Walks into the Welsh mountains and a new writer on my blog

With the last of my holidays I decided to split them up into long weekends and I have given myself a long weekend every month to get on the Welsh coast and go up into the mountains to retune to nature and forget about the boredom of working in a retail environment surrounded by people stuck in there ruts. Sometimes the groundhog day feeling needs to be broken either in the mountains or by the sea.

 

The air was warm the sun was shining to explore the mountain was my goal and I found a lovely few wild swimming/camping spots with views, peace and waterfall pools and I think I did just that and seeing Buzzards and choughs on the wing made the short trip worthwhile. 

As I headed into the mountains my younger brother Ryan went by the sea with his camera in hand to see what he could encounter while enjoying the nature of the coastal wild spots. 

 

Below is a post written by him and his adventures of the day.

SATURDAY 9TH OCTOBER 2022 

UNEXPECTED WILDLIFE ENCOUNTERS

On Saturday 9th Sept 2022 I was in North wales for a few days on the coast, I had planned to go to aber ogwen spinnies nature area to see if the Mute swans were still gathering. On my arrival there I was unable to access the beach and was advised by Bird ringers Kate and Joel not to go on the beach as they were doing a catch of redshank for annual ringing on the Menai Straits as part of SCAN’s monitoring project they also said on the radio let the swan guy know there are 4 Whooper swans in the flock. I managed to count 99 Mute swans = (104 swans) I Was like wow ran to the hide and got some pics of them they then left the flock and flew off towards the great orme. 

They said the cannon net will be going off and banging in around 40 mins they said you were more than welcome to come over once they are in the boxes. I decided to wait in anticipation to see what surprises the wooden boxes on the shore held.

 

They found something unexpected and very shocked to come across a LONG-BILLED DOWITCHER are rare Wader which you don't tend to see. They also had over 150+ redshank 1 of which was an Icelandic redshank) and 5 Curlew sandpipers. It was a fantastic experience to watch. I learnt so much about SCAN and BTO wader ringing. They put silver rings on all the birds before weighing and taking wing and beak length. It was a Wicked day and one that I will remember for a long time.

 Thank you for reading

Diaries of Cheshire wildlife watcher brothers

A visit to Pensychnant Nature reserve

While staying on the North Wales coast I always like to explore Wild areas where I have never visited. On this occasion I wanted to visit a Nature reserve in the Conwy mountains, not knowing how far the reserve is from the seaside town of Conwy we set off early walking from Llandudno, so there was a fare few miles to go. I wanted to visit Pensychant as I had found out there was a few bird species there I have never seen like Spotted Flycatchers, Pied Flycatchers in a woodland not far from the main entrance gate. I only managed to see and photograph one of the 2 Flycatchers species and I took it at quite a distance I will be revisiting sometime in the future to try and find them again. While we were there we enjoyed a walk around the woodland and spotted some very active Bee hives which was nice to see as I have never seen them in a mountain setting before. To find out more about Pensychnant and how to find the reserve then you can find it on the Link here. We found a stunning small pond in one of the woodland glades located close to where there were many bird boxes unfortunately none seemed active with our target birds. As there was places in the mountain I wanted to explore we only stayed at the Woodland part of the reserve for an hour or so as another bird on my list was loudly calling nearby. I will publish the few photographs I got of the Cuckoo in my next blog post plus after we spotted the Cuckoo we ran into another bird on one of the stone walls.
 A Cuckoo was calling on our way back to Conwy

 View when leaving the reserve

A Pied flycatcher in the tree close to the hives

 A pond in a beautiful woodland glade

Thanks for reading my blog

Stay wild, be happy and be safe
 

Mike

Badger visiting my artificial den!!!!

In this post a Badger visits my artificial den I made for Foxes. After placing a Camera trap on the entrance I found the Badgers were visiting and eating the food I was leaving to tempt in Foxes to checkout my den. I think I heard a Cuckoo calling from the woodland in this video at about 2.28 seconds into the video.

