Both Meds and wader numbers increasing

Quite a fresh west wind, mainly sunny.

Red Nab

Pete Woodruff spent a pleasant 2 hours in the sunshine, towards high water. Sat on the wall with his scope he managed:

Mediterranean gull 16 - 15 adult one with a green ring, plus one sub adult.

Ocean Edge

Common Sandpiper 1 flew out from foreshore rocks then south.

Dunlin 12 - again, initially on foreshore then south

Redshank 36 - 26 flushed from Red Nab joined another 10 to roost on the saltmarsh 

Some of the Redshank landing on the saltmarsh 

Lapwing 7 on saltmarsh 

Linnet 9 around saltmarsh 

Mediterranean gull at least three adult roosting with the Black-Headed gulls on the saltmarsh, almost certainly some of Pete's earlier birds from Red Nab.

I don't know if it is the correct name for these flies, but I've always called them Seaweed Flies. Most of these are mating and the mud and rocks were covered with them (they must have been breeding like flies!). The returning waders, particularly the plovers, will reset the balance.

Middleton Nature Reserve 

Janet checked the east side in the morning and I had a quick look at the west side in the afternoon.

Shaded Broad-bar moth

Two Narrow Bordered Five-spot Burnet moth

There were plenty of Common Darter on the wing 

In contrast, I think for the first time ever during summer walks, I didn't see a single dragonfly in the afternoon and only one Common Blue Damselfly. The only water bodies I checked were the small scrapes on the west side, even so I would have expected some. (MD).

Even though there were plenty of butterfly species, again the numbers were lower than I would expect.

Red Admiral 1

Comma 1

Ringlet 1

Meadow Brown and Gatekeeper - several of each

Large White 1

Small White 2

Speckled Wood 4

Burnet Companion moth 2

Only four warbler species heard: Chiffchaff, Willow warbler, Blackcap and Common Whitethroat 

At least this Wren was finding plenty of invertebrates