June 2021

A grapevine message about a White Stork near to work on 9th June was of interest so I called to see it on the way home. It was a colour-ringed individual so I presumed it was an escape or a reintroduction. It proved to be the latter, being one of the birds from the Knepp reintroduction programme in Sussex. Bird number GB6E, it was released as a juvenile in August 2019 and spent time in Spain, France and Holland before being seen here. These large birds don’t breed until they are a few years old so was just a wandering non-breeding bird.

White Stork - Vazon, 9 Jun 21

As previously mentioned, the very cold spring meant that it felt like a bit of an odd year, and there were quite a few non-breeding wader sightings on the island during the month when they usually are well north of here. On 18th June there was quite a brownish, plain Grey Plover on Vazon beach which looked out of place. And then a few days later on 21st there was an unseasonal Lapwing hunkered down amongst the rockpools in the same spot. I was initially puzzled as I could only see a bit of its head and was wondering what a Spur-winged Plover would look like! Only when it moved I could see that it was a Lapwing, but a splendid breeding-plumaged male bird, something I never see here on the island, as we generally get winter-plumaged birds.

Grey Plover - Vazon, 18 Jun 21

Lapwing - Vazon, 21 Jun 21

Lapwing - Vazon, 21 Jun 21

The only other bird sighting of interest was a distant Red Kite circling over King’s Mills on 25th June. It had turned up on the island the previous day and I was in the car park at Vazon/Fort Hommet after work. I scanned across and saw the bird circling - as I also count birds for the local patch when I see them from the patch, even if they are outside, this was a new species for my patch list.

Red Kite - Kings Mills, 25 Jun 21

Red Kite - Kings Mills, 25 Jun 21 - I think that this is probably an identifiable picture?

Juvenile Starlings - Jaonneuse beach, 20 Jun 21

Summer time and insects suddenly take an increased amount of my attention. The moth trap didn’t produce anything outstanding on the few nights it was out but a Barrett’s Marbled Coronet was the first for quite a few years. A tortrix moth found in the evening on a wall in the garden was initially confusing but I decided it was a female Red-barred Tortrix - I have only ever seen males before. The only two new insect species I recorded for the month were both shieldbugs - the recently-colonised White-shouldered Shieldbug (Dyroderes umbraculatus) at Corbiere and plenty of Lesser Streaked Shieldbugs (Odontoscelis lineola) on the sandy coastal turf at Pulias.

female Red-barred Tortrix - garden, 19 Jun 21

Barrett's Marbled Coronet - garden, 19 Jun 21.

Pammene aurana - Mont Herault, 2 Jun 21

Grapholita internana - Fort Doyle, 5 Jun 21

Lesser Streaked Shieldbug - Pulias, 29 Jun 21

Anaspis maculata - Corbiere, 19 Jun 21

Milk Thistle - LBHS, 8 Jun 21

Stinking Iris - Pulias, 12 Jun 21