A lovely, late summer morning, as the Park drowses beneath a dome of blue sky, scuffed with white clouds.
The air is filled with the buzz and chatter of orthoptera, with a huge female Great Green Bush Cricket keeping watch from the Brambles near the top of Tasker’s Path, and Field and Meadow Grasshoppers whirring from among the meadow grasses.
Rounding the corner into Tasker’s Meadow, the air is filled with a whirling blizzard of butterflies, as Meadow Browns circle in a dizzying dance, smaller, orange Gatekeepers flutter among them, along with Large and Small Whites and Red Admirals.
As the meadow grasses fade to a shade of silvery bronze, there is still plenty of colour from tall, imperial purple Knapweed, candy-pink Common Restharrow, white Wild Carrot, tinged with pink, and dark yellow Ragwort (a useful nectar source when many other plants have finished flowering).
Swallows and Martins stream (west to east) along the top of the Lighthouse Field, along with a single Swift, while young Whitethroats fuss through the silver Old Man’s Beard covering a patch of Blackthorn scrub and crimson and yellow Goldfinches hopscotch along the Teasels.
Another successful morning for our bird ringing studies, with the highlight Treecreeper, ringed, weighed, sexed and safely released.
Even as the meadows start to fade, the downland is looking stunning, with a huge swarm of Autumn Ladies Tresses (our final orchid of the year) dappling the short turf in the Saxon Field. Always a bit like a ‘magic eye’ picture, where you spend ages looking for one, before realising you are surrounded by dozens!
Around them, Wild Thyme, Eyebright, Carline Thistle, Ladies Bedstraw, Picnic Thistle, Birdsfoot Trefoil and Kidney Vetch are just a few of the other flowers in bloom.