A wonderful calm sunny morning with a Chiffchaff chimes filling the soundscape from all directions, only occasionally breaking, enabling my ears to hear a distant Wren.
Closer to the ground, the hum of crickets and grasshoppers; each of them springing into the air and taking flight as I step through the mini meadow of Fleabane. Common Green and Meadow Grasshoppers amongst their number, alongside plenty of Roesel’s Bush-crickets. I even spot a moult attached to a stem.
A flutter of wings where a Meadow Brown butterfly dances in the sunlight and the day flying Silver Y moth fanning its wings with distinctive white ‘Y’ shaped marking.
It’s cute to hear all of the high pitched tweeting from fledgling Great Tits as I walk down the timeline. Continuous piping to their parents birds as they beckon them for attention and food. Breaking cover, a Jay appears momentarily to pick something from the path.
Delightful displays of ornamental blossom in the Dell. Magenta-pink ‘ballerinas’ hanging from the Fuchsia, plenty of yellow blossom upon a small patch of Hypericum Hidcote, and the beautiful Mock Orange absolutely brimming with its sweet scented white flowers.
Whilst pausing to enjoy the flowers, a Wall Lizard appears from a crack in the dry stone wall. He flattens his body against the stones, a behaviour called ‘pancaking’, to absorb maximum heat from the Sun. It displays his green intricately patterned skin, almost leopard-print, with two brighter lime-green stripes down each side.
It would be amiss to not visit the clifftop and just enjoy our seabirds going about their day. For hours I could watch the soaring flight of Fulmar and listening to the pitter-patter of Guillemot wings below the sound of cooing Woodpigeon. Jackdaw, Herring Gull, and Shag also pass by. Rock Pipit almost easy to miss if it didn’t break into song.