The video below shows the Badger coming out of the den and then returning into the den exiting from another entrance at the opposite end of the den.

Thanks for visiting

Mike

Watch more of my YouTube videos here

Episode 1 Diaries of a Cheshire wildlife watcher

So here it is my first attempt on a longer wildlife video I hope you like as it took me a few weeks to put it together and to find time. From writing and record the narration to finding all the footage/photographs. Then putting it all together and creating something that shows my passion and love for Nature. I am working on Episode 2 which should be released this time next month. I'm also working on a weekly episode called "Diaries of a Cheshire wildlife watcher Notes/Shorts" which will feature more information on one subject rather the longer main episodes which are a combination of subjects, reviews, footage and photographs.

Thanks for watching

Mike

Episode 1 Editing update

Not had time to really write any posts lately as I am rebuilding my business website right down to the first bit of code from a blank page to a brand New Wilder looking website. I am also working on alot of videos for the Diaries of a Cheshire wildlife watcher which short entertain you through the cold Winter evenings. I have chosen one idea for the episodes setup after throwing out 2 ideas that did not feel right and as I was not happy with the final voice over recording. I have redone the script and I am currently working on that, I'm not sure of a release date but should be on in the next few weeks hopefully and once I get back into editing I should get quicker and push out high quality videos within a few days. Hopefully there should be an Episode a week once I get a few made and on the quiet weeks where nothings really going on I will be doing special Episodes with stories, footage and photographs from my archives.

Thank you

Mike

Diaries of a Cheshire wildlife watcher video Channel

Here's a little teaser for my long awaited online series where I will be sharing my wildlife photographs, videos and encounters as it's something I have put off for a long while and now I feel it's time to bite the bullet. Hopefully we will be having a few sections on my channel one for recent Diaries, one for the archives and one for my brothers videos Diaries of a Swan Whisperer.

Watch my first video below:

Regards 

Mike

Returned from a week by the sea

Just a quick one today as I've just returned from my Autumn trip to Llandudno and had a great week but rather than post lots of blog entry's I have a new way of sharing my encounters which I will go into very soon.

Quick list for sightings:

Ravens

Buzzards

Peregrines

Chough's

Gulls

Wheatears

Gannets

Dippers

Grey Seals plus lots of underwater creatures and an African Grey Parrot :-) as well as many other birds and mammals along the way which I may do quick blog posts about if I don't put them into my new Youtube video channel.

Regards

Mike

Cool evening walk as Autumn sets in

With the season changing from Summer to Autumn I have started going on an evening walk as I really love the evening temperature change as the sun starts to set early and a cold chill fills the air. While the nights are still light and relatively warm I have been doing a different walk each evening. The other evening we headed off on a walk which takes about 30 minutes on a round trip from my home. You get to walk down country roads, over rivers through woodlands and over farmland including crop fields. One thing that stood out was this young llama that seemed curious as we walked past it's field as it grazed with the rest of its family.

A rather nice walk especially as I don't have to go far from home plus on this same walk in the past I have seen Little Owls, Foxes, Buzzards, Hares and Weasels.

Thanks for visiting

Mike

Not long till the Deer rut :-)

Cold evenings and darker nights can only mean one thing Autumn!!!!! and with that in mind only a month till the 2014 Deer rut.  As always I will be following the rut at my local Deer park called Tatton  which is in the middle of Cheshire in the leafy town of Knutsford. 

More information on the Deer rut on the link below:
http://www.discoverwildlife.com/british-wildlife/understand-british-deer-rut
Below is one of the videos I put together from some footage I filmed on my Sony Hdv camcorder before it broke:

I hope to be going a few days over the rut period and I will be mainly focusing on the Fallow Deer but if the Red Deer are performing I shall film them as once there Battles get going sometimes there epic but mostly end without any clashing especially if its a smaller Stag trying to sneak in to mate with a hind.

