Wildlife blog by Ron Allen – 30 June 2024
Stag beetle, dawn chorus and Stroud birds, muntjac deer, some butterflies, and two dragonflies.
I have tried to represent June in 10 images, not easy, but made it.
It was midnight on 3 June when I was checking the moth trap and spotted a large male stag beetle (image 1). I just had to call Mary out to see it. June is when they emerge and there are regular reports of them in Petersfield. I have since had reports of two other sightings in the village and so good to have them.
5th June I was up early and tried for the dawn chorus at the end of the garden. Not many singing but the Merlin phone app was better at recognising assorted calls and picked up 10 species: wood pigeon, chaffinch, greenfinch, wren, blackbird, treecreeper, pheasant, blue and great tits and spotted flycatcher. We have seen the flycatcher several times and hoped it would nest again in our garden, but it seems not.
Song thrushes have been singing loudly and wrens even louder. We spotted a goldfinch through our kitchen window taking seeds off a prickly lettuce plant (image 2). Other birds that Mary and I have heard or seen in the garden and while out in the parish have also included chiffchaff, goldfinch, linnet, starling, jackdaw, carrion crow, magpie, pheasant, red-legged partridge, robin, treecreeper and yellowhammer. We had a baby song thrush just sitting in the garden
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1 A stag beetle in our garden
2 Goldfinch
3 Muntjac buck
4 Muntjac doe
5 Small heath butterfly
6 Cinnabar moth
9 June gave us a surprise, a new species on the wildlife camera at the end of the garden. A male and a female muntjac deer (images 3 and 4). I have mentioned before how they are increasing in our area and here they were in our garden. Mark at New Buildings Farm pointed out that one animal had developing antlers and so was a buck and so the other was the doe. I read that they were brought from China to Woburn Park and Bedfordshire in the early 20th century and following releases and escapes have spread widely, and now reached our garden.
Butterflies have been scarce in this dead period between spring flight periods and later in the summer. Meadow browns have been common on the village green, and I spotted a very tattered comma. A surprise was a small heath butterfly, the smallest member of the brown family and while widespread in the UK I have seldom seen them (image 5). A cinnabar moth turned up on the village green (image 6) and elsewhere. June is always a good month for moths and many species have been attracted to our moth lights including this poplar hawk moth (image 7). On a smaller scale has been this tiny picture-winged lesser golden knapweed fly (image 8) that feeds on black knapweed. We have had them in the house from time to time.
Among the many other insects we have seen have been this broad-bodied chaser (image 9) and beautiful demoiselle (image 10).
7 Head of poplar hawk moth
8 Lesser golden knapweed fly
9 Broad-bodied chaser dragonfly
10 Beautiful demoiselle
11 Lesser Stagbeetle
