- Adur Marine Life Reports
- Coastal & Intertidal 2017
Reports
from
the sea, shore
and coast, including Widewater Lagoon
Information
Coastal saline lagoons and the Water Framework Directive (NECR039)
A number of coastal saline lagoons in the UK have been identified as ‘water bodies’ under the Water Framework Directive. This means that there is a requirement to develop type-based classification tools to help assess their ecological status. This study was commissioned by Natural England to inform future work of the UK Technical Advisory Group and Marine Task Team in developing a national consistent approach to the assessment of lagoons under the Water Framework Directive.
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(Community Group) |
(Community Group) |
Events
8
June
Adur World Oceans
Day
World
Oceans Day was first declared as 8th June at the Earth Summit in Rio de
Janeiro in 1992.
Events
occurred all around the world on and around this day.
Adur
World Oceans Day
CANCELLED
2017
Reports
17 November 2017
Red-breasted
Merganser
taking
off from Widewater Lagoon
A
fairly common winter visitor and passage migrant along the coast
Photograph
by Ian Redman
(click on the image for
large resolution & EXIF details)
16 November 2017
Tamarisk at Widewater
2 November 2017
Wall Lizards
All
four Wall Lizards, Podarcis
muralis,
had lost their original tails by Shoreham
Fort. Three adults and a young one with
a stumpy tail quickly skitted
into holes. There was a solitary Sea Campion
flower
on a large mat of leaves just south of the Coastwatch station.,
Hare's
Foot Clover was still showing (post actual flowering) on two plants
on Silver Sands.
Adur
Lizards
17 October 2017
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Rock Samphire, Sea Campion |
Because of a mixture of health and other reasons, I had not been rockpooling or shrimping this year, but I went for a walk along Southwick Beach with the sea lapping over a small amount of sand in the late afternoon, but nothing was showing washed ashore. There were a few beach flowers on the promenade.
3 October 2017
Slow Worm Wall Lizard
Even the breeze had died down so I was eager to go out. The original plan was to see what was washed up on the shore, but this was forgotten as I found two Slow Worms under some roofing felt near Silver Sands, where there were two fresh sprouts of Childing Pink amongst over a dozen plants still in flower with a few Hare's Foot Clover. On the carnot walls and surrounds of Shoreham Fort, I spotted four small Wall Lizards, Podarcis muralis, on the flint. They looked smaller than normal, were all brown in colour and they could have been born this year? There were also fresh sprouts of Sea Campion near the Coastwatch Station.
Childing Pink
Sea Campion
20 September 2017
Sea
Heath, Glasswort, Thrift,
Sea
Campion, Glasswort
Widewater
Flood Plain
A LIttle Egret waded in the Glasswort-lined shallows of Widewater Lagoon, its yellow feet carefully placed in the black mud. Something silvery (probably a small fish) flashed in its beak. Colours were muted under the dark rain clouds, the crimson Glasswort noticeable on the fringes, but Sea Heath had both dark red and green stubby leaves in patches and frequent miniature mauve flowers in the next dry zone on the shore. Thrift flowers were just about hanging on with a few Sea Campion and a patch of Sea Mayweed.
19 September 2017
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14 September 2017
Cormorant at
Widewater
Lagoon
Photograph
by David Verrall
(click on the image for
large resolution & EXIF details)
Grey Heron at
Widewater
Lagoon
Photograph
by David Verrall
(click on the image for
large resolution & EXIF details)
12 September 2017
White
Melilot, Wild Radish
Rock
Samphire, Sea Campion, Aster
Southwick
A short
sunny interlude around half past one
between the squalls; but the breezy conditions
on the canal edge at Southwick blew the tall plants almost horizontal making
photography tricky. These included Wild
Radish
and a few remaining wild flowers
of White Melilot.
Higher up the bank there was a large clump of one of the Asters
as grasshoppers hopped about. A Peacock
Butterfly rose in front of me and was
blown away in the wind. The Rock Samphire
and a few Sea Campion
were spotted on Southwick Beach by Carat's Cafe.
Flower
Images of the Day
8 August 2017
Childing
Pink, Hare's Foot
Clover, Thrift
Black
Medick, Common Blue Butterfly, Bittersweet
Shoreham
Beach East; Silver Sands
and Shoreham Fort Beach
With
a breeze (Force 4)
blowing from the north and black clouds over the sea, conditions
were unsuitable for photographing the fragile flowers
like the miniature Childing Pink
at Silver Sands
that swayed too much in the wind. A small new plant was discovered on Silver
Sands which seems to be Erigeron
canadensis. I
was not even thinking about butterflies
until I surprised a Painted Lady
by the south-facing carnot
walls of Shoreham
Fort, It fluttered rapidly away.
A male Common Blue
fluttered around the remaining flowers south of the Coastwatch
Station.
Adur
Butterfly List 2017
Dunlin
at
Widewater
Photograph
by Yvonne McKeown
facebook
White
Melilot, Wild Fennel, Yarrow
Radish,
Small Skipper
Blackberry
Shoreham
Harbour (northern canal bank at Southwick & Fishersgate)
White
Melilot, Wild Fennel and
Radish were seen in flower
for the first time this year on the harbour canal bank at Fishersgate.
They had been flowering for several weeks. It
was cloudy but fine, but not warm enough for
many butterflies
to be active but I did spot a Small Skipper
visiting
a Spear Thistle and
a Large White fluttering
around a patch of Greater Willowherb.
