Well, where can you see swamps, meadows, wild flowers, scrub, woodland, lakes, riverside, rough grassland, and even a Victorian monument, all in an hour’s walk, and in easy reach of London? Wraysbury is the answer.
Comfrey by the lakeRing-necked Parakeet in its nest holeMove over, Alabama Swamps, this is Wraysbury! Sheep and Jackdaws on the banks of the reservoir. The Jackdaws devour insect grubs in the grass, especially in sheep droppings.
Colne Brook, May blossom, Lombardy poplars
Cowslips, BugleDaisy lawn, Whitethroat scrub habitatMute Swan drinking – the scene may look peaceful, but his wings and tail are raised threateningly even though no other birds were about! Such is the mating season.Complicated, or what? In August 1832 it must have seemed well worth setting in stone the rights to not being flooded by anyone deliberately raising the water level above the limit defined here …
I don’t know if I’d set this in stone, but I heard 5 warblers singing, and caught a typical glimpse of a Cetti’s warbler diving from a bush beside the lake – big, dark brown, it really wasn’t any other bird. Still, I didn’t hear it call, which would have decided the matter beyond reasonable doubt. So, a 5-and-a-half warbler walk, I guess.
Butterflies: Large white, Small white, Brimstone, Holly blue, Peacock, Speckled Wood.
Odonata: Banded Demoiselle, Common blue (teneral, i.e. just emerged).
Other insects: Mayfly, Alder fly.
On the way home, I went round Heathrow airport, and a Skylark sang to me through the open car window from the grassy areas beside the runways.
Well, I guess the point of a walk in nature in May is to see what is in flower, what birds are singing, and which insects have emerged (in other words, it’s all about sex). The first warbler to make itself heard was the Blackcap, with many singing males trying out different brief songs. They were mixed in with Garden Warblers, which have a distinctly longer and more even song. A Cetti’s Warbler or two sang their loud abrupt call chwitipitit, chwitipitit: once heard, never forgotten. I couldn’t find any Sedge or Reed Warblers by the river for some reason. In the thorny scrub, a couple of Chiffchaffs sang their names, and many Whitethroats rasped out their short scratchy song, flying up to the tops of Hawthorn bushes and hopping about for the optimal perch.
A Little Egret flapped slowly across the lake: it would once have been thought a wonderful sighting, but the species has happily spread northwards and is now quite common on British coasts and lakes.
I was however delighted to hear the wheezing spring call of a male Greenfinch. It was until recently a common bird around towns and villages, but the population was halved by the Trichomonas parasite in the 2000s. Here in London it almost completely disappeared, and it is only slowly recovering.
I glimpsed one damselfly, probably a Common Blue.
Chicken of the Woods fungus on a fallen Poplar. Some find it delicious, others terrifying!
A handsome parasitic wasp, on the hunt for caterpillars
After a long cold spell, it again felt like spring today, and despite the cloud I went to Wraysbury, thinking that it could be a good time for warblers.
I was greeted by a pair of Cormorants on a bleached branch beside the lake. And a moment later by the first of many Blackcaps. Warbler the first.
A little way along the path, a rapid and rich warble went on .. and on .. and on – aha! A Garden Warbler. (How to tell Garden from Blackcap? “Blackcap’s Brief.” Well, good enough for a first approximation.) Warbler the second.
I walked on a few paces, and glimpsed something small and brown in the willows. Binoculars showed an unmistakable Garden Warbler – Sylvia borin[g] – pretty much uniformly coloured, or rather, so beautifully countershaded that it looks flat in sunlight, quite the clever camouflage trick.
It started to sing – and was almost drowned out by the deafening repetitive din of a Cetti’s Warbler (roughly, Chwit-i-Pit-i-Pit! Chwit-i-Pit-i-Pit!), as usual without a glimpse of the songster. Warbler the third.
I then saw my first Banded Demoiselle, indeed my first flying damselfly or dragonfly, of the year. It’s always a lovely moment. A few bright yellow (male) Brimstone butterflies skittered about or sunbathed: perhaps the butter-coloured insect is the original “butter fly”, or perhaps the name refers to the fluttering flight of the whole group – it must make them very hard for predators like birds and dragonflies to catch them, and given how common it is to see a butterfly with holes pecked in its wings, it is easy to believe that anti-predator adaptations are highly advantageous.
Other conspicuous insects were a lot of Sawflies, looking much like tiny red wasps with black-and-yellow striped tails, and numerous large Bumblebees enjoying the purple Comfrey which is abundant beside the river.
The droning chatter of a Reed Warbler came out of another Willow beside the lake: Warbler the fourth.
