The tumultuous weather of the weekend has rolled through, leaving a steady breeze and bright morning light for today’s patrol.
Eight Wood Pigeon launch and clatter away over the Workshop roof as I arrive, accompanied by the strident alarm call of a non-native Common Pheasant.
Just outside the Learning Centre, a Chiffchaff lunges after a flitting Red Admiral, before aborting the attack run and contact calling from the Willow hedge.
Around the Learning Centre and throughout my walk, Chaffinch call noisily from the undergrowth, a heartening sound considering the species’ sharp decline across the UK due to disease.
A fair weather day also means opportunity for our charms of Goldfinch and Meadow Pipits to strike out and feed across the wider reserve, moving in gliding flocks, filling the air with tinkling calls.
As I reach the Lighthouse Road, a solitary Carrion Crow is busy with its breakfast in the canopy of Small Copse, the Sycamore trees increasingly bare of leaves after Storm Amy’s attentions.
Despite thinking summer had well and truly departed after a conspicuous absence last week, a pair of House Martins are spotted still swooping and dipping in the air.
Overlooking the Lighthouse and gazing down into the post-glacial Gully, I think I spot the slate-grey back of a male Sparrowhawk diving into the dense scrub.
Approaching the Lighthouse bridge, the frantic burble of a Blackbird’s alarm call announces my approach. On the wall of the bridge, a small mixed flock of Great Tit and Blue Tit congregate, perhaps canvassing the rockwork for small invertebrates.
I skirt the Lighthouse and dip down into the seaward end of the Gully on the South West Coast Path. Steadily climbing the stone stepping, I spot movement directly opposite me across the valley side.
A Roe Deer buck, antlers fresh from his late-summer rut, steadily meets my gaze before carefully picking his way into the dense Hawthorn scrub, to rest up over the daylight hours away from human eyes.