My two wildlife highlights today were one of our largest moths, with a wingspan of 75mm and one of the smallest Umbellifers with each flower just 1mm across. The Red Underwing was on my window and the Slender Hare’s Ear was flowering at the west end of the Beach Reserve.
This flower is now looking its best…. despite its name this is a native of Sicily, but has become established at Rottingdean… and recently at Rye Harbour, just seaward of the red roofed hut near the river mouth.
.. this is one of the tiny rambling members of the pea family. It grows about 25cm tall among grasses, but has a flower that is only about 6mm. You can identify it by the flowers usually occurring in pairs and the seed pods have 4 seeds in, hence the name Vicia tetrasperma.
Today’s dull lighting was good for photographing the first Sea Pea flowers to appear this year. The yesterday’s rain should be good for the shingle plants after a long period of drought. A good area to see them is on the seaward side of the road 100m west of Ternery Pool, but please be careful - they do not like trampling!
and the Sea Kale is looking great…
During my week of work experience I have noticed lots of colourful flowers on the shingle. Today was the first time I have seen the delicate yellow flowers of Yellow Horned Poppy.
Sally
… is just one of the 70+ common names for Lotus corniculatus, a very common flower of the RX area that is now in flower and should continue into September. It is an important foodplant for many insects, including the Common Blue butterfly.
The coming week will be the best for seeing Sea Kale in bloom, with the enormous domes of white flowers dominating the shingle shoreline. So if you want to see or smell (of honey) this spectacle you know what to do… this photo was taken this morning (for photos of white flowers bright sun is useless, choose overcast or hazy sun and try to pick a calm day our weather station on the website will help).
A couple of our smallest blue flowers are in bloom now, both growing on dry, short grassland at Rye Harbour. Early Forget-me-not in the photo below is next to a Rabbit dropping for scale.
Even smaller is Wall Speedwell…
Lesser Celandine was reported in flower on 3rd December on Rye Hill by Frank Palmer. Today there was Alexanders in flower at Rye Harbour (below).
There are extensive areas of this shrub (Hippophae rhamnoides) on the dunes at Camber. It is thought that it was originally planted there to stabilise the sand (although it is a native to some parts of Britain). The berries are very tasty, rich in vitamin C and much sought after elsewhere in the world (click here), but I rarely hear of people eating them in Britain. I have eaten them much earlier in the year, but there are still masses on the bushes and today they were being eaten by a flock of about 100 mixed crows…
Welcome to RXwildlife Sightings - the weblog with the latest wildlife sightings for the Hastings, Rye Bay, Dungeness and Romney Marsh area.
RXwildlife Sightings is a sister site of the RXwildlife Projects website, which contains information about the nature conservation projects currently taking place within the RXwildlife area.
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