From across the river, just audible but quite definite, came the Chiff-Chaff-Chiff-Chaff-Chiff-Chaff song of .. you guessed it. Warbler the fifth.
Across the bridge and onto the flat scrub, and in almost the first bush was a Whitethroat singing its short simple scratchy ditty. (Presumably female Whitethroats find it enticing. Or other males find it repellent, one or the other. Maybe both, actually.) Warbler the sixth.
I reconnoitred the wood-and-scrubby area for possible Willow Warblers (they don’t inhabit willows any more than Willow Tits do), but they don’t seem to have arrived yet. Some Song Thrushes improvised their fine, repeated melodies of many different repeated phrases.
Well, I had two delightful surprises on my Wraysbury walk today. The first, as you can see, was a Cardinal Beetle, by no means a common sight any more, and unlike many claimed sightings, seems to be the actual species. I say seems to be, because the antennae were not especially toothy: the detail below shows that the end segments were certainly well toothed, the rest not. So either this was an individual with a slightly aberrant pattern, or it was a closely related species.
Cardinal Beetle – detail of antenna, well toothed at least at the end
The other thing was the warblers. There have been hardly any Chiffchaffs around in the reserve, but today I heard about six of them. They struggled to be heard above a background of Blackcaps with varied songs; and in some spots, a barrage of Garden Warblers as well (mixed with a bit of Blackbird, Robin, Chaffinch, Robin, and Wren). And, just once, the second delightful surprise: a Lesser Whitethroat, with its distinctive trill. So it was a Four Warbler Walk. I listened out carefully for Sedge Warbler, Cetti’s Warbler, and Willow Warbler but there weren’t any singing – the Cetti’s were surely lurking nearby.
Overhead, apart from the planes, were a Buzzard, gently mobbed by a Carrion Crow, later joined by a circling Sparrowhawk.
The brambles and herbs (from nettles to Comfrey) were being used as perches by a mass of Banded Demoiselles, both the blue males with their glorious dark blue wing-patches, and the more subdued green females. They were joined by a few Common Blue Damselflies, the first of the year for me, as the demoiselles were.
It was a lovely sunny walk today, spring in everything but temperature, in a fresh Northerly wind.
I was greeted at Wraysbury Lakes by a jumble of music, a loud and vigorous Garden Warbler competing with an even louder Song Thrush to pour out rich fluty notes in a confusing stream.
Suddenly the air is full of rising Mayflies with their long triple tails. The masses of Comfrey and Nettles are dotted with the iridescent blue of Banded Demoiselles, like slender dragonflies, and the clear green of the females. Also quite a few Azure Damselflies, the males brilliant blue with little cup markings at the base of their abdomens (Segment 2), the females green with little ‘Mercury’ markings in the same place. I think I saw a slender Sawfly, too; and quite a few bumblebees visiting the Comfrey. Just two butterflies, a Speckled Wood and a battered Red Admiral.
Canada Goose with Goslings
On the lake, a pair of Canada Geese watchfully escorting their fluffy line of chicks.
Further along, Blackcap, Robin, Blackbird; then a patch of Chiffchaffs; more Garden Warblers, then a few Whitethroats, making extraordinary wheezing and squeaking anxiety calls, and one in song flight; a little flock of Goldfinches; a few Willow Warblers, deep in the scrub, my first of the year. The May blossom is on time, the Hawthorns heavy with their white dresses. In clearings, Bugle, Forget-me-nots and Cowslips; a Red Campion.
In the sky, a Kestrel; a dozen Jackdaws; a Heron and a Cormorant; more surprisingly, a pair of Shelduck, rather big, rather white, with black wingtips and a brickred band across their chests. Four Swifts wheel past, race low over the hill.
Among the mares with their foals, a dozen Starlings making their rasping calls, feeding their newly-fledged young on the ground in the open or watching from the bushes; a French (Red-Legged) Partridge running rather than flying; a hen Pheasant flying in, her broad wings heavily loaded like the wide-bodied jets that roar overhead.
It’s utterly different from the heat earlier in the week, when I was down in Wiltshire, watching a Kingfisher flash along the river in Bradford-on-Avon, a Heron stalking fish in the shallows, a Horseshoe Bat among the bushes at dusk.
Prime Garden Warbler Habitat at Watlington Hill, with Gorse, Blackthorn and Wild Cherry in bloom
The weather forecast said fine and warm, getting warmer each day. The chalk downs called, so I popped out to Watlington Hill to enjoy the spring sunshine and the birdsong. I wasn’t disappointed: I’ve never SEEN so many Garden Warblers, and I mean seen. Their full, rich warble came from every patch of scrub, sometimes two or three singing at once, and the still mainly leafless trees (the buds just broken) make them visible for once. In binoculars, they are almost evenly soft mouse-brown all over, slightly paler below for countershading, with the merest hint of a little half-collar of pale grey. Sylvia borin has been called “Sylvia boring” by birders, and it’s a good mnemonic, if not much of a joke. They don’t have the Whitethroat’s white throat or patterned tertials; they don’t have the Blackcap’s black cap, or even the Chiffchaff’s eyestripe. All negative descriptions: but their song is both lovely and readily recognisable.
