Thursday 25 June 2009

Mull Orchids in June


my hobby horse:

once again our 'enviromentally friendly' council have contracted to cut the roadside verges at this time of year. Right now the road sides are full of wild flowers in full bloom, including birdsfoot trefoil, a valuable food plant for Butterflies. In flower are a variety of Orchids; The rare greater butterfly orchid, fragrant orchids, northerm marsh orchid and many others. In the next week they will all feel the blades of the mower, before they have had time to set seed and continue the renewal of older plants. If the council waited until the end of July to cut the verges then they would be behaving in an enviormentally friendly way.

On the bird front we have had an exciting month of June witha Scarlet Rosefinch being found in a garden at Kellan Mill by Loch na Keal on 16th and this is a first for Mull and only the 12th record for Argyll. We also have had a Lesser Whitethroat at Loch Buie reported by Ashley Saunders wh was leading a group from Oriole Adventures.

We have been enjoying some beautiful weather for the last three weeks now....it's got to break sometime soon. This image is of a Greater Butterfly Orchid.
28th June...............Good news about the grass cutting. Following my 'strong e mail' I have been informed that grass cutting here on mull is being delayed until the end of July period. This is great news


Monday 15 June 2009

Mull Orchids in June


15th June 2009. I have just received a report of a Hawfinch in a local garden in Calgary, Isle of Mull. This is a first record for Mull of this very scarce bird. Unfortunately there are no pictures but my thanks to Andrew and Helen Mortley for this report. It was Helen and Andrew who reported the first ever Nuthatch here on Mull , that was last year.

Earlier this month, on the 4th there was a report of an Ortolan Bunting at Craignure, and pictures were taken which I was able to see and I am delighted to be able to confirm this sighting of an extremley rare bird for the UK and it is a first for Argyll and for Mull. I am hoping that the people who found the bird will get back to me with photos as they said they would.

At the moment our island is full of beautiful orchids and today I went out with a friend and we found seven species, you can see some of the on my web site at http://www.mullbirds.com. in the gallery are several pages of orchid images.