Day 30 - 30 Days Wild - A look back over the month

* Today's random act of wildness -  a lookback over #30DaysWild

So today is the last day of #30DaysWild - what an amazing 30 days it has been. When i started I set myself a few goals to achieve in the 30 days they were...

1. Spot a kingfisher - Check :)
2. A visit to Skomer Island - Check :)
3. Plant wild flowers and see what they attract - Check :)
4. Go camping
5. Listen to dawn chorus 
6. Go star gazing - Check :)
7. Making my own suet coconuts for the birds
8. Litter pick to create a better environment for wildlife
9. Make a tasty moth syrup and see what shows up - Check :)
10. Do a reptile survey for ARC - Check :)
11. Trip to see the Ospreys at Dyfi - Check :)
12. Create my own bird table
13. Beach combing - Check :)

I only managed to do 8 out of 13, but I am very happy with what we achieved. The main one was seeing a kingfisher - that was a pretty awesome day to finally see the one bird I wanted to see all my life. The other great day was seeing the puffins at Skomer, I have been before but I never get bored of seeing those lovely little birds.

Some interesting facts from this month's #30DaysWild:

• Spotted over 100 different animals (including 60 different species of birds)
• Visited over 15 places
• Saw my first kingfisher (did I already mention that?)
• Met lots of lovey people through #30DaysWild Twitter & Facebook Pages.

Even though #30dayswild have now ended I will still continue to 'Stay Wild' and will document it on my other blog http://sands-walks.blogspot.co.uk/ :)

Roll on 2017, until then 'Stay Wild'!

Day 29 - 30 Days Wild - Fledglings in the garden

* Today's random act of wildness - Fledglings in the garden *

It's the last but one day today - it has gone so quick! This evening was spend in my shed looking at the birds in the garden. I noticed we are getting a second brood of starling fledglings and a few younf sparrows show up too.

I haven't just fed these birds for the last 30 days I have been feeding them for years and will continue to do so for many years to come.

Cute Starling fledgling

Starling fledgling having a drink in the bird bath

Starling fledgling with adult

This is what I feed them - suet pellets and mealworm

Suet cake (I also feed them fatballs, peanuts etc...)

Sparrows, the one on the right is a fledgling

Male sparrow

Cinnabar Moth caterpillar

Cinnabar Moth caterpillar

Day 28 - 30 Days Wild - Pond dipping

* Today's random act of wildness - Pond dipping *

Day 28 and what horrid weather - it had rained almost all day! Finally at around 7.30pm the sun began to come up so we decided to go to Penllergare Valley Woods, a local woodland to see if there was any activity in the small pond there. Earlier in the year when we visited there were lots of tadpoles, so hopefully we would see some frogs or toads.

This is what we discovered...

The small pond full of lilies

A young toad in the grass

Young frog with water boatman 

Damsel Nymph

Newt Larvae - you can tell it's a newt tadpole because of the feathery gills around the head, distinguishing them from frog and toad tadpoles.

An adult newt, the water was too murky to tell if it was Palmate or smooth (definitely not great crested)

Another newt larvae

Young frog...

...this one still had it's tail

A huge dragonfly nymph

The sun starts setting and we decided it was time to leave.

Wildling enjoying climbing trees!

Day 27 - 30 Days Wild - Foxes in the churchyard...

* Today's random act of wildness - Exploring a churchyard *

Day 27 of 30 Days Wild - oh no, only 3 days left after today :(

In South Wales there are many graveyards and sadly many of them are neglected and over run with foliage. With so many plants and grass left to grow unattended there is no doubt that these sacred grounds must be teeming with nature.

I asked a few local people on Facebook which ones they felt were worth visiting for wildlife and I had a long list back, which was quite sad really that these once beautiful maintained areas are now left to the elements.

After work we went to the graveyard on Carmarthen Rd, Swansea to see what we could see. Unfortunately we couldn't access the place - it was so overgrown we couldn't see the paths for the graves - so we decided to leave this one.

A graveyard on Carmarthen Road, Swansea - not accessible due to the overgrown foliage

Gravestone lost under the brambles

Next stop was a church about 10 minutes drive away where the graveyard was full of bramble, balsam and other creeping plants. It was hard to see some of the gravestones due to the ivy, but there were indeed an array of insects. Many wildflowers were growing among the graves including clover, vetch & daisies - which brought the bees, wasps and butterflies. Here are some of the insects and flowers we found...

Purple Vetch

Clover

Bee on Yellow Vetch

Large Bee on nettle 

Insect needs IDing

Ringlet Butterfly

Micro Moth

The time was about 6.30pm when we reached the middle of the graveyard and we noticed a flash of orange through the long grass - as we got nearer we realised there was a beautiful red fox there just chilling out. We were very quiet and managed to get a few photos including a big yawn, we must have stood there for about 30 seconds until it spotted us and then it was gone. What a treat!

