Garden on a cool but sunny + still May morning. I've identified 8 different bird* species + seen at least 7 individual newts in the pond.

The newts were active during a warm spell in April but they disappeared during the cold start of May. I was worried they were dead. But now the males are in full glorious mating colours.

No toad spawn yet.
The azaleas are coming out, tulips just past their peak, marsh marigold in its prime.

#ClimateDiary #NatureDiary
*Inc. Wren, chiffchaff, tree creeper

On a calm sunny morning, watching the behaviour of three quite different nectar-feeders on the flavour-of-the-week #wildflower here, "Red Deadnettle", more accurately Lamium purpureum, carpets of it on previously exposed ground.

The common solitary " #bumblebees" flying in bezier-shaped arcs, testing one flower on a head, and if dissatisfied, moving on at ground-level at least another metre in the same gentle arcs.

A common hive-type #bee, flying nearest-stem-to-nearest in fairly straight lines, walking from flower-to-flower on a stem, testing every one.

A large #hoverfly with a globular shiny brown abdomen, most amusing: tests one flower, leaps backwards 5cm, flies precisely circumferentially around the same floret always facing it, pounces on the next flower at 90°; repeat.... pings to vantage point 1 metre up, looks for the next flower-head.

edit - if you have a better idea what the 3rd insect is - it might of course not be a hoverfly despite its hovering - do let me know. No illustrations near enough in appearance to post. gone by the time I had camera.

#portugal #natureDiary

#climateDiary #birds #naturediary #portugal

Yesterday a wall of grey-brown across the west horizon, and today a bit of rain [as drizzle] arrived. Whilst sunny yesterday, I sat and enjoyed the first concerted #woodpecker of the year. A few exploratory taps over previous days but this session was surely rehearsed. The bird went through all the vowel sounds on several trees within a few hundred metres, ah-r-r-r-r… eh-r-r-r-r… ir-r-r-r-r… OR-r-r-r-r [particularly resonant and impressive!]… ur-r-r-r-r… all the more impressive for the stereophonic panning. Not actually in our vowel-sounds order, plus with repeats. Punctuated by the odd chuckle of vocal delight, voice a bit "buzzier" than the woodpeckers I lived with last year, who were very loud and bright in their laughing.