Gliding and circling over the meadows was a Buzzard, this large brown bird had its wing tips slightly pointed up and the variety of different brown colours were showing in the sunlight.
Swooping through the air some wonderful deep blue coloured Swallows, these a very different shape and style of flight compared with the Swifts which were magnificent last night, as lots of these black shapes were scything through the skies.
The sound of Stonechats and Common Whitethroats seemingly calling from every patch of scrub, the youngsters and adults popping up to the tops to enable good views.
Butterflies galore in the back meadows as the black and white Marbled White basks on the purple heads of Greater Knapweed while fluttering around were Meadow Browns and the generally smaller and brighter coloured Gatekeepers.
Amongst the riot of Brambles, Black Bryony, Old Man’s Beard and Honeysuckle almost all the ‘smalls’ were spotted, including the Small Skipper, Small Heath, Small Copper, Small White and Small Blue.
Just the Small Tortoiseshell missing, however most unusually and for the first time since 2008 a Large Tortoiseshell was spotted (Wednesday), this time on the Buddleia by the Castle – any further reports please let us know.
Above the downland the Skylarks are still singing, loud and long, sometimes hovering above the grasses, showing off their slight white stripes before disappearing amongst the plants.
A I watched some Soldier Beetles crawling across the white flower of Wild Carrot, the smell of Ladies Bedstraw was pervading the area, the lemon yellow flowers carpeting the ground alongside Restharrow, Squinancywort and Wild Thyme.
The chirring of Meadow Grasshoppers was accompanied by that of the Field Grasshoppers, one of whose characteristic identifying features is that it has a hairy chest!