Stonechat

We are gradually exploring the Cumbria Wildlife Trust Reserves. This morning we visited Dorothy Farrer’s Spring Wood, which proved to be just fabulous. Carpets of bluebells and wild garlic everywhere. It was historically managed as coppiced woodland to produce bobbins, swill baskets and charcoal, but as elsewhere all that stopped in the 1940’s. But the Trust reintroduced coppicing in 1989 to help improve the woodland’s biodiversity. The extra shows a green veined white butterfly feasting on a bluebell.

We then travelled up the nearby Kentmere valley to the village of Kentmere and walked a circuit. This is the first time we have been into proper “hill country” for a long time. Lots of ewes and little lambs, this is sheep country. We heard our first cuckoos of the year. Swallows were everywhere hawking over the fields. A redstart singing right at the top of an oak tree on a rocky crag. But the image I like best is this stonechat. He and Mrs Stonechat were clearly annoyed by our presence and made it plain we should pass on.