MAMMATUS MONDAY

As the weather forecast for Tuesday was awful I went to the Hoe on monday,"it will be warm and sunny"said Carol,and so it was for about half an hour,then the clouds rolled in from France and it rained for the rest of the day,only drizzle admittedly but enough to keep the butterfly transect off the menu.Tuesday said Carol would be torrential rain up to 50mm we would all drown!did we? no we had a couple of heavy showers for about 5 minutes in the morning and that was it,the wonders of modern technology.
Mondays clouds were most impressive and should have brought storms and a deluge but didn`t.

MAMMATUS CLOUDS OVER THE CHANNEL

. Before the cloud cover arrived this female common blue was seen sunning itself on the sheep grazed bank.

COMMON BLUE female,
The first wasp spider I have seen this year was also located in the longer grass.It was a bit low down and quite dark by now so am hopeful of better images soon.

 FEMALE WASP SPIDER.

DOVERS GOT TALONS

If you were a wood pigeon the last thing you would want to see is one of these hurtling down on you at lightning speed,though you probably wouldn`t know much about it.

PEREGRINE FALCON note the needle sharp talons for killing its prey usually in a high speed mid air attack.The seriously hooked bill is used for plucking and tearing meat from the dead unfortunate.
This bird is probably a male or TIERCEL,smaller than the more robust female .

After this it was back to the more gentile surroundings of Temple Ewell downs for Silver Spotted Skippers and Adonis Blues,Devils bit scabious and Autumn ladies tresses.

ADONIS BLUE the most vibrant colour that is difficult to capture and do justice to.

DEVILS BIT SCABIOUS.

SILVER SPOTTED SKIPPER on a field scabious

SMALL COPPER nectaring on wild marjoram.

The white spiral of AUTUMN LADIES TRESSES.

 COMMON BLUE (left) AND ADONIS BLUE underwing comparison.Note the black veins extending into white margin on Adonis,

CLIFFTOP RAMBLINGS AND BACKSAND REFLECTIONS

Walked from Langdon Hole to South Foreland on Sunday morning,found my first Whinchat of the autumn and quite a few warblers were in the bushes near the coastguard station including common and lesser whitethroat, blackcap,willow warbler and chiff chaff.

COMMON WHITETHROAT

As usual the LESSER WHITETHROAT was more elusive but gave occasional glimpses whilst gorging on the plentiful elder berries.

LESSER WHITETHROATS

Moving on to Fan Bay the male yellowhammer was still in the area but no sign of young birds.

At South Foreland there were not too many birds but a fresh Brown Argus was compensation.

On Monday a return visit to Backsand did not reveal the hoped for rarity but the usual suspects in the form of Green,Common,and Wood Sandpipers Greenshank and Little Egret provided the interest.

GREENSHANK

LITTLE EGRET

 COMMON SANDPIPER

WOOD SANDPIPER

GREEN SANPIPER

COMMON SANDPIPER "AVIN A BARF"

Finally at the Hoe yesterday morning whilst out counting butterflies amy attention was drawn to a bit of a kerfuffle at clifftop level when the local kestrel took an objection to another raptor passing through at first I thought sparrowhawk then the white rump of a harrier showed and the rufous breast meant Montague`s Harrier it was all too brief as the kestrel was joined by crows and gulls to see off the interloper but a couple of blurry distant shots were taken,apologies for the poor quality.

MONTY AND KESTREL

MONTY on route for Folkestone and beyond who knows where?

RETURN OF THE TURNSTONE

On Monday evening the weather was warm and sunny so a stroll along the pier seemed like a good idea, so it turned out with the first returning turnstones scurrying around picking up tasty tit bits providing the bird interest and Old Red the resident common seal hauled up on the hoverpad having a rest from fishing.

 TURNSTONES still in summer plumage.

COMMON SEAL with RINGED PLOVER (lower left)

At the Hoe on Tuesday at 7am there were dozens of Gannets and Sandwich terns feeding off shore along with several harbour porpoise,probably feasting on the mackerel shoals.

NEVER TRUST A BRIGHT CLEAR MORNING.

HARBOUR PORPOISE breaking surface.

One of the eight Wheatears at Samphire hoe on Tuesday.

ROCK SAMPHIRE from which the Hoe derives its name.

GOLDEN SAMPHIRE.

WALL BROWNS are enjoying a good second brood.

GREAT GREY BUSH CRICKET ? This was found in one of the life belt boxes during the weekly check.

Talking about cricket England doing well against India and all the bowlers are English.

A TIGER IN MY TANK

Quite a surprise the other morning when a JERSEY TIGER moth turned up in the moth trap,an immigrant from the continent,the first I have seen here; this is the one that is found in thousands in Rhodes in the wrongly named Valley of the Butterflies.

JERSEY TIGER.

This pristine GRASS EGGAR was one of three.

Three SCALLOPED OAK MOTHS on my slate.

Also had a quick walk around the grassy banks of Temple Ewell on Friday afternoon and found half a dozen silver spotted skippers.

SILVER SPOTTED SKIPPER,they often sun bathe on dried cow pats,lovely.

This male was in clover.

MARBLED WHITES are still hanging on.

A second brood of WALL BROWNS is on the wing

There are lots of wonderful CHALKHILL BLUES at Temple Ewell too.