Weather
The weather this month has continued to be a bit up and down with the odd fall of hail stones and some heavy downpours but most days fairly dry if – almost always – a bit windy. Towards the middle of the month we got some more heavy rain and this continued intermittently until later in the month. Towards the end of the month we got a bit of a mini heat wave though we were on holiday at the time.
Garden
Some Swifts occasionally seen over the garden. The occasional sighting on the feeders of a single new Goldfinch; otherwise there are usually four Goldfinch adults each day and a male and a female Chaffinch continue to attend the feeders. Blackbirds, Collared Doves and Woodpigeons all on the ground. Dunnocks regularly scuttling around but still no Robin. I am sure our local Robin must have come to a bad end because I don’t think our garden has ever been so Robin free.
On the 11th of June we found another scattering of white downy feathers on the lawn and again on the 20th. It wasn’t really possible to say whether this was a Sparrowhawk or a cat but I suppose the latter is more likely as they were downy feathers mainly and looked like a cat had caught a bird by the rear end and given it a bit of a mauling before it had escaped. We returned from 9 days holiday at the end of the month to find a much more comprehensive scattering of white feathers all over the lawn so I think a Sparrowhawk was responsible for this one and has made our garden a regular visiting place – probably early in the morning. We can now discount our neighbours’ new cat as a culprit as it appears that it was run over by a car whilst we were away. Apparently they have a new kitten but they are keeping it inside for a month. It remains to be seen whether it proves to be as tenacious an enemy to our garden birds as the previous one was.
By the middle of the month some more juvenile Goldfinches seen – maximum 6 at one time but with no adults present – and usually six is the maximum number of all age groups. Also by the middle of the month Collared Doves and Blackbirds less frequent ; Woodpigeons ever present. Still no Robin ; a couple of Dunnocks normal. The juvenile Blue Tits and Great Tits seem to have reduced in number a little. By 21st we were seeing up to 10 Goldfinches – mixed adults and juveniles and a couple of newly fledged Collared Doves showed themselves. Still getting the two Chaffinches regularly each day. On 22nd we went on holiday so that was pretty much the end of our garden observations for the month.
Birding Trips
Of the various birding group mornings out we have only been able to go to the ones at Neumann’s Flash on 7th June and Rixton Clay Pits on 21st June. Unfortunately we will miss the last day of the group calendar as well as we are away on holiday for a week to ten days and I believe that there are no more trips until September some time.
As well as those we have had a number of days out. On 5th June we went to Lymm Dam, on 6th June we went to WWT Martin Mere, on 15th June we went on a Nightjar walk in the Coed Llandegla forest and on the 16th June we went to RSPB Lake Vrynwy. On 22nd we went on holiday and we broke our journey south with a stopover at Slimbridge WWT 23rd. Then we spent 3 days at Montacute where we heard a Cuckoo but didn’t see it. We managed to fit in a trip to Radipole Lake and Lodmore on 25th and from 26th to the morning of the 29th in the New Forest and on 30th we went back to Slimbridge before returning to Manchester. See other postings for the details of the birding we did over this period.