Slithering and buzzing Saturday 3rd June 2017

With what seemed a reasonable early morning forecast I carried out a full survey of the reptile refugia at Pembrey LNR.

It was exciting to discover that this morning seven of the, now, 12 survey sites had reptiles with a total count of 12 Slow Worms, 6 Common Lizards, and a single NEW Grass Snake.

I say new as this individual was about a mile away from the records of last week!, the usual home range of an individual is between 0.18 - 9.41ha, although the average is around 3.56ha, todays individual was well outside the "usual" range.

Whilst checking the refugia I found another Bee Orchid plant and confirmed the mystery leaves from yesterday as Sea Bindweed.

an unusual "top down" view of a Bee Orchid flower

Bee Orchid

Beetles and Bees

Despite the damp and drizzly conditions I carried on with surveying for the Strandline Beetle on Cefn Sidan, this time between CE52 and CE51, I found another two individuals, brining the total so far to at least 12 individuals at fourteen grid references.

On the walk back though the dunes at CE51 I stopped to photograph some leaves which may or may not belong to the rare Round-leaved Wintergreen, or Sea Bindweed (awaiting confirmation) as I took photographs I spotted two familiar orchid spikes of the- BEE ORCHID Ophrys apifera,

Bee Orchid spike, note the twist in the stem

Although not in flower yet they are easy to identify, interestingly they are on ground which was "disturbed" by the winter Sea Buckthorn clearance.

I'll post more photos if they make it to flowering.....

Showy Orchids Morfa Berwig Tuesday 30th May 2017

A few hours checking around the reserve at Morfa Berwig was well spent, the orchids are looking great, mostly Southern Marsh but possibly Early Marsh also, checking it out

There is a wealth of flowers on show at the moment with Ragged Robin and Ox-eye Daisy standing out.

Ox-eye Daisy

Southern Marsh Orchid

Ragged Robin

A few Common Blue damselflies were on the wing, but the only big "dragonfly" was a Four-spot Chaser ♂, near a fast disappearing ephemeral pool.

Four spot Chaser (cropped image)

The rogue horses seem to have disappeared and there's no obvious mess left behind.

Beetle survey and more Monday 29th May 2017

Whitsun bank holiday Monday, great weather, overcast breezy with drizzle !!

With a high tide around 09:00 it seemed a good idea to make more of an effort to survey for Strandline Beetle, It was well worth the effort with EIGHT found today, under a mixture of natural debris, drift wood, pallet and planks and a couple under old tyres and plastic lids, and yes, a beetle was under one of the new refugia..

Strandline Beetle

A learning I think is that generally if the object cannot be moved with one hand because its buried in the sand then its unlikely there will be Strandline Beetles there either.

With the high tide the birds were concentrated with c2500 Oystercatchers, c300 Sanderling, many in summer plumage, and c10 Dunlin, all in summer plumage; at the eastern end of the beach.

Sanderling

I also found another DUNE TIGER BEETLE,  and a PAINTED LADY butterfly, as well as the spider, Arctosa perita a cute little thing complete with egg sac in a burrow under a piece of wood.

Arctosa perita

I bumped into fungi legend Dr Philip Jones and his wife who then kindly left a note on the van to say that the Lead coloured Puffball Bovista plumbea was making an appearance on the dunes.

Bovista plumbea, (photo from Wikipedia)

When I returned to the car park at CE53 I was greeted with a family happily loading two very large pieces of driftwood into their car, I engaged and educated, they were doubly embarrassed because the drift wood was part of a project set by the daughters school!!!!! I gave them a leaflet to take to the school.....

With the onset of a spell of drizzle I went and checked refugia No4, usually never anything to be seen until last Wednesday when a small Grass Snake was found, well today a much larger Grass Snake was lying curled up.. it soon made for cover though.

Grass Snake, Natrix natrix

Oh the irony of vandalism Sunday 28th May 2017

I didn't visit the reserve until this afternoon, and the car parks were quite full with an attendant amount of litter.... whilst picking, litter along the track to the beach at CE53 I couldn't help  but notice that the sign installed a few months ago with an assortment of information including "NO FIRES" had disappeared.

It didn't take long to find the remains of the wooden post and boards in a recently extinguished, large fire!!! oh well making a new one will give me something(else) to do this week.

On a brighter note a walk along the beach near CE51 revealed THREE more Eurynebria complanata, the Strandline Beetle, two were under an old car tyre and one was wedged in a crevice in a log, very encouraging....

A 9.0m tide driven by south easterly winds flooded almost all of the marsh