Red Fox just chilling out.

Big yawn!

The undergrowth began to get a lot thicker and harder to navigate so we made our way back to the car and drove home. In the evening I finished my kingfisher painting and was over whelmed by the response on Facebook when I posted it on there - over 450 likes is mind blowing and made me realise that perhaps I should have more confidence in my work and maybe consider selling them :)

My watercolour of a kingfisher - June 2016

Day 26 - 30 Days Wild - Painting on a rainy day

* Today's random act of wildness - painting a kingfisher *

Today is a very wet and dull day, so I have spend hours updating my blog on some of the wild things I have done over the last few days - My legs are quite tired from Skomer yesterday too, so a day of chilling out is on the cards.

It's been awhile since I have picked up a paintbrush, but I have wanted to draw/paint a kingfisher since I saw one a few weeks ago. I have sketched out the composition of my painting and added a splash of colour on it...

Step One - A basic pencil sketch of the kingfisher

Step Two - A quick wet wash with splashes of colour

Step Three - Starting to fill in some detail

Check out my blog tomorrow for the finish piece, in the meantime here are some of the paintings I did last year...

Watercolour of Blue Tit

Watercolour of Red Fox

Watercolour of Kingfisher

Watercolour of Barn Owl

I have a Facebook page with some of my other artwork...check it out https://www.facebook.com/sandsartwork/

A magical time at Skomer Island - 25 June 2016

After taking a whole week off work to go to Skomer and finding out that the boats had been cancelled every day due to North winds we thought we would never get to see the puffins this year.

We woke up early on Saturday morning (Day 25 of 30 Days Wild) to a grey and wet day and thought lets go for it...so off we went to Marloes, Pembrokeshire hoping the boats were running. We got to the car park at 8am and headed to Lockley Lodge to get our tickets, there were about twenty people infront of us. Finally we got our tickets and I felt like Charlie excited to enter the Chocolate Factory!

At 9.50am we started to board the Dale Princess boat and made our way to Skomer!

Me queuing to board the Dale Princess

When you arrive on Skomer it doesn't take long before you start seeing the birdlife and as we were climbing the steps up to the island there were guillemots mating a few feet away and puffins popping up literally everywhere! After our talk on island rules "Stay on the paths!" we were free to roam the island for about 5 hours. 

This is what we saw on the magical island... 

Guillemots getting romantic!

Puffins are everywhere and only a few feet away!

Black backed gulls with chicks

Gorgeous black backed gull chicks

Puffins in Sea Campion

Guillemots on cliff

Oystercatcher

One of the main highlights of Skomer is 'The Wick' a large cliff with ledges that is home to Fulmars and other cliff nesting birds. There are many puffins here too and I was lucky to see a few come in with sand eels in their beak.

Puffin at The Wick

Puffin with a beak full of sand eels (it's standing ny one of the numbered burrows)

Puffin just chilling

Dan admiring one of the puffins

Skomer isn't all about puffins though, there are many other birds on the island and here are some of the ones we spotted as we walked for miles and miles...

A pair of Curlew

Rock Pipit 

Manx Shearwater (OK, it's dead sadly but this is such a common site on Skomer. There are many deceased Manx on the island due to gulls attacking them)

Thousands of Guillemots on the cliffs

Another Rock Pipit with juicy grub

Male Wheatear with a grub

Wheater fledgling (Thanks Darren Hemsley for helping me ID it)

Black Backed Gull

Juvenile Reed Bunting

Oystercatcher

A quick visit to the farmhouse and more importantly the only toilets on the island. There was loads of wildlife around the buildings including a little wren singing its heart out. You can stay on Skomer and we did it a few years ago to see the Manx Shearwaters at night - a wonderful experience and amazing to see sunset and sunrise :)

The old farmhouse

A beautiful Wren singing it's little heart out

A rather tatty Painted Lady butterfly

We were looking good on time so we decided to go to the Garland Stone to see if we could see any seals. There were in fact 3 on the rocks, 1 Grey Seal and 2 Common Seals. There were also lots of seabirds around here too - puffins, guillemots and razorbills.

Garland Stone being photo bombed by a Puffin!

Seals on the rocks

Grey Seal chilling out

Razorbills among thift

Puffin and razorbill

Guillemots and a cormorant on the cliffs

More Puffins...

...and another one!

Sadly it was time to leave this magical place and has we made our way down to the boat we saw even more razorbills and puffins along the way. Skomer is one of my favourite places in the world, when I am on there I never want to leave. I would recommend it to everyone :)

Sad people waiting for the boat to leave the island

Razorbills having a nap

Puffin bids us goodbye!