To bee or not to bee

I'm ready to be shouted down, but for nature, autumn has already arrived. Of course, birds don't see the seasons as we do, but most wildlife in the temperate northern hemisphere rears its young in the spring and early summer, and then they either moult their feathers or start their southbound migration.  If birds fail to breed for any reason, they'll start their migration sooner, and that's what we're seeing at the moment.  There are several teal here, a pair of shovelers and a small number of curlews, that have probably come from elsewhere in Britain, while the black-tailed godwits will be travelling back from Iceland.  All these are birds that we'd expect to see here from mid June onwards.  A female wigeon on Monday (10th) and Thursday (13th) was unusual for the time of year, as was a wheatear on Sunday (9th)

More unexpected was a male common scoter that flew in on Wednesday during a guided walk for the local U3A group, a bird that should be up in Scotland or the Arctic at this time of year, and are unusual on the lagoons at any time.  This came on the tail of two avocets that were here on Thursday (6th), but they moved on after just a day.  Sandwich terns were seen on Friday (7th) and Sunday (9th) and at least one snipe seems to be over-summering.

Meanwhile, there are chicks at various stages of fledging around the reserve, including lesser whitethroats, willow warblers, moorhens and mallards.  A few broods of Canada geese are growing up, but a lot more adults have arrived from other sites in North Wales, and will probably stay to moult here over the summer. A few greylag geese are with them, as is a snow goose and a bar-headed goose, but the latter two are unlikely to be wild!

This is usually 'stoat time', when the young kits start to explore the reserve, but like everything else this year, they're a bit late, though adults have been seen at various places around the reserve, particularly near the Afon Ganol (though a large male mink was also photographed there this week).  Our bee orchids are also a bit late, but they have started to flower this week - ask at the Visitor Centre for details, and if you want to photograph them, please make sure you don't crush newly-emerging ones in the process!  There are marsh orchids in flower along the wet bits of the Ganol Trail too.

Check the ponds for huge numbers of azure and common blue damsleflies, and broad-bodied chaser dragonflies, and common blue butterflies have been seen daily.  It's great to see lots of bumblebees nectaring on the abundant flowers, but I'm going to have to get the book out to identify them.  If you know your bees, do tell us what you're seeing.

Sorry we've been a bit tardy updating the website with sightings recently. We've been working full-on to complete The LookOut and the other improvements as part of Conwy Connections, but we do report sightings on our Twitter account much more frequently (over 5000 times so far!).