Letter from Sussex, 22 August 2007

Weatherwise it has been a pretty poor summer, although I think we have had less rain and more sun here by the coast than further inland.  Like everywhere else, however, April was hot and dry and this brought some unusual records.  We don't have many marine mammals here, just the occasional harbour seal, so a harbour porpoise which turned up in the harbour entrance during April caused quite a stir.  Moth trapping during this month yielded 86 species, including three unusual vagrants which were firsts for Pagham - a Dewick's plusia, a purple marbled and a Clancy's rustic.  On the last day of April, after earlier reports of a relatively large number of glossy ibis seen in south-west England, one arrived on Ferry Pool near the visitor centre.  It then moved to Breach Pool by the north wall, but had left five minutes before I got there - the story of my life!  However, I did see the male gargany duck which was a recent arrival.

Although the weather then deteriorated, I did manage my bimonthly breeding bird and butterfly surveys.  Breeding success in birds seems to have been better this year, probably because wetter weather meant that more food was available than in 2006.  Unlike last year, the blue tits in my garden box fledged successfully, together with blackbirds and dunnocks.  There were several broods of coot, moorhen and mallard on the lagoon, and also a pair of great crested grebe with two young.  Several male Cetti's warblers were singing and established territories, and reed warblers also did well.  Ringed plover, oyster catcher and skylark were more successful this year owing to fencing on Pagham and Church Norton spits which kept visitors away

The most exciting news was that terns were breeding again in the harbour after a break of 15 years.  At least 12 pairs of common tern and one of little tern bred on Tern Island and a further seven pairs of little tern on Church Norton spit.  It is thought that they may have moved back because nests at Langstone Harbour were being predated by rats.  Kestrels, crows and young peregrines took an interest in the chicks but even so a good number survived.  The peregrines were probably from the nest on Chichester Cathedral, where four young fledged again this year.

It seems to have been a good year for small birds too, judging by the numbers of goldfinches and greenfinches feeding on thistle seedheads in Slipe field where I am doing my butterfly survey.  The butterflies have not done so well.  At the end of July numbers of large and small white, meadow brown and gatekeeper were up, but then fell after rain and wind in August.  Few migrants such as painted lady or clouded yellow have been seen and not even small tortoiseshell.  However, in mid-August my daughter Anne and I were walking back from the north wall when a family approached and asked us if we knew what the butterfly was that was perched on a bramble leaf in the man's hand.  It was a newly emerged white admiral - not the kind of thing you expect to find by the sea, although it is quite wooded in that area.  Our conservation warden, Ivan Lang, confirmed next day that this was the first record for the reserve since 1973!

By the end of August the southward migration of birds had already begun.  Wheatears have been seen in some numbers, and I saw 300-400 sand martins moving south-west on 12 August.  Grey plover, dunlin and black-tailed godwit are returning from their breeding areas, still in summer plumage, and the hedges are full of ripening sloes, elderberries and hawthorn.  Autumn is on its way.

Brenda Chapman