RXwildlife Sightings

Highlights this morning included 7 whimbrel, 150 Sandwich Tern, 11 Common Tern on Flat Beach Quarry, 6 Avocet and 180 Golden Plover on Flat Beach Flood, 12 Avocet and Little Ringed Plover on Harbour Farm Pools. Lots of activity at Ternery Pool with Black-headed and Mediterranean Gulls and thankfully the water levels are dropping daily creating more space on the islands. Yellow Wagatail (pictured) and Wheatear were present on the grassy area at the River Mouth. From the viewpoint yesterday at various times during the day Whitethroat, Blackcap, Chiffchaff, Willow, Sedge, Reed, and Cetti’s Warbler, several Bearded Tit and 6 Swallows.

An unwelcome find in my garden in Rye today was this Red (or Scarlet) Lily Beetle (Lilioceris lilii), a notorious, recently naturalised pest of lilies. It’s a very small, slow-moving, distinctive beetle about 8 mm long – see the RHS website at www.rhs.org.uk/science/plant-pests/lily-beetle. Not easy to photograph the whole insect clearly, owing to its ‘three-dimensional’ bulk, but the picture shows the contrast between the rich glossy red and the jet black, these being the only colours.