Cumbria Naturally
  • Home
  • Blog
  • My Books
    • Cumbrian Contrasts
    • A Lakeland Experience >
      • Introduction
      • Derwent
      • Langdale
      • Ullswater
      • Kentdale
    • About Scout Scar
    • Atlantic Odyssey
  • Other Writing
    • What Larks!
    • Further - Explore Shetland
    • Autumn Migration
    • Rydal and Nab Scar
    • Perspectives
    • The River Kent
    • Wings
  • Gallery
  • Contact

Skylark, Cuckoo, Redstart and Hoary Rock Rose on Scout Scar

20/5/2023

0 Comments

 
PictureMale skylark with breeding crest
A male skylark sings to assert that this is his territory, so the look is aggressive. His song is ravishing, the  song usually heard  in display flight. Individual feathers show on his raised breeding crest and his toes clutch the juniper twig.
For weeks now I've been hoping to find cuckoo but  he was elusive. Today, I heard a cuckoo in the direction of Warriner's Wood so was off in pursuit.    He was somewhere high in the green of larch trees. I always have binoculars but today I'd forgotten them.

Back in the time of Shakespeare cuckoo were so common that people didn't regard the call of the cuckoo as special. 
                  'He was, as the cuckoo is in June,
                    Heard, not regarded'

 King Richard II  made himself too familiar, says  Henry Bolingbroke, his cousin who deposed him. 
To me, hearing a cuckoo is become so special I have to follow it, back and forth over Helsington Barrows with interludes to admire drifts of cowslip and early purple orchid.
And I pick up the call later as I come off Scout Scar.   A walker asks me directions so I tell him and add that he may hear a cuckoo on his way.  'What does that sound like?' he enquires. I thought he was joking but he was not.   How could a middle-aged walker not even know the call of a cuckoo.  
Tall larch trees hide the cuckoo well and he startles me when he calls from a tree close beside me, then flies off fast.   Stealth is the keynote for cuckoo, a brood parasite for whom deception is essential.   When I hear male cuckoo I look for a display post, the top of a dead tree. But this bird was canny and they're sharp-sighted. I snuk between larch trees in full May foliage and I could hear he was close but I couldn't see him until he flew.  I pass a mature oak  where once I stood hearing the gurgling of a female cuckoo above me unseen in thick foliage.
Hoary Rock Rose opens in the bright sun and this is the season of the flora of the cliff-edge.   The flowers are distinctive in their rocky habitat and in their pallor.  Common Rock Rose and Vetch flower too. 
0 Comments

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    Picture

    Author

    Jan Wiltshire is a nature writer living in Cumbria. She also explores islands and coast and the wildlife experience. (See Home and My Books)

    Archives

    May 2025
    April 2025
    March 2025
    February 2025
    January 2025
    December 2024
    November 2024
    October 2024
    September 2024
    August 2024
    July 2024
    June 2024
    May 2024
    April 2024
    March 2024
    February 2024
    January 2024
    December 2023
    November 2023
    October 2023
    September 2023
    August 2023
    July 2023
    June 2023
    May 2023
    April 2023
    March 2023
    February 2023
    January 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    January 2015
    November 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    September 2012
    July 2012
    June 2012
    November 2010
    August 2010
    July 2010
    April 2010
    January 2010
    November 2009
    January 2009
    January 2004

    Categories

    All
    A Local Patch
    Birdlife
    Butterflies And Moths
    Flowers
    Locations
    Views
    Walks
    Weather
    WIldlife

    RSS Feed

Website
Home
Blog
Gallery
Contact



​Cookie Policy
My Books
  • Intro - My books
  • ​Cumbrian Contrasts
  • A Lakeland Experience
  • About Scout Scar
  • Atlantic Odyssey
    ​
Other Writing
  • Intro - Other Writing
  • What Larks!
  • Further - Explore Shetland
  • Autumn Migration
  • Rydal and Nab Scar
  • Perspectives
  • The River Kent
  • Wings
Jan Wiltshire - Cumbria Naturally
© Jan Wiltshire 2022 All rights reserved
Website by Treble3