchester Peregrines Mel and William being revealed to the world. On Winchester lunch time walks Winnall Moors was a key site to visit and it was good to discover St. Giles Hill and it’s stunning panoramic views across the city. Elsewhere locally a great Lakeside summer on lunch time and precious evening walks in light times included regular Common Tern and Cormorant sightings, the second brood of Great Crested Grebe chicks this year, one of two Wasp Spiders I was stunned to see this summer and lovely darting dragonflies including Black-tailed Skimmer and Migrant Hawker, male and female. At home in moth traps and just generally coming in we saw a few great moths this summer including Rosy Footman, Lesser Broad-bordered Yellow Underwing, Willow Beauty, Small Magpie, Orange Swift, Double-striped Pug and Small Blood-vein. Hedgehogs were regular in the garden.

A key weekend of July was a long one going to Rutland Water for the Global Bird Fair and time at the nature reserves. The Bird Fair a stimulating and inspiring weekend again and Ospreys, a surprise Caspian Gull, Greenshank, Green Sandpiper, Muntjac Deer, scarlet Ruddy Darter dragonflies as well as Brown and Southern Hawker on a hot day and rich wildflower meadow hosting a strong array of butterflies including Peacock and Small Copper with tufted vetch, bird’s-foot trefoil and wild carrot key flowers in the meadow were key wildlife sightings. The weekend after that was a pivotal one in my year; another inspiring day on Salisbury Plain getting sensational views of Great Bustards on a Great Bustard Group tour in Wiltshire then turning to Dorset again the next day when we were lucky to catch late glimpses in its stay of the Little Sea (Studland) Purple Heron, this and Great Bustard two of a few species I’ve seen for only the second time in the wild this year both taking my year list to 220, level with my then highest ever total in a year in 2023. Common Grayling a thrilling butterfly sighting at Little Sea. Towards the end of July as the England Women football team completed an exhilarating retention of their European title I had a momentous day myself stepping up the butterfly ladder with treasured sightings of Brown Hairstreak and Silver-spotted Skipper at Shipton Bellinger and Perham Down respectively and Wall Brown enjoyed too taking me to within one species of my target, levelling last year’s total of 43.

It would take only one more week into early August to get the icing on the cake of my butterfly year and that forty third, the unmistakable Clouded Yellow at St. Catherine’s Hill, my first of two sightings of this exotic migratory butterfly this year to date. Also that day Silver-spotted Skipper again and Chalkhill Blues, gems of the summer that alongside Adonis Blue as well on one occasion starred on visits to Stockbridge Down this summer too, were key sightings. From mid-July into August it was an honour and an obsession once more count butterflies for Butterfly Conservation’s Big Butterfly Count. The weekend after St. Catherine’s Hill and as birds on autumn migration began to trickle through a pair of species I often see together in late summer which I had trusted sightings of could make my year list my highest ever turned up at Hook-with-Warsash, Whinchat and Yellow Wagtail and I was ecstatic to see both. Breathtaking and beautiful birds to see, so fitting to make my year list my highest ever.

A strong summer of a strong year of birdwatching for me continued in August with Spotted Flycatchers seen four weekends running at various locations, luxurious chances to see this bird again this year which was a year tick at Bosherston Lily Ponds in the June Pembrokeshire week. The fourth of those weekends at Hayling Island’s Northney Paddocks in trees dripping with bright red hawthorn berries symbolising the landscape currently whilst enjoying cracking views of the Spotted Flycatchers we were overjoyed to spot a rarer in these parts on migration female Pied Flycatcher among them. A great sighting of an enchanting bird. We had an amazing August bank holiday of birds with one of two Ospreys seen this year on migration from the car and a fantastic bank holiday Monday with Knot, Little Stint, Black Tern, Black-necked Grebe and Red-crested Pochard highlights between Lymington and Blashford Lakes. Into September and the change in weather brought another bird species we had longed for, a charming Grey Phalarope at Hayling Island’s Oysterbeds yesterday. Hobbies, Kingfisher, Small Heath, Fox, centaury, common toadflax, sloes and ebullient butterfly orchids were other key species this summer. I look forward to seeing what autumn brings.

Nothing to see here

Just blackjack and octavious enjoying the fall fair

Sunlit Centaury

✨I will not go out of my way for others.

✨I will provide help if there is receptivity on the other side.

✨I know my limits and boundaries.

✨I will not provide help unless the need for it, it's asked or expressed.

King of Cups. Art by Kevin Jay Stanton, from BOTANICA.