12th - 15th June..... Rain, Rain & more Rain.

This past week has been what you might call a 'washout', where as we've been moaning with comments such as it's suppose to be Summer & it should be warmer than this. It's been potentially disastrous for our wildlife, with constant rain & chilly temperatures making it hard work for adults feeding their young, either in the nest or newly fledged. It's just as well our House Martin nests remain unoccupied as the young would have surely perished, due to a lack of insect food, I've seen this in previous years when after only a couple of days of constant rain, resulting in the dead chicks being ejected from the nest.

Our Goldfinches have survived the weather with the adults still incubating, one morning as I peered out of the window both birds were at the nest rubbing beaks.

As I stood at the back door mid afternoon on 13th June sheltering from the pouring rain I could hear the contact calls of a newly fledged juvenile Blackbird, a bit of searching revealed it keeping dry in the wood store, still unable to fly properly, just skimming along above ground level, meaning the dog had to be kept in for a couple of days. The following day it nearly came to a sticky end, only narrowly avoiding the lawn mower, as I cut up against the hedge, there must be a hell of a lot of creatures meet their maker in this manner under all the mechanical garden & farm machinery in use.
A family party of 13 Long tailed Tits passed through the garden on the where a Blackcap is now singing again.


On the evening of 14th I came across a pair of Foxes in a hay meadow, first time I've seen two together. As dusk fell I was pleased to find the Tawny Owl chick had survived all the downpours & was now about 400 yards from the nest site, by the following morning it was back roosting near the nest tree, the wing feathers have developed well, but it still covered in plenty of downy feathers & is able to fly strongly.
15th saw a Grey Wagtail briefly visit the garden pond. Stewart picks up a dead adult Tawny Owl on the road at Hunts Green with a broken neck, presumably the same bird that Robert had been telling me about earlier in the day, that he'd seen sitting on his garden wall there the previous evening, no doubt it was still providing prey for it's growing family, which have struggled through the bad weather this past week, now just have a single parent to provide prey for them. 

Through out the week a young Rabbit & Green Woodpecker have frequently fed on the lawn.
Don.