Moss

The second day of our Arnside trip saw us on a roughly circular walk of the woods, mosses and meadows of Silverdale, Warton and Yealand Conyers, incorporating a visit to the Leighton Moss RSPB reserve.

Starting at Crag Foot, we walked the Occupation Road across Warton Crag, before cutting through the Three Brothers Allotment SSSI toward Yealand Conyers. A Robin posed for us as we walked by, while other wildlife was feasting on fungi.

Walking past lime kilns and Red Admirals feeding on Ash sap, we went through Crinklebarrow Wood toward Yealand Storrs, where a fine finger post helped direct us onward through Yealand Hall Allotment to Gait Barrows Nature Reserve and Hawes Water. In amongst the Red Admirals, Speckled Woods and Small Whites, we spotted one very late flying Green-veined White.

We lunched at Hawes Water, while dragonflies and darters zipped around our ears, before heading across to Leighton Moss. We sat in the public hide for half an hour, enough to see two of the three most significant species here: Marsh Harrier and Bittern, along with plenty of Teal. Those of you in the UK have a chance to see a lot more of Leighton Moss soon, as it will be the location for this year's BBC Autumnwatch programmes.

The image for today's blip is looking out from the main path at Leighton Moss, toward one of the lagoons, near where we came across a fine moth pupa.

We then circled through various Silverdale Woods before joining a short stretch of the Lancashire Coastal Way across Quaker's Stang salt marsh back to Crag Foot. We admired an old pumping station chimney and another finger post, before heading back to the hostel in Arnside.