June '11

Weather This Month

Max Temp = 27.7°C   Min Temp = 1.8°C  Mean Temp = 12.4°C   

 Max Wind = 14 mph   

Day's Of Rain Over 2mm =11   Rain 24hr Max =  24.61mm   Rain For Month = 114.2 mm

Diary

30th.  A couple of things I need to include in the garden diary but for now I shall just leave you with these pictures of a real welcome visitor to the garden and indeed a first record ( I think) for Rossendale of a headless wonder!

The picture of this Little Egret is of an individual a long way away but a good record non the less. It has stuck around Holden Wood Res and Ogden Res over the Haslingden Grane. My first in Rossendale even at distance.

An enforced day off today as a hospital appointment was attended. What a good bit of timing as on my return I looked out into the garden and noticed the unmistakable movement of a very special moth....especially this far North and considering the overall cool temps up here of late. I have recorded these beauties on at least two occasions previous but that was later in the year when it was a lot warmer!

If you are not familiar with this species that is becoming more regular to these shores then please click the link for more inforamtion, and better pictures! HERE

Anyway the zig zag movement had me dashing for the point and shoot camera and luckily it obliged even though it needs warming up the moth hung around feeding from Primula Candelabra and Red Campion.

.The pictures, whilst poor, are good enough for me as these are notoriously difficult to capture due to the speed of their wings and coupled with the poor light and overcast conditions, I am pleased. Mandy may get a better chance with her DSLR setup...but did I mention some have to work!

27th.  Wow....it seems that a lot of the country shared in the high temps over the last two days. Some parts of the country have seen over 30C+ but here in the Rossendale Valley 248m above sea level it topped out at 27.7C which I think is the 2nd hottest temp I have ever recorded in the garden. To be honest it felt very stuffy and a high dewpoint of 21.1C today confirmed that. The useless humidity percentages  that meteorologists use in telling you how muggy things are is nonsensical, rather if you are interested in a more useful scale in the measurement of how muggy the day is then I would recommend reading up on dewpoint.

26th.  Ah ah.....the weather listened to my complaints and as the temps rose throughout today it did remind me of the comments I made as somehow even though it was 25C it began to spit! Mandy and I both laughed as the clouds were hardly noticeable so we wondered where it was coming from. Anyway that soon passed and eventually we hit this years high at 17:03 topping out at 25.8C. Id did drop again before it reached those highs again at 18:30 where it plateaued, and as I write this at 19:20 the temp are still high at 25.4C . It has been a remarkable change round from the rubbish weather we have had and whilst the wind has been evident today gusting up to 14mph it's been lovely. I have sat out on the deck most of it with just a few chores pulling me away now and again and Mandy decided she would like to resemble a belisha beacon, something she has accomplished!

Now what will the weather hold next week I wonder!

25th. The weather is really quite poor and sadly this has been the case since April. As you can see we have already had almost 5" of rain so far this month and the summer solstice on the 21st had us turning house lights on at 19:00! It really does seem odd that some of this little Island are undergoing droughts whilst others have forgotten what the warming of the sun feels like.

The weather report has suggested that a heatwave may hit us this weekend but as I write this at 17:00 I can assure you it has not been in the Rossendale valley. Non the less undeterred I now read that Sunday is going to top 22C.....oh good at least it will be warm rain then!

21st.  I set the new gadget up last night to just test out how it went about it's buisiness. I knew I had several hedgehogs visiting but what I did not know was how many times in the course of the evening they visited the garden looking for the food I put out. I presume we have more than two individuals but one things for sure we can prove we have two!

20th. Mandy and I celebrated our 12 wedding anniversary yesterday and today I am another year older. The gadget count grew during this time period thanks to an inspired buy from Mandy. A Bushnell trailcam was given to me and so I tested out both the video and picture capabilities. A couple of visitors were recorded today whilst we were out. I shall be testing it's night time capabilities tonight also but for now a few daytime visitors will have to suffice.

I think it shows great promise in it's chosen field but what visitors will it record overnight I wonder!!!!

3rd. Pheww what a scorcher....it's hard to believe we have been struggling for double figures in temps of late and now we are hitting year highs. It finally peaked at 17:43 today whilst topping out at 25.3C.

No further sightings today of the young Blue Tit I photographed yesterday, I can only hope it made it to the safety of trees and mum!

2nd. The weather today was something that resembled spring/summer with a nice high of 22.9C being reached by late afternoon. It's strange as the press have been reporting on a dry May as though only the South of the country exists as we have had plenty throughout May.

The birds to have responded to the great weather with a flurry of youngsters visiting us for the first time this year. A nestbox at the far end of the garden has Blue Tits in....well I say in... they are now out and one is sitting very precariously on the garden floor tucked into the foot of a buddleia. I hope it makes it through the night as we will be keeping the cat in but other cats do patrol also. the picture below is the very bird I mention and you can see that it is a very young bird indeed with the yellow of the gape still very much in evidence.

Great Tit's have not been outdone as later this evening I could hear them calling as mum fed them wax worms that I have been putting out in small numbers. Sure enough I could see one of the youngsters been fed a worm which as always was greatly received. Goldfinch young have been visiting since last Saturday with those now numbering two. We have a pair of Male Bullfinch visiting with only the odd visit from a female. I am hoping that the male is passing regurgitated seed on to the young and hope for a chance to see a few of the young in the garden.

Other thing of note today as the sun shone was a visit by a small Skipper butterfly. It has also come to my attention that the rapidly spreading Tree Bumblebee has been recorded this far north so I am keeping my eye out for these as they were only recorded in the UK in 2001 so the fast spread of these is remarkable.