Bats, Buzzard, Bank vole and Buckingham Palace

 In the first week of May I took one of the Cuerden Valley volunteers with a friend to check for bats. She lives right on the edge of the Park so we decided to walk from her home to the reservoir. Initially we only detected 2 Noctules. Walking upstream of the River Lostock on the path we reached the Link Bridge at the bottom of the Meadow and paused again to check our detectors. After five minutes we heard the click click of a Common Pipistrelle so decided to walk back to the reservoir. Once there our detectors were non stop with the sound of bats echolocating their breakfast. We waited another fifteen minutes or so and then walked back home. I was amazed at the totals recorded when I looked at my recordings. Soprano Pipistrelle - 3; Natterers - 15; Common Pipistrelle - 35 and Noctule - 65. The best bat night I ever had. 

 

Later that week I was showing some students on work experience how I monitor hedgehogs and also survey for small mammals. When we checked the trail camera we had a pleasant surprise of noting that a buzzard had called in at our feeding station.You should see the bird on the left about one third the way down. We had also noted our regular hedgehogs

 

Even more excitement when I went to check our humane small mammal traps. We had set these up much earlier in the morning and left them about four hours. The first two had caught slugs but the third one had caught this wonderful Bank Vole. It was released once photographed. Two young men ended their week thrilled with their experience.

 

On the 21st May, my special day out to London for the Royal Garden Party at Buckingham Palace arrived. Travelling there by train, I was accompanied by my granddaughter. We left Lancashire in sunshine but as we arrived in Euston so did precipitation. Good job I brought an umbrella. Despite the bad  weather we both had a good time, even noting Ring-necked Parakeet flying in the garden there. See below for before and after photos.

 

I plan to stop singing "Long to rain over us"

  

Botany and Beautiful Birds

 Late April was our Cuerden Flower Walk one Saturday morning. We noted Lesser Stitchwort in flower, Bluebells by the reservoir and a flower I had not spotted before on Cuerden. I discovered it was Cornsalad. It was good also to see Cuckoo Flower with Orange Tip butterflies possibly egg laying. In total there were 44 plants in flower. Since we also crossed the WI bridge on its 24th birthday, we sang "Happy Birthday"  The Bluebells did not disappoint either visually or with their amazing perfume. 

 The following weekend was another of the wildlife highlights of spring, our annual Dawn Chorus walk. Starting at 5.00am, We noted Blackbird, Blackcap, Blue tit, Canada Goose, Carrion Crow, Chiffchaff, Coal Tit, Dunnock, Garden Warbler, Great Spotted Woodpecker, Great Tit, Grey Heron with young, Grey Wagtail, Jackdaw, Jay, KingfisherLong Tailed Tit, Magpie, Mallard, Mistle Thrush, Robin, Song Thrush, Sparrowhawk, Whitethroat, Woodpigeon and Wren, The two birds that excited me were, a tawny Owl hooting about 50 yards away as we started and a Common Sandpiper at the edge of the reservoir. We completed our walk by nine o clock when most of us went into Cuerden View Cafe for a well earned breakfast. Below is a photo of a Common Sandpiper.