Twite Update - 25th June 2014

 

Several juvenile Twite giving crippling views today.

The majority of the readers of this blog might think that I have hung up the binoculars for the summer and focussed on the non-feathered flying animals. This is far from the truth as I've only really been looking at insects and flowers on my few days off from my Masters fieldwork. Most days I am in the Nant Ffrancon valley seeing what the Twite are getting up to. In the last week, I have managed to locate a few family parties of Twite indicating a successful breeding season for at least a few pairs. It is of course still early, so I'm expecting numbers to increase dramatically over the next month, but we shall see.

Today I was rewarded with wonderful views of a party of 14 Twite feeding 15-20ft away in a sheep pen including 10 juveniles. Shortly after this, I located 'another' flock of 10 also featuring 8 juveniles. I am really unsure whether or not this is the same flock as previously seen, which is probably more likely given that this was only 200-300m away from the other flock. Sadly, whilst the entire flock is still unringed, I can't make assumptions. Whether or not I saw 14 birds or 22 birds, I don't know.   

In addition to the Twite, there's still a couple of singing Cuckoo, a reeling Grasshopper Warbler reappeared today. In addition, I've had intermittent sightings of Sedge Warbler, Wood Warbler, Spotted Flycatcher and Kingfisher.

Beautiful Demoiselle female

There's some real nice quality of insects in the Nant Ffrancon too, including Beautiful Demoiselle, Golden-ringed Dragonfly, Small Heath, Small Pearl-bordered Fritillary, Dark Green Fritillary and what I think was a Chimney Sweeper moth yesterday.