New Year's Day Wildlife Walk

I had volunteered to help with Paxton Pit's Wildlife Walk yesterday but, as the organiser said he had enough other helpers, I decided to do my task of recording what plants are in bloom on New Year's Day or just after. The answer was not much - 2 grasses plus Groundsel, Germander Speedwell and White Deadnettle. Bird life was abundant with all the expected duck species plus Goosander (Merganser merganser), Red-Breasted Mergansers (flew off before photograph!)  and Red Crested Pochard  - all a bit distant for my lens.

Winter Birds at Paxton Pits

After a conservation morning laying hawthorn and blackthorn trees to make low scrub for summer avian visitors, I took my camera for a walk to see what was around. As expected, Cormorants, lots of ducks  including Shoveller, Gadwall and Widgeon, Egyptian Geese and flocks of Fieldfares. All distant shots so not a lot of quality but beautiful colours in the water and plumage

Fungi Survey at Paxton Pits

The last wildlife monthly survey of the year at Paxton concentrates on fungi and we were fortunate to have a fine day and plenty of species last Saturday. The first image of a troop of Mycena (?) toadstools sums up the magic of the morning (second image with flash to light the stems). Puff balls, Shaggy Pholiota, Dead Man's Fingers, Beefsteak bracket, three types of Inkcaps and another Mycena species complete the images displayed here though we found many many more species and are hoping to identify a few more.

Paxton Pits Dragons and Damsels

Paxton Pits now has a well-established colony of Norfolk Hawkers- a very attractive green-eyed dragonfly. The exuvia is probably a Norfolk Hawker though there are also Hairy Dragonfles (4) around at the moment. another speciality is the Scarce Hawker (5, exuvia - 6). As usual I had to revise the differences between the three common 'blue' damselflies. So in order they are Azure, Variable and common Blue plus Blue-tailed Damselfly.

 

Paxton Pits RPS Field Trip

 On Saturday, we had our second Field trip of 2021 for the RPS Nature Group, a general natural history day at Paxton Pits. We saw a wide variety of birds and insects on a warm very bright sunny day. It was not the best conditions to get photos but certainly made the whole day very enjoyable. The Willow Warblers were singing very prominently from many perches along with Blackcaps. The bees are mining bees Andrena nitida and Andrena nigroaenea with a Blood bee (Sphecodes) that is a parasite of bees laying its egg in their brood chambers