Friday 24 September 2010

Beckett Park

Having been offline for a few weeks, I'm please to report that I'm back up and running and here's a few recent sightings from Beckett Park. Lots more fungi have started to appear on the grassland and in the woodland, here's a wee selection.


Grasses left unmown underneath the canopy of a Common Beech. 


This week I spotted 4 Speckled Wood butterflies on the woodland perimeter of Queens Wood and despite having only the little camera, managed to get near enough for a couple of pics.




On the way into work, near the train station I discovered this feather (pictured). The black ground colour and white spotted margins suggested a Great Spotted Woodpecker. After wandering around the web and I came across Michel Klemann's website Feathers, which is a really useful resource. Here's the link to the Great Spotted Woodpecker page. The first illustration, Example 1 Leftwing (primaries and secondaries), confirmed my initial guess and left me feeling pretty pleased with myself.


Ive heard a Woodpecker a few times in the vicinity of St Stephen's churchyard & the opposite side of the road between the old alloments and the railway track, so I'm going to pay a little more attention as its only a minute or so from home.  

Even closer to home, last night, from the doorstep, we watched a bat fly above the back gardens at approx. 7.30pm. Having attended a couple of bat walks at Rodley Nature Reserve I'm pretty confident it was a Pipistrelle, and its the first time Ive seen it this year. If I kept such a thing as a list of garden sightings I'd stick it at the top of my list.

5 comments:

  1. Thats a great 'feather' link Linda

    ReplyDelete
  2. Glad to have you back online :-)The Speckled Wood has really been the most seen butterfly for me this year - they seem to be everywhere I go!
    Pam

    ReplyDelete
  3. you might also think this feather link interesting: http://www.lab.fws.gov/featheratlas/

    ReplyDelete
  4. Good time of year for fungi Linda ... if only I could remember half their names!
    Interesting to hear about the garden Bat sighting as we had a similar experience here about a month ago ... first sighting in 30 years or are we just getting more observant?

    ReplyDelete
  5. Hello Citybirding, its useful isn't it. I notice that Dream Falcon has sent through an additional URL so I'll be checking that one out too.

    Hello Pam, thank you, they've been around in abundance haven't they, plus they seem to have a longer season than most.

    Thank you Dream Falcon, I'll be sure to check out the URL, much appreciated.

    Hello Frank, yes me too. I can make a guess at fungi names based on a few features but am conscious that it requires more detailed attention. Aesthetically they're fascinating and add a extra interest to a woodland wander.

    Best wishes everybody and thanks for dropping by, Linda

    ReplyDelete

Thanks for stopping by and taking the time to leave a comment.

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...