The Famous Five Go Mad in Sandwich Bay - Last Chapter (1 Viewer)

The obs staff then opened two very large moth traps and started iding the hundred of specimens therein in an impressively knowledgeable way considering how many species of moth there are altogether in the country. Only one or two needed recourse to the book. For somebody not very well up on moths it was an amazing education. Dave who has his own home-made moth trap back up in Cliffe particularly enjoyed this bit of the day. I found the names so poetic, Lunar Underwings, Vestal, September Thorn, and one called a something Hebrew Characters. We are now going to get a big moth book because few of these are in our little Observers Book of Larger British Moths!
The mothing went on for a an hour or more and was still going strong when we decided to go for a swim in the sea as the final part of our adventure.
The swim was great but we also saw the Eider again - in flight this time, more Sandwich Terns, loads of Common Gulls - a bird we had hitherto had not really studied in as much depth as we now did - eventually getting the differences between Black-Headed Gull in winter plumage, Herring Gull and Common Gull in flight nicely pinpointed. Flocks of ringed plovers flashed by out to sea. Finally to round this account off with a little bit of magic - a common seal put in a couple of appearances close offshore popping up to inspect us. We didn't catch any smugglers but there was lashings of ginger beer!
B
ps. Next time I'll write my account in Word first then paste it!

james

Did James mention that out of the two of us, I am the one who's held a Willow Warbler!!!!!!

A fantastic day James and Geraldine,
A very big thank you from all of us for showing us around and giving us a memorable day out.
One thing James didn't mention was almost every bird we saw from the Great White Heron to the flocks of Ringed Plovers is they are all going south, there isn't someone out there wanting to send us some Icelandic weather is there? I mean if it drops below 25C we need a winter coat on down here

I enjoyed all of the Sandwich Bay postings and thanks for sharing them with such evident enthusiasm.

Cheers Grousemore! I did ramble on a bit but glad you enjoyed them!
:t:
Hi Dave,
Really pleased the day went well. I was worried we wouldn't see much but considering the weather was not migrant-spotting conducive I thought we did pretty well. The Eider Duck, Great Egret and (have to admit it!) common gull were ticks for me. Plus the great green bush cricket and most of the moths!
:bounce:

james

"great green bush cricket "

That was brilliant, I really didn't think we had insects like that in the UK, a big thanks to the Obs. staff for walking that insect all the way out to the golf course.

That's what I love about the guys at Sandwich bay, they take such pleasure in sharing what they see and what they know. They are never too busy to answer a question, or help somebody to learn something.