{"id":677,"date":"2010-09-06T13:18:19","date_gmt":"2010-09-06T13:18:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/?p=677"},"modified":"2011-11-07T12:41:13","modified_gmt":"2011-11-07T12:41:13","slug":"valley-of-tranquility","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/birdwatching\/valley-of-tranquility","title":{"rendered":"Valley of tranquility"},"content":{"rendered":"

Although our Cheviot Valleys<\/strong> and North Pennines<\/strong> safaris are concentrated in the springtime, we run a few trips to those inland areas in the late summer and early autumn.\u00a0 The final day of August was a trip to the Cheviots, and it could hardly have been better; the weather was wonderful, there were hardly any other people to be seen anywhere and the wildlife was, well, as good and varied as we would expect.<\/p>\n

After collecting Hamish and Vanessa we drove past Morpeth then up the A697 and through the ford at Coldgate Mill.\u00a0 The Happy Valley<\/strong> was deserted and peaceful; a Slow Worm<\/em><\/strong> was basking in the dappled light between gorse bushes, Small Copper<\/em><\/strong> butterflies (a personal favourite) were feeding and sunning themselves and there were even a few Silver Y moths<\/em><\/strong>.\u00a0 We get these migrants in our trap occasionally, and I’ve seen them in profusion on the coast, but these were well inland.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

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Camera-shy Silver Y<\/figcaption><\/figure>Goldcrests<\/em><\/strong> were calling, and eventually spotted,\u00a0Spotted Flycatchers, Treecreepers <\/em><\/strong>and Long-tailed Tits<\/em><\/strong> were all found in one tree, Robins<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0seemed to be\u00a0everywhere we went\u00a0and the first of the day’s Common Buzzards<\/em><\/strong>, rising rapidly in a thermal, suggested that searching skywards could be productive for birdwatching.<\/p>\n

After lunch we walked along the far end of the valley.\u00a0 Red Grouse<\/em><\/strong> were cackling hysterically on one side of the valley, at the same time as we could hear a shooting party on the other.\u00a0\u00a0Siskins <\/em><\/strong>and Lesser Redpolls<\/em><\/strong> were feeding around the treetops, although they did pause briefly so we had a chance to look at them.\u00a0 The warm sunshine and\u00a0excellent visibility mean that it did turn out to be a raptor day; as well as Common Buzzards<\/em><\/strong> there were regular Common Kestrels\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>and\u00a0a Sparrowhawk<\/em><\/strong> then, as we walked back to the car park, a Peregrine<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0 soared majestically and menacingly against the blue sky overhead.\u00a0 Sadly our only Adder <\/em><\/strong>of the day was roadkill, although it had gathered an interesting collection of flies<\/em><\/strong> and beetles<\/em><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

One thing that our safaris have proved to be is a break from the hustle and bustle of everyday life.\u00a0 If you need to get away from it all then give us a call, or if you know somebody who would benefit from a day of chilled out wildlife watching then our gift vouchers could be just the thing they need \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n

Hamish kindly provided some images from the day (including the Silver Y that really didn’t want to be photographed) and my own favourites are here;<\/p>\n

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Mother Nature ages trees better than any bonsai artist can!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

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Northumberland heather in bloom<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Although our Cheviot Valleys and North Pennines safaris are concentrated in the springtime, we run a few trips to those inland areas in the late summer and early autumn.\u00a0 The final day of August was a trip to the Cheviots, and it could hardly have been better; the weather was wonderful, there were hardly any […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,8,12,5],"tags":[371,823,148,320,135,134,121,825,55,208,370,89,261,291,131,285,338],"class_list":["post-677","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-birdwatching","category-cheviot-valleys","category-pennines","category-northumberland","tag-adder","tag-birdwatching","tag-common-buzzard","tag-common-kestrel","tag-goldcrest","tag-lesser-redpoll","tag-long-tailed-tit","tag-northumberland","tag-peregrine","tag-red-grouse","tag-silver-y","tag-siskin","tag-slow-worm","tag-small-copper","tag-sparrowhawk","tag-spotted-flycatcher","tag-treecreeper"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/677","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=677"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/677\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1399,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/677\/revisions\/1399"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=677"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=677"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=677"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}