After many attempts of urgent flapping the largest of the herring gull chicks manages several lift off and landing on the chimney where the nest is situated.

One of the adults returns

The constant screeching and flapping has attacted the attention of other nearby herring gulls and a noisy ariel combat takes place.

Eventually all quitens down and gulls retire to their respective roof tops

Grass snake at Lewes Railwat Land Nature Reserve

I had just finished working on a pond education session when I spotted this beautiful grass snake cutting its way through the duck weed.

Herring gull chicks

I have been watching the herring gull nest on the roof behind our house for a while now. Up until now I have only noticed two chicks. Today I saw that there were three chicks.

Butterflies and wasps

There are been several species of butterfly in the garden so far. These include tortoiseshell, comma, red admiral, speckled wood and this holly blue. This the most common of the small blue butterflies that visit urban gardens

I also noticed this strange wasp in the passage down the outside of our house. I have not decided on an ID for this one yet.

Cold wet bee

There were many bees visiting the bottle brush bush yesterday, which is now in full flower. While it had been raining on and off during the day, the bees disappearede and reappeared as soon as the sun came out. I watched a bee on the bottle brush when it stared to rain
The bee hid on the underside of the flower. This time it did not stop raining and as it got dark I noticed the bee was still there.

This morning I noticed the bee was still there. I expected it to be dead as it was very wet and probably cold. However I touched the bee and it moved a leg.

So I carefully brought the bee inside to dry off and warm up. After a while it started to move around the container and so I took it to the door and away it flew.

Magpies and Herring Gulls

I while I was working I heard a commotion in the front garden, the loud calls of magpies. There were 6 in total (6 for gold)

After chasing each other around the front garden, one manageed to pin another to the ground.

Its also nice to see that the herring gulls are nesting again on the house roof top behind our bungalow.

They appear to have three chicks at the moment.

The bramble flowers in the back alley way are attractiung a lot of bees.

These include buff-tailed bumble bee and honey bees.

I also saw my first tree bee this year and as I watched I noticed as many as three individual tree bees.

This bee is a recent colonist for the UK and their populations are being monitored, however this bee is not thought to impact on our native bee species. Its called a tree because it often nests in the cavities in trees or in an unused bird box.