I love a bit of visible migration and it was certainly happening at Formby
beach on Saturday. I met up with Josh late morning and we walked down lifeboat
road to the beach. The tide was receding so we walked out half a mile to the
waters edge and then headed south towards Hightown, gradually getting further
away from the shore as the tide retreated. Out this far there was a wonderfully
cooling easterly breeze and it was a pleasure to be here.
Once we got away from the Lifeboat road area the beach was deserted, not
another person in sight. There were small groups of birds here and there,
mainly gulls but also perhaps about 500 noisy sandwich terns including a few
juveniles. Numbers of these terns will gradually build into August, and from
ringing recoveries they are known to originate from colonies on Anglesey
(Cemlyn Bay), Ireland and Cumbria. Otherwise it was very quiet, just a few
common terns and hardly any waders.
The beach wasn't completely deserted though. There were loads of butterflies
coming in off the sea and every one that I managed to identify was a red
admiral, though there were probably also painted lady's involved as well. We
saw a single hawker type dragonfly flying low over the beach a good three
quarters of a mile offshore, but frustratingly it was silhouetted and flew
into the sun before I could identify it, but it's tempting to think lesser
emperor or Norfolk hawker given the numbers that are around at the moment. We
also saw at least two moths, smaller than silver y but not as big as a
hawk-moth. As expected nothing landed so identifying individuals to species
level as never going to be easy, and although they all made good progress
inland, they were buffeted by the wind and following them in binoculars was
very difficult.
When these migratory insects are blown west over the water by easterly winds
such as we are currently experiencing, they compensate by angling their flight
into the wind and returning to the mainland. It's a fabulous experience to
walk through it as it's happening.
The results of the recent influx of insects was clear to see at Martin Mere
today, where I estimated at least 300 red admirals and around 50 painted
ladies. Red admirals were easily the most common butterfly today.
Painted lady.
Dune helleborine is a rare plant of the pine woodlands in the area.
Unfortunately not quite open yet.
No comments:
Post a Comment