Monday 14 June 2010

One hundred not out!

I had a look around New Hythe lakes today. There were very few highlights with just a couple of Sand Martins passing through, a Reed Warbler showing well in the reeds alongside Brooklands and a surprise Grey Wagtail in the corner of Abbey Mead lake along with a Nightingale and a very vocal Garden Warbler. There were a couple of juvenile Goldfinches on the East Scrub also a Green Woodpecker and a couple of Great Spots. A Willow Warbler was still singing in the West Scrub where a Jay was also seen. The only raptor spotted was a Kestrel soaring eastwards over the river on the way back.
This is my 100th post on Sharp by Nature and I was hopeful that something special would turn up for me at New Hythe and it did. Not a bird but a butterfly, a Green Hairstreak, now I know this isn't a rare species but it's the first i've found at New Hythe and that makes it special. It's not the greatest of shots but it'll do. There were surprisingly few butterflies around but I did manage Holly Blue, Common Blue, Red Admiral and Speckled Wood in small numbers.





GREEN HAIRSTREAK

Dragonflies were also few and far between with this female or immature Black Tailed Skimmer was the only one that settled long enough for a picture.
BLACK TAILED SKIMMER
While walking across the East Scrub I saw Dennis and Doreen who had been shown some Orchids on site earlier by Eddie Denson. They then pointed them out to me and below are some of the pictures I took of them.
PYRAMIDAL ORCHID


SOUTHERN MARSH ORCHID
COMMON SPOTTED ORCHID
Unfortunately I'm not too confident with identification of these little beauties......................but I'm sure somebody will help me out and then I'll label them properly.
Many thanks to Greenie of Greenie in the Wild for helping me out with the ID's of the Orchids. Click on the link to visit his blog.

7 comments:

Greenie said...

Phil ,
Congratulations on the ton , and on the Green Hairstreak , I said they would be on site .
Spot on with your BTS identification .
Re. Orchids , I would say Pyramidal , Common Spotted and Southern Marsh in the order you posted them .

Anonymous said...

Happy 100th Phil. I guess a telegramme from HM The Queen will be on its way.
You did better than me with the Green Hairstreak - the only one I've seen had a damaged wing.

Warren Baker said...

look forward to the next 100 post phil!

Well jealous of the G H. Ive been searching for one all summer :-)

Ken. said...

Hi Phil.
A well deserved find for your 100th blog posting.Keep it up.

ShySongbird said...

Congrats on the 100th and also the Green Hairstreak, such a lovely colour! Lovely to see the Orchids too.

Steve said...

Well done with a Green Hairstreak Phil. Not the easiest to track down at New Hythe are they. Are you missing any of the other butterflies for New Hythe? Purple Hairstreak?

Phil said...

Haven't had a Purple Hairstreak yet Steve, although I haven't been down much of late. Hopefully that will change soon and i'll try and track one down just over the railway line.Clouded Yellow would be nice too....watch this space!