🦆Cotwall End Valley nature diary
April 1. Red admiral in Milton. Lots of bluebells in flower on the golf course.
April 2. The carrion crow nest in the garden off the green looks complete. Herring gull, great black-backed gull and lesser black-backed gull in low flight over Straits. Female sparrowhawk low circling flight over Straits.
April 3. Greenfinch calling from tree on the green. Male mallard in low flight across Wordsworth. Female sparrowhawk in circling flight across Straits.
April 4. Magpie nest in Tennyson. Magpie carrying nesting materials in Longfellow.
April 5. Lots of chiffchaffs singing. Female mallard on Bob’s Brook. Pair of moorhens on main pool. Three blackcaps singing. Opposite-leaved golden saxifrage. The video also covers thoughts on fly-tipping.
April 6. Lots of chiffchaff singing in the woodland alongside the brook. Several blackcaps singing. Nuthatch calling. First swallow of the year, in flight east to west over Wordsworth. That’s 52 for 2025. Badger in lane after dark.
April 7. Early dusk walk in woodland off the lane. Two badgers. Two foxes. Muntjac feeding in woodland. If you can see them then invariably they can see you. Very noisy magpies mobbing a tawny owl (not seen).
April 8. Pair of jays. Pair of ravens mobbed by a carrion crow. Both sightings in low flight over Coleridge. First orange-tip of the year, in the lane.
April 9. Lesser black-backed gull on regular telephone pole perch in Longfellow. Several herring gulls in the area. Collared dove calling from tree in Masefield.
April 10. Two common buzzards soaring low over the woodland on eastern slope. Chiffchaffs singing. Male mallard on small woodland pond. Butterflies: orange-tip, peacock, speckled wood, large white. Fox in woodland, sat there watching us.
April 11. Short walk in woodland off lower lane. Pair of jays. Lots of speckled wood, two large whites and an orange-tip. Carrion crow sitting nest in tree off the green.
April 12. Carrion crow on the nest in the garden off the green.
April 13. Five noisy jays in flight heading into the woodland beyond the land, with seven returning a few minutes later. Seen from the garden.
April 15. Single swallow in low flight over Wordsworth, heading up the western slope.
April 16. Two noisy Canada geese in very late flight towards Himley.
April 17. Bluebell walk on the eastern slope, captured in the video. The section of woodland that we walked to has thousands of bluebells in bloom at the moment. One of the UK’s great spring nature spectacles.
April 18. Male mallard in flight across the green.
April 20. Walk around local area. Several small whites.
April 21. Lesser black-backed gull on regular telephone pole in Longfellow.
April 24. Walk around immediate area. Four lesser black-backed gulls perching on roof tops in Wordsworth. Several starlings, including a bird with worms destined for chicks. Carrion crow nest in garden off the green still active, watched the female making her way on the nest.
April 25. Walk around immediate area. Collared dove in flight across Longfellow. Lesser black-backed gull on telephone pole in Longfellow.
April 26. Pair of collared doves in Longfellow. Several starlings gathering food for young, including six on the green.
April 27. Four calling Canada geese over our home in very late dusk flight, heading east.
April 28. Muntjac in meadow alongside Sandyfields Road.
April 30. Carrion crow on the nest in the garden alongside the green.