Aug 20th Mousehold Heath & Aug 21st Strumpshaw Fen

Aug 20th Mousehold Heath



Brown Argus

It has been a while since my last butterfly survey at Mousehold, hasn't it? Will, Mousehold's warden, has been extremely busy as of late and had been doing them in his limited free time without me. Today, though, I was able to join him. It turned out to be a very successful survey with 61 butterflies counted. This included; 13 gatekeepers, 1 painted lady, 14 small whites, 2 large whites, 3 small coppers, 2 commas, 10 red admirals, 2 common blues, 4 speckled woods, 4 meadow browns and 2 green-veined whites.

The best of the bunch though was seeing 4 brown arguses. A brown argus is a member of the blue butterfly family and looks very similar to a female common blue but has brown upper wings with orange dots. I've not seen them that often at Mousehold, but this year, they seem to be doing exceptionally well at the site. Their cousin, the common blue, on the other hand, are not doing as well. I hate to admit it, but I haven't seen as many of these brilliant blue butterflies as much throughout the last few years. It really is a worrying decline.

Aug 21st Strumpshaw Fen

The sun may have been shining, but it was still a rather quiet morning at Strumpshaw. However, I'm just happy that it wasn't windy or rainy like most Wednesdays. I had heard that a garganey had been seen from Tower Hide, so I decided to check it out before my shift began. Along the way, I spooked a muntjac deer, walked past a basking lizard and had bullfinches follow me from Sandy Wall to halfway down the river trail. At Tower Hide, there were many drab-looking ducks, but with the sun in my eyes and my hot, sweaty face fogging up the lenses of my binoculars, I was unable to spot the garganey, only teal, shovelers, gadwalls and mallards as well as herons and two Chinese water deer.

At Reception Hide, a kingfisher made several visits, perching at the post partially hidden behind reeds at the centre of the reedy islands every now and then. There were also swarms of swallows with the odd house martin swooping over the broad and I had to rescue a dragonfly that had flown inside the hide, flying into the window above the main door like most insects that cannot distinguish the difference between free airspace and glass. I had to use a net to catch it, which was not easy. I've often saved butterflies trapped in this hide, but this was the first time I had to save a dragonfly. It was a big one too! A southern hawker, I think.