Andy Goodey found a few Purple Hairstreak butterflies along the Flitch Way and one White Letter Hairstreak by the allotments at Duckend Green.  Both of these butterflies live in the tree tops except when they come down to nectar on flowers such as the bramble.  The latter butterfly is now uncommon and is only found in small numbers where the Elm still survives.  The allotments are such an area but if many more of the Elms die as they succumb to Dutch Elm disease then the butterflies will almost certainly die out as well. Andy also commented on the very poor year for butterflies.  This was the middle of July and since then the weather has deteriorated further. The one exception has been the large number of Gatekeeper butterflies during early August.  Most insect numbers are very poor though on the few sunny days, we have had a good emergence of Dragonflies.  Andy reported two Crossbills flying over Pods Lane and as I write this has just had four more flying over his garden in the Street.  Andy had some scaffold erected and immediately Collared Doves nested on it.  This is close to another nest previously reported on top of the bracket for a Sky dish.  Andy also sent me details of a Kestrels nest near the Flitch Way and I know of another nest the other side of the village.

Phil Monk reported that his garden Coal Tits fledged 4-5 young and he has a Brown Hawker dragonfly in his garden.
Keith Brunning found a baby Grass Snake by his front door and had a Goldcrests nest in a conifer hedge.
Veronica Pollitt and ourselves have also had adult Grass Snakes on our compost heaps so Duckend Green should continue to have a good population of snakes this year.
Neville Walker also noted the low butterfly numbers this year.  The clematis Nellie Mosa though has been nearly defoliated by Sawfly larva.  He also notes that Ladybirds are scarce in the garden this year.  Unfortunately when cleaning the garden pond he found a dead adult Hedgehog.  There have been few reports of them in the village this year.  Neville also had a Leopard Moth in the garden.

Edward Warboys found a Leopard moth in our farmyard.  The caterpillar bores into woody stems of shrubs and trees and feeds on the wood for two to three years before burrowing out to pupate and emerge as a moth.  I have reported in the past about the top of a neighbour's Birch tree which snapped off after a Leopard moth caterpillar bored round the circumference of the 80mm stem.
Roger Martin had a Buzzard circling overhead along Pods Lane and later reports from Robert Bucknall and Andy Goodey suggest that a pair may have nested in or near the Parish.  Roger has also heard two male Song Thrushes in Duckend Green during the year singing to proclaim their territories.  He also saw a pair of Bullfinches in his garden, they are now on the BTO red list.  We had an adult and a newly fledged youngster in our garden so this pair probably successfully bred.

Christine Milton and Andy Goodey commented on the Pyramidal Orchids flowering on the bank at Century Bridge.  They are not common in Essex but this is the third year they have flowered and this year we had 15 flower heads in three different sites.  There have been Bee Orchids on these verges for some time and this year there were nine flowering spikes.  Christine has regularly seen a Little Owl around the meadow to the west of Century Bridge and thinks it may have nested in one of the nearby Oaks.
Keith Rawlings Baytree Close has a home made bat detector and recorded Pipistrelle bats foraging in the garden at sunset.  Later the same evening a larger bat which was not echo locating much or else very quietly also foraged in the garden.  The latter bat was probably a Brown Long-eared bat that has very good eyesight and hearing and no need to echolocate like other species.

John Taylor School Road, has listed 7 species of Bumble Bee in his garden which is a very high figure and is waiting for confirmation of possibly an eighth rarer species.
Mary Hitchen was on her way to work just after midnight when she saw a pair of badgers in the lay-by opposite the Swan.  These were the first wild badgers she had seen and she was able to stop and watch them.  They were probably juveniles as they were quite small.  When we give talks we often ask how many of the audience have seen badgers and the answer is very few.  Though they are a very large animal they are extremely well camouflaged except for their striped head markings.

Many parishioners reported the huge number of flying ants present over a very short period which made national news.  There were reports from round the village of Frogs, Toads, Gulls and Starlings all feasting on this food bonanza.
Peter Crosby sent me a picture of a bird that resembled a Starling.  I passed the pictures to Andy Goodey who decided it was a 'washed out Starling'.  I am always pleased when someone notices the unusual; too many of us do not spend the time observing our natural surroundings.

Roger Jiggins Tel. 01376 324 311, email mailto:r.jiggins@btconnect.com  (please put Wildlife as the subject)