Dreadfully Boring Post

 

Still recovering - perhaps more from the medication than the condition - I once again stayed local to the inner Patch and didn't go swanning about after tweety birds elsewhere.

 

 

With the weather still feeling rather unhelpful, birds weren't amazingly thick on the ground, or in the bush, though a few sizeable flocks of Woodpigs were flying about in their typical seemingly aimless manner. Being off the main line of migration, the Woodpig Annual Display is limited to those flocks which detour to stuff their funny little bills with acorns on the local coastal wooded slopes.

[See? Those 'horrid non-native' evergreen oaks have their uses...]

Thus you can, while traversing IMD or Lincombe Drive, flush vast clattering masses of them. Maybe hundreds not thousands 'vast', but still a sight to see.

 

My attempts to find a Pallas' Warbler of my very own met the expected utter failure - I couldn't even relocate a YBW this weekend* - though a lovely Firecrest on Sunday [showed beautifully until I went for the camera, the little scamp] made some recompense. The same day also saw a seemingly lone Redwing having some rather, er, vigourous discussions with local Song Thrushes, also at the Nose.

[I'm really not sure what was going on there, but watching a Redwing chasing a Song Thrush around at head height was entertaining - for me at least!]

 

Careful checking of sea found exactly zero divers, and of the gulls found zero fancy ones. Plus ca change.

Once again, the day was saved by those reliable little darlings; Fungi.

Yup, another parade of mostly little mostly pretty funguses ensues..

Blackening Waxcap, with

ooh, lookit the spider!!!!

Is that a Strawberry Spider?? It's tiny and pinky-red, anyways.

 

[[Note to self. Get book on spiders. Also bees. Also hoverflies. Also..]] 

 

 

Ahem.

Observe a little progression;

Blackening Waxcap

 

Blackening Waxcap

 

Blackening Waxcap

 

For extra win, those three were within a metre of each other. :D

 

Parrot Waxcap

Parrot Waxcap

 Note the stem colour change, but still a greenish hue to the flesh.

 

Scarlet Waxcaps

I'm pretty sure the pale effect on the bigger ones [none are at all 'big'] is caused by windburn.

 

 

Goblet Waxcaps

 

They look like cherry tomatoes, nestled in the grass.

 

Now a little variation;

 

Vermillion Waxcap

 

Same sp.,

Showing nicely the characteristic striated yellow margins to the cap.

 

 

Mrs. Kestrel

 

Bird required. :)

 

 

Due to excess fungi I have cut this post into two.   More on the way!

 

[It's nowhere near as scary as 'I've seen more gulls..', now isn't it?]

 

Be Seeing You...

 

 

 

 

[[* I did meet one in the village, though, so I guess they've filtered more inland... This is not a great thing for trying to find them, as 99% of the trees they might be in are in someone with too much money's garden. ]]