Also singing were Chiffchaff and Blackcap, both in numbers; Blackbird, Mistle Thrush (conspicuously perched atop their respective trees, and calling loudly and ringingly to each other); Dunnock, Great Tit, Blue Tit, Robin, Chaffinch, Wren. From the woods, Jays screeched; a Pheasant called in the distance; a few Swallows caught flies overhead; Buzzard, Stock Dove, Wood Pigeon, Magpie, Jackdaw, and Carrion Crow were about.
The hill is on the west-facing scarp of the chalk (Cretaceous, obviously) of the Chilterns, dropping down to the Oxford Clay plain which stretches away to Didcot and Oxford in the haze. The chalk grass is closely cropped by rabbits, but constantly invaded by hawthorn, blackthorn, whitebeam and bramble scrub.
Dog Lichen, Peltigera canina, in chalk grassland, with rabbit dropping for scale
I was pleased to see some patches of the Dog Lichen in the low turf.
The shadow of a Red Kite passed over the grass, and I looked up. A pair of the long-winged, fork-tailed raptors drifted over the hill, swivelling their tails, their bodies perfectly streamlined and front-weighted like gliders.
Brimstone female
As it warmed up, a Brimstone butterfly appeared, perching on the ground to absorb some heat from the sun. It is one of the most leaf-like of our butterflies, which would suggest camouflage: but they are conspicuous even with closed wings. Perhaps birds see them differently from us.
OK, it’s official, spring has arrived. It may be freezing in the North wind, snow may be forecast, but … this year’s foals look lovely, relaxing with their mothers in the sunshine.
Overhead, the first three Swifts of the year wheeled against the blue sky; a couple of Buzzards drifted past, one mobbed by a pair of Carrion Crows; a Kestrel hovered, moved on, hovered again.
Down below, Wraysbury’s Lakes are empty of ducks, the winter visitors long returned up to the far North. The bushes, however, are rapidly filling up with warblers. Chiffchaffs, Blackcaps, and for the first time this year, masses of Whitethroats (there must have been at least a dozen, wheezing out their scratchy little songs) displayed atop still bare thorn-bushes, one male even venturing a little song flight. Several Sedge Warblers chirruped, whistled and churred their complicated but not very harmonious song — avant-garde jazz with Ute Lemper, perhaps — and to my great pleasure a Garden Warbler gave out its marvellously rich, full, even, sustained warble from a dense Hawthorn. So it was a five warbler walk.
The prettiest bird of the day, however, was a male Linnet. After months of being drab and scruffy, he was in full breeding plumage, his head gray, his back brown, his tail crisply forked, and the band across his breast redder than a Robin’s orange, really startlingly red. Most of the time I think Lars Svensson’s marvellously detailed Collins Bird Guide is exaggerating in those too-beautiful colour plates by Killian Mullarney and Dan Zetterström — but its painting of a breeding male Linnet is exactly true. Red. So there.
Freshwater Clam at Wraysbury
While off the beaten track listening to the warblers, I found this 13cm long Freshwater Clam shell. It was considerably thinner than a marine clam, and handsomely greenish-brown. I had no idea there were such large ones here right by London. It looks very much like the Swan Mussel, Anodonta cygnea, given its size, and indicates that the water “is in tip top condition”. The Natural History Museum has seen a specimen 19cm long.
I had a beautiful, peaceful, sunny summer walk down at Wraysbury Lakes. Away from the roar of the traffic and the enormous queues brought on by roadworks and summer weekend commuting, I was surrounded by fluttering, glittering, shimmering Banded Demoiselle males, and on the vegetation also the gloriously iridescent green females, their clear green wings like fine lace dress trimmings to accompany their dazzling emerald-jewelled and enamelled bodies.
Common Blue damselfly pair in cop
As well, Common Blue damselflies basked in the sun; a few pairs in cop carried out their incredibly complicated sex act, all claspers (male tail to female neck, female tail to male belly with its spermatophore and secondary sexual organs, forming the startling ‘heart’ or ‘wheel’, in which the pair can, at a pinch, fly like synchronised swimmers.
At first I thought there were no warblers about, but gradually little bursts of song punctuated the afternoon, and by the end I had heard six warbler species, and good binocular views of three of them (Garden Warbler, Whitethroat and Willow Warbler).
