Warkworth beach

Paula and I escaped the house mid-afternoon to take a walk along the beach - and I was hoping to catch a few birds and plants as well, it being a bit breezy and overcast to hope for too many insects. Monty rolled in some muck on the beech, and we had to get him to go in and out of the waves to make him compatible with civilisation again, but all was eventually well.

Black-headed Gulls, Herring Gulls, Lesser Black-backed Gull, Sandwich Tern, Shelduck, Mallard, Greylag Geese, Little Egret, Grey Heron, Curlew, Oystercatcher, Meadow Pipits, Linnets, Reed Bunting, Whitethroat, Willow Warbler.

Harebell, Hop Trefoil, Common Vetch, Bush Vetch, Red Clover, White Clover, Black Medick, Common Restharrow, Burnet Rose, unknown Speedwell, Smooth Hawksbeard, Autumn Hawkbit, Common Daisy, Thrift, Yarrow, Mouse-ear Hawkbit, Rough Chervul, Marram Grass, Cocksfoot, Gorse, Goat Willow, Ash, Sycamore, dried out orchid flowering spikes, 

East Chevington

Barn Owl, Sandwich Tern, Black-headed Gull, Little Gull, Cormorant, Mallard, Gadwall, Willow Warbler, Sedge Warbler, Goldfinch, Reed Buntings, Meadow Pipit.

I was very bad I think with one of the Sedge Warblers, which chitted away very close to me. Afterwards I realised that I had probably disturbed it very close to its nest, and the photos showed it with a cranefly in its beak.

Lindisfarne

This SHOULD be a Meadow Pipit, Anthus pratensis, not too dark a bird, with fairly clear streaks, some yellowish tinge to the lower bill and lightish legs:

Little Gulls at Cresswell, and Druridge Pools

What a pretty little gull, that I didn't take enough notice of!

Two Avocets, 7 Black-tailed Godwits, 4 Shelduck, 1 Grey Plover, 2 Redshank, 4 Mallard, about half a dozen Tufted Duck, and a wonderful view of a Sedge Warbler. A Newcastle birder told me that there were two Reed Warblers singing behind the hide, but I didn't hear either of them, a bit worrying. A good group of House Martins with a few Swallows

At Druridge Pools I took Monty along the path to the two hides that I had found yesterday. There were Greylag Geese, 1 male Shoveller, Mallards, House Martins, Swallows, Black-headed Gulls. On the path on the way back I tried to photograph a Whitethroat, and heard Willow Warblers and Chiff Chaffs.

Hauxley Nature Reserve

Monty and I popped in very briefly. Monty was OK on the permissive paths as long as he kept his lead on, and fair play to him, he was very good in the hide, settling down quickly to snooze on the wooden floor.

I misidentified the orchid a Pyramidal from the deep colour, but it was of course Northern Marsh Orchid, Dactylorhiza purpurella. A wide spreading (sometimes referred to as diamond-shaped apparently) lower lip, with darker cerise markings over the purple ground, topped by a plain hood and two "flying" wings (typical for Dactylorhiza?). There are broad basal and sheathing stem leaves. It grows in generally damp but not not acid habitats. The flower spike is often said to look a bit broad-topped and stumpy - these two are not fully out yet.

The cerise markings should be all over the lip,  not just near the centre, according to one of the websites - this looks good enough!

This is the commoner subspecies purpurella, not growing more than 35 cm, with leaves that tend to be unspotted, except for occasional light spotting at the tip. The flowers tend to be a deep pink rather than purple, and it can grow well away from the sea, as opposed to ssp. majaliformis, found typically in places like the Hebridees. According to Kew in 2005 ssp majaliformis is a synonym and the correct name is ssp cambrensis (Wood, 2005). http://aplx5.rdg.ac.uk/annual-checklist/2009/show_species_details.php?record_id=5028937.

The maroon spotting is described in Francis Rose as heavy - the Southern Marsh Orchid's spotting is by contrast described as light, and those flowers are wider, over 1.9 cm wide. The Southern takes over in the SouthEastern half of the country, except for a Northern Marsh Orchid outlier in the New Forest in Hampshire.

The species appears to have occurred more or less as an as an allotetraploid from a nybrid between D. incarnata and D. fuchsii/maculata, as apparently several other species have, such as D. majalis, traunsteineri, sphagnicola and lapponica. On the other hand D. maculata has been interpreted as an autotetraploid of D. fuchsii. http://archive.bsbi.org.uk/Wats21p113.pdf

The poor genetic isolation and the morphological intergradation in areas of sympatry of many of the members of the genus Dactylorhiza may indicate that treatment of the allotetraploid marsh-orchids as taxonomic species may not be justified. They might be better treated as subspecies of a single variable species, D. majalis, as suggested by some recent studies (e.g. Bateman & Denholm 1983; lenkinson 1991; see also Sundermann 1975; S06 1980). This subspecific status still recognizes that these taxa may have evolved independently, and that they have at least partly different distributions and contrasting habitat requirements. It is interesting to think about the timing of their origins, and the different land masses they occur in.

http://www.leedingain.com/2013/06/orchid-confusion-in-northumberland-7.html

Arrival at Warkworth

On the drive across from the A1, it was nice to see a Lapwing, Vanellus vanellus, flying over the road.

Lovely to get down to the beach and hear the thunder of the waves! As I dropped down the slope from the car park past the scrub, a Whitethroat, Sylvia communis, sang briefly just to the N of the path, and then when I cluttered over the dunes what I thought was a Meadow pipit, Anthus pratensis, called "sip-sip" from the top of one of the bushes on the crest and then several more times from overhead as it flew high, repeating the whole process twice.

It was half past seven in the evening, and the weather started off poor and then finished atrocious. I got very wet! Along the beach some Black-headed Gulls, Chroicocephalus ridibundus, were feeding by the edge of the incoming tide, picking at the sand as the first salty water washed over it. Many others skimmed regularly overhead travelling in both directions along the tide line. Sadly no Sandwich Terns were seen today.

There were several small groups of small waders scuttling along the tide. I  think they were too dark above to be Sanderling, Calidris alba, but equally there were no obvious dark patches seen on their breasts, so unlikely to be Dunlin, Calidris alpina, and therefore Ringed Plover, Charadrius hiaticula, would be my best bet, with no very clear wing-bars when startled into flight. About 20 in total I reckon, one smaller group, one larger group.

Warkworth Sunday

Fantastic walk along the beach. Sandwich and I think Common Tern, Common and Artic Skua, Black-headed Herring and Lesser Black-backed Gull, Redshank, Curlew, Turnstone, Curlew, Dunlin, Red-throated Diver, Eider, Cormorant,

There were about a flock of about 50 finches in the dunes inland of the beach - I hoped for Linnets but the could all have been Goldfinches.

After I trudged quickly back down the beach South to the old harbour, little more was seen until I reached the river estuary and followed the muddy offshoot of the Coquet (locally known as the Gut, I think) towards the dune slacks overlooked by the picnic site where I had left the car. On the Gut itself there were Black-headed and Herring Gulls, lots of redshank and a single curlew. I saw one Lapwing overflying, but the walk had now turned into a bit more of a route-march to try to get back to the house at a reasonable time - and to have some breakfast!