Red and Yellow and Pink and Blue........

Well, what a brilliant day today at my favourite Kent RSPB reserve. Firstly I was there early to snap some images of the marshes cloaked in early morning mist, that was a bit of a failure as the mist had retreated over toward the River Thames, so I sat down at Sweeney veiwpoint and just admired the view which never ceases to amaze, a Little Owl let out a repeated 'kee ew' to my left and a brief glimpse of the feathered ball as it flew into the wood, not far behind it a Green Woodpecker flew into the same wood. 

I then met a very nice lady resident from High Halstow, we sat on the benches and bemoaned the building of so many houses on the Hoo peninsular, nearly always to the detriment of the wildlife on this unique area of Kent, so close to the Capital yet a million miles away. On a clear day Canary Wharf, The Shard and some of Londons' other iconic sights can be seen with the naked eye, money, influence, power and politics dominate those places but out here nature rules, the Peregrine over the ducks, the Heron over the small fish and the Marsh Harrier over the frogs. They no nothing of Brexit, Westminster or Europe and we when we visit such an enchanted place shouldn't either and just marvel at the wonders of the natural world all around us for a few blissful hours.

As we talked a Great spotted Woodpecked flew across with that distictive undulating flight, even more pronounced to my mind than its larger, greener cousin. Unsurprisingly the conversation rounded to Lodge Hill and the disgracesful Homes Englands', hand in glove plan with Medway Council to build a couple of thousand houses on a Site of Special Scientific Interest.

On my way back the car-park I spied a small brown butterfly fluttering up ahead, suspecting it to be a Speckled Wood I was pleasantly surprised to see it was in fact a Wall Brown, it made my morning little did I know that butterfly-wise the day was just getting warmed up, literally.

On the Common Ivy by the office, as the morning warmed up, flies, bees, wasps and hoverflies supped on the plants sugary sweet secretions. Wasps, honey bees and the afore-described Ivy Mining Bees were in evidence, a few Red Admirals were amongst them as a Large White flew on to the farm yard. Flies generally have a bad press but the beauty of some of them is easily over looked

It was a delight to see the shiny, polished black of a Noon Fly (Mesembrina meridiana) with its' so distinctive yellowish orange patches on the wing bases.

With the day promising to heat up in more ways than one I left to return a couple or three hours later.

Parking up, Murray Orchard was just getting out of his car and I was aware he was going to give the Interns a practical on BTO Wetland Bird Survey (WeBS) methodology. I also met Rob Budgen who had been refurbishing the garden pond at the rear of the office, by coincidence we had all spoken about butterflies and specifically Clouded Yellows, agreeing that they were uncommon this year and me certainly emphasising I'd not seen one in 2018.

I set off for Northward Hill part two and hadn't gone 50 metres towards Sweeney V.P. when a super-fast butterfly shot past me, golden-yellow wings heavily edged in black there no doubting its' ID! A Clouded Yellow. Amazing, then I saw it again up at the V.P. My butterfly count for the day was 6! Not bad for nearly mid October, the others were Speckled Wood, Common Blue, Red Admiral and Large White.

It was interesting to see a day or so ago a skein of 50 or so Greylags flying north across the reserve in the fading light to roost out on the marsh, then last night a skien of 70 Brent Geese flying across the reserve in the opposite direction toward the River Medway, personally my first this year and it always amazes me that they have flown all the way from the top end of Russia.

So red and yellow and blue, the pink.....Spindle.

My thanks to Rob Budgen and David Saunders for the images.