Linacre sunshine, butterflies and a Swallow

On Thursday the sun was shining and it was about 14 degrees, so I decided to have a couple of hours down at Linacre, which resulted in my first Linacre butterflies and Swallow of the year.

I started at the top of the site today, and had a quick check of some of the tit nestboxes. As predicted at the weekend, there was no sign of any nests yet, but I did manage to see a couple of Brown Hares (in the woods, not in the boxes!), and these 2 little critters; Brown Long-eared Bats, I believe.

Brown Long-eared Bat

 

Waterbirds were quite sparse, but there were a couple of Grey Herons on site, along with a metal-ringed  breeding plumaged Cormorant. Chiffchaffs were singing around all three reservoirs, and I counted 7 in total, as well as a single Swallow over the top reservoir.

With the weather so nice, I spent half an hour at the bottom of the top reservoir, where there was a willow tree full of catkins and butterflies, with 7 Peacocks, 1 Comma and 3 Small Tortoiseshells present.

Willow Tree