Around the Patch

The weather has been pretty consistent for the whole of June and into July with quite a heatwave - bar a day of strong winds from Storm Hector in June, which brought down many branches and even trees. We could really do with some heavy rain, my pond is not looking too great at the moment! Although many plants are flourishing, a lot aren't and grass everywhere has a beige rather than green hue, the rain would definitely be welcome. Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be anything expected anytime soon!

I've been constantly cleaning and refilling the watering holes for the birds/mammals around the garden, they are all well used. At our feeders, the noisy young Starling's are still around and they've been joined by lots of newly fledged House Sparrows too, they're giving the Starlings a run for their money.

Small flocks of Great and Blue Tit fledglings chirp their way through the gardens regularly, stopping at the feeder, they figured that out pretty quickly. For the first time we've had young Long-tailed Tits in the garden too, beautiful little birds, they're one of my favourites so I was really pleased to see those. A Thrush made a brief appearance on the shed roof, the first since the snow in March, but it was gone too quick for me to tell if it was a Mistle or Song.

Great Tit

Young Robin

House Sparrow

Young Goldfinch

Young Blue Tit

Starlings & a House Sparrow

Blue Tit

The first young Goldfinch in the garden this year (the one on top)

Blue Tit

Long-tailed Tit

A rare occurrence one Sunday morning when a pair of Greenfinch appeared on the feeder

Elsewhere in the garden the Hedgehog is a sporadic visitor, I haven't seen it in a few weeks but the poop still appears in the garden. I typed this last night with intentions of finishing and posting but just after i'd done what should appear in the garden but a Hedgehog! It had a good snuffle around, walked in and out of my (pretty much dry) pond and I left it taking a long drink. I took a few photos on my phone.

I haven't seen a fox in a while though i've heard them. There has been a lot of bees and butterflies in the garden, the Lavender buzzes from dusk till dawn. There was a garden first with a Ringlet plus a fair few Meadow Brown too, I haven't checked all my records but I think that's also a garden first. We've also had Small White, Tortoiseshell, Large White, Red Admiral, Speckled Wood, Comma, Holly Blue, Green-veined White and Small Skipper.

Ringlet

Green-veined White

Small White

Small Tortoiseshell

Meadow Brown

This Cinnabar Moth Caterpillar was on the watering can, the only one i've seen in the garden this year

A Spider has taken up residence in it's web between the washing line and the house

On my walk to work Swallow numbers have increased finally, again like the Swifts they're not in huge numbers, i've seen up to 7 around the farm near work. Also by work a Crow family have successfully fledged 3 chicks, I can't recall ever seeing a Crow's nest around here before so i've enjoyed watching them.

Magpies have fledged in the park along with more Great/Blue Tits and a couple of Robins. I watched a pair of Wrens gathering insects I assume for their young, one flew right in front of me about a foot off the ground and grabbed a large fly right out of the air, that was pretty cool to see!

Down in the woods there is still plenty of young Blue, Great and Long-tailed Tits around, a Song Thrush is still singing regularly and a Chiffchaff too. A new bird viewing screen has been built with several new feeders. The first few days the screen went up it was vandalised with some of the panels being kicked in, I don't get some people at all, why would you get pleasure from such destruction? Fingers crossed it's left alone now it's been repaired.

Shieldbug

Lacewing?

Woodpigeon

Blackbird

Song Thrush

Woodpigeon

Unfortunately the heat and lack of rain the stream through the woods has dried up

Crows

Great Tit

Long-tailed Tit

Hopefully in the next patch update, I can start off with 'It finally rained'...................