Despite a chilly north-easterly breeze, it’s still impossible to deny that spring is here! White scuffs of cloud chase across a blue sky and after some showers last night, the air is full of the fresh smells of spring.
The meadows are covered with drifts of yellow Cowslips, bobbing in the breeze, with the delicate stems and blue flowers of Pale Flax. Skylarks are in good voice, their bubbling, exuberant song cutting through the wind.
The downland is dotted with Early Purple Orchids, with their distinctive black-spotted leaves, darker purple Green-winged Orchids, with Early Spider Orchids by their hundreds.
Green-yellow Crosswort is also in bloom, with patches of Birdsfoot Trefoil, Horseshoe Vetch and Milkwort hugging the short turf. Above them, Wild Parsnip is starting to flower, with the huge, ferociously spiky leaves of Woolly Thistle also starting to appear, along with spikes of blue Wild Clary.
Bloody-nose Beetles, huge, shiny and black plod through the grass, where the tiny, curious Adderstongue Fern (like a miniature Lords and Ladies) can be found, with the large Oil Beetle Meloe proscarabeus our searching for sites to lay her eggs.
Whitethroats blast out their scratchy song from Blackthorn scrub, with a great view of a Lesser Whitethroat among the branches and sweet-scented white flowers of Hawthorn.
In the Lighthouse Field, Stonechats flit among the scrub, with a Whinchat seen near the Globe.
On the cliffs, my most exciting sighting of the morning – 3 Swifts (my first this year), newly returned from Africa swooping in to the cliffs – they must breathe a huge sigh of relief as they arrive!
Down below, Guillemots bob and growl on the water – pop into the Castle to see live pictures of them on the ledges. Also seen, much blacker Razorbills, as Fulmars veer around the clifftop and Shags flap along, with beaks full of nesting material.
Rock Pipits are starting to make their showy display flights from the clifftop, with a Peregrine Falcon scanning for prey from a rocky perch near the Observation Point.