13th March to 20th March 2019

Wednesday 13th March:
Today, Mike Lomax and I undertook a large circuit around the Common to plan a possible future walk for Butterfly Conservation. We took in a mix of habitats and covered many of the site's different areas (Upper Terrace, Terrace Embankment, Lower Terrace, Lower Heath and Lower Poolands area).

It wasn't really butterfly weather but this was a recce to plan the route. That said we still saw a good mix of wildlife.  Highlights included 2 Ravens, 1 Meadow Pipit (flyover), a Scarce Footman moth caterpillar, Pine Ladybirds, a 7-spot Ladybird, Yellow Dung Fly, a queen Buff-tailed Bumblebee going into its nest hole and an area of Turf Mottlegill Fungi.

Scarce Footman (Eilema complana) larva

Sunday 17th March:
I only had time for the briefest of visits today so I decided to spend some time down at Hillditch Pool.  It was quite a dull, cool day with little of note on the invert front.  Bird wise I didn't fair much better, that was until I had all but returned to my car and, in the wooded area next to the 'dog dip' pond I picked up on a Chiffchaff that was busily flitting about and fly-catching non stop as it feed back up following it's long journey from Africa.

Tuesday 19th March:
This afternoon i undertook a walk around the Lower Poolands ad Upper Terrace areas of the common.  Once again the cooler weather kept the inverts at bay but it was a productive visit on the bird front as there were now 2 singing Chiffchaffs present. Linnets had also started to return back to the reserve for the breeding season with 2 Linnets seen (one of which was singing).  In the winter months the Common's Linnets move away to arable areas where they join other Linnets in sometimes quite large flocks (in the hundreds) searching the fields for food.

Linnet (Linaria cannabina)

Wednesday 20th March:
Finally the weather had started to improve and as this afternoon was sunny and mild my hunt for inverts was on.  I decided to walk part of the Lower Terrace and the Terrace Embankment and this really paid of as I saw my first few Early Colletes (Colletes cunicularius) bees active near their nest aggregation site.  This species is a rare species in Worcestershire and a scarce resident species on the Common. They are usually found at coastal sand dune locations in the UK but have started to colonize a few inland sites (the inland dunes and sandy soils of Hartlebury Common are perfect for them).  At their peak last year I obtained a maximum count of c.40 at the nest area so not exactly numerous there.

Early Colletes (Colletes cunicularius) 

Also of interest during the walk were a small number of female Clark's Mining Bees .  On the butterfly front a Peacock and 3 Small Tortoiseshells were present on the sunny slopes of the embankment.

Clark's Mining Bee (Andrena clarkella)

Peacock (Aglais io)

One of the day's biggest highlights though was hearing a Yellowhammer back singing on the Common.   As with the Linnets that breed at the site the common's breeding Yellowhammers also move away to arable areas in the winter months.  It is always a joy to hear one again in the following Spring as they regale us with their "a little bit of bread and no cheeeeese" song.   Two Chiffchaffs were heard in song on the Lower Terrace.