SE Nature Notes w/e 6th March
8 March 2010
Portsmouth & Portsdown
A number of brimstone butterflies were seen this week including one in a Cosham garden on Monday and one at Staunton CP the next day.
There were 9 purple sandpipers and a singing rock pipit at Southsea Castle on Sunday 7th.
Sweet violets are beginning to flower on Portsdown.
Havant hayling & Emsworth
On Monday 11 roe deer on North Hayling fields included two quarrelsome stags.
There was a Dartford warbler with a possible second bird in the gorse near the Inn on the Beach on Monday. A firecrest and a woodcock were at Sinah Warren on Friday evening.
Fifty Mediterranean gulls were displaying noisily on the oyster beds islands on Monday. There is still a velvet scoter off shore and there was also an unconfirmed sighting of a long-tailed duck here and later in the day off Budds Farm. A count of birds in the harbour covered 86 red-breasted mergansers, 39 goldeneyes and 15 black-necked grebes.
An avocet flew past Sandy point into Chichester Harbour on Tuesday when there was also a great northern diver off shore and 4 buzzards, 2 skylarks, redwing and a grey wagtail on or over the reserve.
On Wednesday a peacock butterfly flashed its wings on the carpet around the altar at St Peter's church Hayling Island during a wedding rehearsal.
A pair of mistle thrushes were at Brook Meadow on Thursday.
Around 370 bar-tailed godwits were in the area between Northney & Langstone on Friday 5th.
A flock of 400 Brent geese were in a field west of Pook Lane on Saturday. The first there this winter. There were around 50 redwings on the Warblington Farm fields and a male bullfinch in Pook Lane.
There were 5 Slavonian grebes, 2 common scoters and 4 eider in Hayling Bay on Saturday.
Yew trees in Havant and Warblington cemeteries have been releasing pollen this week. Lesser celandine and common whitlow grass are flowering.
Yellow brain fungus was noted in Nore Barn Woods on Saturday.
Fareham and Gosport
Twelve red-breasted merganser were seen off Portchester Castle on Tuesday afternoon.
A marsh harrier caused mayhem among around 400 black-tailed godwits at upper Titchfield Haven on Thursday. A couple of barn owls were hunting over the reserve.
Three great northern divers were fishing off shore with 3 velvet scoters on Friday.
Waterlooville and South Downs
Two red admirals and a number of scarlet elf cap fungi were seen in the Queen Elizabeth CP on Tuesday.
A woodcock was seen in Creech Woods on Friday.