I have been following the rut at Tatton for many years now and I still love to watch and photograph the Deers as there's always a few photographic gems to be had.
The Prince approaches put through a few programs to make this stunning Sketch type image

Rut in the wind

Sunrise and Stags = Epicness

 Autumnal trees + Deer = Epicness

Thanks for visiting

Mike

Buzzard in the river!?!?

Another slightly autumnal day here today with strong winds and crispy leaves beginning to fall from the trees still with there emerald green glow of summer. Due to the weather being unpredictable I waited till the wind and rain stopped and in the early evening in the last rays of sun we set off to a place 5 minutes from my door to see if I could get an unplanned Otter encounter and having not been to this spot for a while I had no clue what I was going to find but what I did find was unexpected as I got a surprise of the bad kind.

 I climbed down into a narrow gulley where a shallow rippling stream flows past an unused Badger sett down into a faster flowing river and this is where I found a young Buzzard floating on the surface with an injury under it's wing.

Luckily the Buzzard was reachable so I grabbed the bird from the water and took it off into cover to examine the bird as I had no idea if the bird was shot and as it felt warm I guessed it happened recently. I checked the bird and I think it was a fledgling and possibly attacked by an adult and not shot but I could not be 100% positive. My theory is this younger bird flew into an adults territory and got into a scrap high above and was injured then fell into the river and drowned. I put the Buzzard in a tree stump to let it decompose for the skeleton and skull. I will be checking this area every few days to see if there are any more signs of shooting but hopefully the Buzzard will still be there and if the bird was shot a pellet will be left behind once the flesh has rotted away. If this is the case I will be having a word with the owners of the woodland on the opposite side of the river bank as they are wildlife lovers and will be happy to keep an eye out for any suspicious behavior.

Thanks for visiting

 

Mike

2 Weeks of Dolphins sightings from my Holiday in June 2014

Been putting this blog post on the back burner as I have so much to post about from my 2 weeks of Dolphin sightings on the North Wales coast as every day we were there we had sightings of Bottlenose Dolphins and one evening I had an encounter that I have always wanted.

View of the bay where we looked for Dolphins

Each morning at sunrise and before sunset in the evenings we would head to a vantage point over the sea where we would be able to see any Dolphins breaching the waters surface and we chose a lovely spot not far from the Cottage where we could see a large area of the coast then when we spotted a Dolphin we could run down a hill nearer to get right next to the sea to get a better view and hopefully photographs. 
One evening we used this technique and ended up spotting a family group of 10 Bottlenose Dolphins including calfs they came from the offshore Wind farm and started heading closer to the Little Orme allowing for some great views of individuals jumping up out of the water. Below is a few photographs that I managed to get as I ended watching the Dolphins instead of photographing them as the light began to fade as the sunset giving a orange glow over the sea and the Dolphins fins as they came right infront of us and headed around the Little Orme past Angel bay and into Llandudno bay and off around the Great Orme.
Most of the sightings we had were near the red line and pretty much used the same route while playing and feeding
A few of the best photographs I took from my evening encounter

Closest photograph I have ever got of a Bottlenose Dolphin from land on the North Wales coast

 
Photographs taken over the 2 weeks of other encounters with the pod

One afternoon we saw a pod of 5 Adults moving fast out to sea with calf's and they were being chased by 3 others which I think were males and after this sighting  we got no more encounters and as it was the end of the week I was not to bothered about not seeing them one last time before we left as that one sunset encounter was my best encounter with wildlife that I have ever had.

A few shots from the Little Orme as we headed back down to the cottage as the sunset over Llandudno bay

 My brother in silhouette photographing the sunset

I return to N.Wales for a week in September so hopefully a few more Dolphin encounters and a chance for me to use my Easy breath mask in the sea that's if the weathers still warm but with the Autumn taking hold early this year due to an early Spring/Summer we shall have to wait and see.

Thanks for visiting

Mike