April to May 10th
Slow down, slow down, where’s it going, the spring, where did April go? But that’s always been the way of it, spring always was such a rush. That great green surging tide, that crashing wave, is suddenly there and before you know it the winter is no more, and its waters will spread out and remain for the summer, until they recede again in the autumn. No hanging about in the spring, all the growing and courting and singing and displaying and breeding and nesting has to be got on with. Male migrants arrive and straight away there they are singing for a mate, setting up territories. In come the females over whom and for the males will sing and fight, and then will court with. Then it’s on with it, building nests in between more singing to hold to and announce that this is now ‘our’ territory, and more courting and of course the all important romantic interludes…the result of which and before you know it there are young mouths to feed, everywhere, round the clock, parents rushing here and there, back and forth, back and forth, from dawn til dusk, day in day out, whilst all around the trees get greener, the grass and bracken thicker and taller, flowers come into bloom and go back again, their seeds ready to be sown in the summer and nourished in the autumn, ready for the spring of next year. It’s all such a dashing, mad rush, and it passes by so fast.
April was unsettled, but there was plenty of sunshine, and when the sun shines in April then the place to be is the woods, before the light is lost as the wood roof closes over in a few short weeks. Light that shines on woodland flowers and early butterflies. I said it before, but it is, it is a beautiful bright full of light month. And that bright, fresh new brilliant dazzling glittering time carries on throughout the following month of May.
And April showers, yes, and longer spells of rain, after one of these I went to see a waterfall, one that is not high and it doesn’t have much of a drop either, but the river suddenly takes a sharp right angled turn and the bed rock narrows and drops, through which all that water from the wider river above is forced. You can hear it and feel it a along way before you reach it, a very impressive roaring rumbling seething crashing thunderous rush of white water and splash and spray. There is that unnerving feeling, standing close by it, telling you to take a step back, it’s such an impressive force of nature. But April is not about rain, it’s about sunshine, and spring time.
Those on the move pipits, skylarks and pied wagtails were still on the move even towards the end of the month, and I was surprised to see skeins of geese north bound quite late in the month too. Migrants arrived pretty much when expected with none being especially early or late, although I didn’t see or hear wood warbler or redstart until early May. I don’t know when the sand martins and wheatears arrived, by the time I caught up with them they would already have been here a few days. Willow warblers were in on the 11th April, swallows on the 16th, tree pipit and common sandpiper the next day (the sandpipers straight away fighting over a stretch of lochshore), cuckoo on the 20th, grasshopper warbler 22nd, house martin 24th, whitethroat 26th, sedge warbler 28th, and redstart and wood warbler on May 2nd.
There doesn’t seem to be many swallows around as I write, I’m hoping there are more to come, and that the lack of them is to do with the last week of wet weather and quite cold temperatures, and not to do with the fact that a third of the old barn in which local birds breed has been knocked down and much of what remains boarded up. (The rest is to get knocked down later this year, where will they go next spring, a great shame, but who cares about a dozen pairs of swallows). Perhaps there are other migrants too that aren’t here in their full numbers yet, many birds are still on the move, moving through, pushing further north. Today, the 9th of May, I saw wheatear where you wouldn’t expect to see them, birds on the move, and in a field, where over the past couple of weeks I’ve been seeing and enjoying a few curlew that appear to be hanging around before moving on, a flock of around fifty whimbrel. Here in the northwest you will only see them in May and on their way south again in September, and actually you don’t see them, not often, but hear them instead and only high above, on passage. So that was quite a treat, a favourite bird too, even though I rarely see them. They are a favourite because of those high illusive calls, one of if not my very favourite bird call, evocative of the far north, a loud, clear, far carrying, fast rippling whistling pu-hu-hu-hu-hu-hu-hu-hu, I love it. They all went up when a buzzard came down from the woods, and the sun was on their backs and their shadows sped across the green green May fields and over yellow gorse covered knolls, with the silver sea beyond as sunlit showers fell on distant black hills like showers of pearls, circling they came back to their field to resume their on route feeding. Nice to see you whimbrel, and very special to hear you again too. The curlew too have treated me to their stunning singing, is there any better? (18 whimbrel remained the next day)
Other birds still not there yet, greenshank, either lone males, or pairs courting around the edges of larger loch before heading up to their upland breeding lochans. Black-throated divers doing the same. And a yearling sparrowhawk, in and around the gardens and at the garden birds, (Including lots of siskins that don't appear until the late winter / early spring) you made it, made it through the winter, where did you go to spend it? What a predator she is, a stunning hunting bird. She nearly hit me once as I was about to step across the gap between the house and the shed, when through that gap she came like a bullet just a split second later and…well, no she would not have hit me, she can fly and chase birds at death defying speeds through gaps in the branches of trees narrower than that gap, what a bird. She’s gone now, where to?
Butterflies, not many yet, some peacocks but not as many as in some years after two poor summers in a row there were fewer to over winter and so fewer to make it through to the spring. I saw both the first speckled woods and green-veined whites on April 17th, but no other species yet, although I have had a report of a pearl-bordered fritillary, I do expect to see them the next time I’m in the woods on a sunny day, along with green hairstreak.
No dragonflies yet, but a few large red damselflies.
What became of the lapwing? Just the other night I heard one down on the meadow, but other than that I have not seen or heard them since that one arrived and began displaying back in March.
Yes, these first few days of May have been pretty miserable, very wet, quite cold, and very windy for the time of year. That poor little soaking wet fledgling sparrow, just out of its cosy nest the day before, sat there in the pouring rain, looking thoroughly miserable. Seriously though, such heavy and cold and prolonged spells of rain and wind at that stage in any birds life is life threatening, whether you’re a sparrow just out of a nest box, or an eaglet just out of the egg on a high and exposed nest on a crag.
But the forecast is for much better weather next week, I can’t wait, May, a glorious, stunning month.
What else…an otter seen close up on a fresh water loch was nice. A low, close golden eagle, a second or third year bird, flushed from a knoll as I crested a rise. A smart drake goosander flew away from the wood edge out over the loch, has he a mate on a nest in the trees somewhere? Eiders in a dazzling seaside bay ringed with coconut scented gorse, courting males and females with thier comical calls. And so much more, so much more. Those beautiful brilliant green spring trees and bright flowers, those bluebells, amazing, so blue, the woods and hills, and the spring sunshine, wonderful, beautiful, spring…don’t rush by too quickly, too soon. But today, an orchid! And orchids speak of summertime!
