{"id":4790,"date":"2019-06-05T08:00:50","date_gmt":"2019-06-05T07:00:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/?p=4790"},"modified":"2019-06-05T08:00:50","modified_gmt":"2019-06-05T07:00:50","slug":"getting-ahead-of-the-weather-cheviot-valleys-bespoke-birdwatching-04-06-19","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/northumberland\/cheviot-valleys\/getting-ahead-of-the-weather-cheviot-valleys-bespoke-birdwatching-04-06-19","title":{"rendered":"Getting ahead of the weather; Cheviot Valleys Bespoke Birdwatching 04\/06\/19"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I collected John from Cramlington, earlier than originally planned because the weather forecast wasn’t looking great and I wanted to stay ahead of what promised to be some heavy rain, ahead of a day in the Cheviot Valleys<\/a> and we headed north west in bright sunshine…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Roadside verges left unmowed are a haven for invertebrates and Common Blue<\/em><\/strong> and Blue-tailed Damselflies<\/em><\/strong> were alongside Red and Black Froghoppers<\/em><\/strong> and bees<\/em><\/strong> busied themselves searching for pollen and nectar as Oystercatchers<\/em><\/strong> engaged in noisy aerial chases.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The riparian triumvirate of Dipper, Grey Wagtail<\/em><\/strong> and Common Sandpiper<\/em><\/strong> all put in an appearance, Willow Warblers, Chaffinches<\/em><\/strong> and Song Thrushes<\/em><\/strong> were all singing as the buzzing calls of Lesser Redpolls<\/em><\/strong> wrapped around the taller conifers, Meadow Pipits<\/em><\/strong> song-flighted over open ground, the eerie cries of Curlew<\/em><\/strong> rolled down the valley sides and a Peregrine<\/em><\/strong> soared in the updraft over a ridge. Green Tiger Beetles<\/em><\/strong> were around areas of the path left puddled by recent rainfall, Red-legged Partridges<\/em><\/strong> and Pheasants<\/em><\/strong> added a touch of the exotic (both very underrated birds…), a lone Brown Hare<\/em><\/strong> on one side of the valley contrasted with a field full of Rabbits<\/em><\/strong> on the other and a Common Buzzard<\/em><\/strong> in heavy moult laboured up the fell side. A pristine Adder<\/em><\/strong> slithered away from it’s newly shed skin and as we returned to the car the first few raindrops began to fall \ud83d\ude42 A trail runner came down off the hillside, having hit ‘the wall’ 32 miles into a 36 mile run and we gave him a lift into Wooler before heading south as the rain intensified.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I collected John from Cramlington, earlier than originally planned because the weather forecast wasn’t looking great and I wanted to stay ahead of what promised to be some heavy rain, ahead of a day in the Cheviot Valleys and we headed north west in bright sunshine… Roadside verges left unmowed are a haven for invertebrates […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[371,290,57,102,289,214,172,257,25,256,123,134,207,146,210,284,943,759,145,213],"class_list":["post-4790","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cheviot-valleys","tag-adder","tag-blue-tailed-damselfly","tag-brown-hare","tag-chaffinch","tag-common-blue-damselfly","tag-common-sandpiper","tag-curlew","tag-dipper","tag-great-spotted-woodpecker","tag-grey-wagtail","tag-lapwing","tag-lesser-redpoll","tag-meadow-pipit","tag-mistle-thrush","tag-oystercatcher","tag-rabbit","tag-red-and-black-froghopper","tag-red-legged-partridge","tag-song-thrush","tag-willow-warbler"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4790","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4790"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4790\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4791,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4790\/revisions\/4791"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4790"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4790"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4790"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}