There were some handsome Ichneumons about, but perhaps the insect I was most surprised to see was a Small Tortoiseshell butterfly. When I was a boy these were so common as to be unremarkable – as were House Sparrows, Starlings and Yellowhammers. It is almost a shock to discover that seeing just one is now a rare treat: more nostalgic than pleasurable, perhaps. Much work needs to be done on landscape-scale and farmland conservation to bring back our common butterflies.
May is the fastest time of Nature’s year. What a difference a few days make! Last time at Wraysbury, a few sluggish mayflies sitting around as if waiting for something to happen in a one horse town.
Well, today it’s happening. In places, the sky is filled with rising mayflies: a few mating, most alone. Here and there, some repeatedly dance up, and a few seconds later, down; but most just climb, and fly about, seeming frail on their large wings, their triple tail streamers hanging below them: it’s worth zooming in on the picture. Even better, here’s a short video clip. The soundtrack combines an airliner taking off and a Blackcap singing.
Male Banded Demoiselle on Bramble
One of the glories of summer by water is the brilliant turquoise and green iridescence of the male Banded Demoiselle – the so-called band is actually the appearance of flickering of the wings, the dark spot on each of the four wings giving a hard-to-describe semblance of a sparkling blue jewel in flight, with bands of colour too fast and changeable for the eye to understand. But he’s pretty fine at rest, too.
Male Common Blue Damselfly
Common Blue, Bluetail, and Red-eyed Damselflies have all now emerged, the Red-eyed being the scarcest of the three, seemingly.
Soldier Beetle, Cantharis rustica on Cow Parsley
On the Cow Parsley were, as well as the damsels, two cantharid Soldier Beetles, Cantharis rustica or a close relative. Another enormous cloud of rising mayflies, and suddenly behind them a pair of Hobbies, hawking for insects – whether damselflies or even mayflies is impossible to tell. One comes close, wheels away on scything wings as it sees me.
Silver-Ground Carpet Moth Xanthorhoe montanata
A Silver-Ground Carpet Moth, Xanthorhoe montanata, flutters weakly past me among the Hawthorn bushes and flops onto the grass. Garden Warblers sing, a Whitethroat rasps in its songflight. A Treecreeper sings its little ditty sweetly from near the river.
On the hill, three Greylag and two Egyptian Geese form a peaceful flock. Stock Doves and a mixed flock of Crows and Jackdaws rise from the grass. A Song Thrush gives a marvellous solo recital near the road.
The sun is shining … in between the showers. Mayflies are resting all over the plants near the river. May blossom makes a bright show on every hawthorn bush. Yes, it’s May down at Wraysbury Lakes. The energetic breeze gives a cool feel, but out of the wind it’s very pleasant. Enjoying the brisk airflow are at least four Common Terns over the lakes and overhead; a few Swallows; and a small number of Swifts, newly arrived in the last few days, racing down to the water surface to catch flies — not the mayflies, which are active mainly at night. The warblers which are definitely about are hard to hear for the wind in the trees, but I caught snatches of Chiffchaff, Blackcap, many Whitethroats, plenty of Garden Warbler, a Willow Warbler, three Song Thrushes and a Blackbird, not to mention Robins and Wrens. A Cormorant lumbered past, climbing with effort, its jizz very much like that of the Boeing 747s lumbering heavily into the air.
Mayfly look, but no tails. Hmm
There are some pale mayflies, with neither antennae nor the 3 tails: maybe these have broken off in the vegetation.
Beautifully iridescent green-bronze: a female Banded Demoiselle
Also new today are quantities of damselflies: there are many brilliant iridescent blue male Banded Demoiselles, with their beautifully clear green-bronze females. This one seemed definitely to be watching me attentively. Two small blue species have also emerged, Blue-Tailed Damselfly and Common Blue Damselfly.
Over the lake, a long-winged falcon swooped at speed: I wondered for a moment if I had a Cuckoo, but the moustache and white face markings showed it was a Hobby, arrived from Africa in pursuit of the Swifts, and perhaps hunting damselflies as easier prey in this place. The low number of Swifts is worrying; they have been declining for years, as building renovation removes their old nest-holes, and increased human population pressure in Africa threatens them there too.
A small Grasshopper on Comfrey
This small grasshopper, missing an antenna, is my first of the year.
Further along, the bare damp area that often has teasels is bright yellow with clumps of a yellow Brassica that has clasping leaves like wild turnip (or cultivated swede). There’s a definite cabbagey smell. A Whitethroat, caught out in the open, makes a dash for a bush.
The English seem unemotional … except for their passion for nature
