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Ian Barthorpe

For the first time in a couple of weeks I took the opportunity to explore the Coast Trail this afternoon. I had a few target species in mind, but as is often the case I failed to see some of them, instead enjoying good views of a few other goodies.

My first target was to see our bee-wolfs for the first time this year, and this was easily achieved, though sadly I couldn't get a photo. I hoped to spot my first ever hairy-legged mining bees (aka pantaloon bees), but they weren't playing ball. I did manage to find another species of predatory wasp, before my attention was drawn to beetle that landed abruptly in front of me. He was a real beauty, and luckily posed for me to run off a few photos, allowing my colleague, Chris, to identify it as a dune chafer (aka vine-margined chafer, or Anomala dubia).

A dune chafer in the North Bushes

Leaving these beautiful insects behind, I strolled on a few more metres were my timing proved to be both good and bad. Good because I arrived just as the stone-curlew pair were swapping over at the nest, giving superb views. Bad because the male redstart that Mike had just found had disappeared behind the bramble bushes and remained hidden from view.

This pattern of success and failure was repeated along the North Wall where i expected to find a few butterflies, especially skippers, but instead managed excellent views of one of our prettiest day-flying moths, the six spotted burnet. In fact, as you can see from the photo, there were several burnet moths feeding on black knapweed and creeping thistle flowers, including this mating pair.

Six-spot burnet moths on black knapweed

Elsewhere along the North Wall the reed warblers were in full song and a juvenile bearded tit briefly flew between pools, but one lucky visitor this morning had seen two otters in one of the pools here.

My next stop was East hide, where I hoped to possibly find an unusual tern or wader. No luck here, but I did see an impressive variety of birds: 10 spotted redshanks, 20+ common redshanks, 40+ black-tailed godwits, eight dunlins, three dapper male ruffs, a ringed plover, two common sandpipers, six kittiwakes plus the usual avocets, common terns, Sandwich terns (11 pairs are nesting this year), two Mediterranean gulls and a variety of other common ducks, geese and gulls.

A lovely pair of linnets in the dunes wouldn't sit still for a photo, and the little egrets on the Konik Field were just a little bit too distant, but there were excellent numbers of black caterpillars both on the path and the adjacent nettles. Many were definitely peacock butterfly caterpillars, but some were, I think, small tortoiseshell caterpillars.

Peacock caterpillars

Next I made my way to South Hide where the avian variety increased further. The big highlight was one of the smallest birds - a lovely trio of little gulls. Numbers of this diminutive gull are likely to increase as the month progresses. Other birds here included two Sandwich terns, two ringed plovers, a spotted redshank and a dunlin, but unfortunately I missed out on seeing my first greenshank of the year - it was reported soon after I returned to the office.

I had more success in Wildlife Lookout where after some perseverance i located my first green sandpiper of the year along with two more ruffs, three dunlins, two Sandwich terns, good numbers of common terns and avocets, several little egrets. A few black-tailed skimmers skimmed the surface of the water - surprisingly these were the only dragonflies I saw today.

Returning to the visitor centre I enjoyed good views of several roach swimming in the ditch, a lovely red admiral, and large clumps of one of my favourite flowers - tufted vetch.

Tufted vetch (all photos by Ian Barthorpe)