I made the most of the winter sun this morning to stroll down to East Hide in search of a few year ticks - the commoner ducks were very numerous with the bonus of six pintails and four tufted ducks, three avocets, a turnstone and a nice flock of 35 dunlins.
Even allowing for the spring like weather that we've been experiencing, and the beautiful winter sun, I was still totally stunned when a very worn looking painted lady butterfly fluttered past my face in the dunes behind East Hide. While winter sightings of butterflies are not unusual, painted lady is definitely not a species that you would expect to see in January. It seems, however, that there has been a spate of records across the country since New Year's Day.
Now, to see one butterfly in January is a surprise, but barely ten minutes later, as I walked through the North Bushes, this sparkling, freshly emerged peacock butterfly patrolled a sunny glade before settling to absorb some rays, allowing me to quickly take this most unseasonal photo.
A peacock butterfly photographed at Minsmere on 4 January 2016 by Ian Barthorpe
Elsewhere on the reserve, a number of other species have been added to the year list since Saturday, including stoat, red deer, goldeneye, ringed plover, bar-tailed godwit and two tundra bean geese that arrived on the South Levels this morning. taking the bird list up 95 and the mammal list to eight already. What will be the 100th bird species, I wonder?
The 100th? A raven would be nice. Or a hen harrier.
Lovely photo of the peacock butterfly, by the way!
Our herring gulls are red listed birds. Think about that the next time you hear some flaming idiot calling for a cull of them.