Wild
Flower Images of the Day
9
July 2017
On
another warm sunny day, occasional butterflies
could be seen over the vegetated shingle on Shoreham
Fort Beach Most of them were Large
Whites around the Sea
Kale, but I spotted at least two male Common
Blues, a Meadow
Brown and a Small
Skipper.
30
June 2017
A
handful of Silver Y Moths
fluttered around the Sea Kale
and the other shingle plants on Southwick
Beach above the high tide
mark east of Carat's Cafe. A grasshopper
nymph was noted again despite there being
no grass.
29 June 2017
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On
a cloudy afternoon, the
vegetated
shingle patch outside Carat's Cafe, Southwick
Beach, alongside the road on the north side
was full up with a selection of wild plants notably
Silver
Ragwort,
Yellow-horned
Poppy,
Sea
Beet, Rock Samphire, Sea Campion, a
prostrate Common Mallow,
sapling
Tree
Mallows,
Plantains,
Sea
Mayweed,
a
Spear
Thistle,
Dock,
Bird's
Foot Trefoil, Black Medick, Seaside Daisy,
the dead flowers of Kidney Vetch,
the
leaves and globular seed pods of Sea Kale,
a small Viper's
Bugloss and
lastly one only of my first ever Rock Sea
Lavender, Limonium. It could
be the Rottingdean Sea Lavender,
Limonium
hyblaeum. It could be a garden escape
of a cultivated Limonium platyphyllum
or
one of a handful of Rock Sea Lavender plants?
There
was a prostrate Orache with what looked like "seed pods" on the
shingle near the wind turbines. However these were leaves rolled up by
the Orache Gall Aphid Hayhurstia
atriplicis. A
very small
hopper nymph
hopped around the Sea Kale.
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Southwick Beach
26
June 2017
A
pleasant sunny day with a Gentle Breeze (Force
1-3) meant
a visit to Shoreham Beach around
the middle of the day. I was rewarded with my first handful of Small
Skippers fluttering around the shingle
plants without settling. These were my first of the year and in atypical
habitat for this small widespread butterfly.
Skippers
are easily overlooked or mistaken for a moth.
Large
White Butterflies fluttered around the
Sea
Kale.
Silver
Ragwort was the most prevalent flower
on Shoreham Beach
by total mass.
Six-spotted
Burnet Moth, Viper's Bugloss, Sea
Heath
Hare's
Foot Clover
Childing
Pink
Silver Sands and Widewater margins
Widewater
Flood Plain hosted my first Six-spotted
Burnet Moths of the year, the first seen
visited the fading Thrift,
and then a newly budding Common Ragwort,
but then seven were seen on a single Viper's
Bugloss spike. The two parent Mute
Swans cruised by with four cygnets
in tow. An adult Herring Gull
descended into the shallow lagoon with a splash and emerged very quickly
with a fully grown Shore Crab.
Three new plants were spotted in flower for the first time this year: isolated
Melilot
on Shoreham Beach and the yellow Biting
Stonecrop and Rock
Samphire on Widewater
Flood Plain.
Adur
Ragworts
23
June 2017
With
a Strong Breeze (Force
6 gusting to Gale Force 7) conditions
for photographing flowers
was difficult to near impossible.
Yellow-horned
Poppy, Silver Ragwort, Mayweed
Viper's
Bugloss, Tree Mallow, Mayweed
Shingle
Beach, Shoreham and East Lancing
Viper's
Bugloss was noted as being prevalent and
very common on Shoreham Beach, with Silver
Ragwort plentiful in flower
and small amounts of Yellow-horned Poppy,
Cat's Ear and Field
Bindweed. The edge of the cyclepath by
Widewater,
Lancing, had notable amounts of a Mayweed
(Sea
or Scentless?) and the inevitable
Smooth Sow Thistle. Occasional Tree
Mallow swayed
in the breeze west
of Lancing Sailing Club. The Widewater Flood
Plain was covered in flowering Sea
Heath with small patches of Ivy-leaved
Toadflax and English
(?) Stonewort
had just started flowering.
Adur
Mallows
Sea
Heath, English Stonecrop
Sea
Heath, Ivy-leaved Toadflax, English (?) Stonecrop
Widewater
Flood Plain
Kidney
Vetch, Tree Mallow, Broom
Viper's
Bugloss
Shoreham
Beach
Summer plants recently noted in flower on Shoreham Beach included the ground hugging Bird's Foot Trefoil, Seaside Daisy and Kidney Vetch, the more upright Common Mallow, Viper's Bugloss, Cat's Ear, Slender Thistle and one clump of Broom.
Red Valerian
Abundant
Red
Valerian stretched for hundreds of metres
on the shingle above the high tide mark with patches
of Silver Ragwort
(only
one clump seen in flower), clumps of
Tree
Mallow, flowering Oxford
Ragwort, widespread clumps of Thrift,
ground hugging Sea Campion and
the omnipresent Sea
Kale. Two small green beetles
Psilothrix viridicoerulea visited
the yellow centres of the Seaside
Daisy. Windsurfer weather (Strong
Breeze Force
6) impaired close-up photography.
Adur
Ragworts
Tree
Mallow, Red Valerian. Sea
Kale (? this
could be Hoary Cress?),
Oxford Ragwort
Yellow-horned
Poppy, Starry
Clover
Shoreham
Beach
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7
May 2017
Beetles at Widewater Psilothrix viridicoerulea |
28
April 2017
In
the late afternoon in cloudy (poor light) and breezy conditions that were
poor for photography:
Sea
Campion x2, Red
Valerian & Silver Ragwort, Hoary
Cress
Sea
Kale x2, Hoary Cress with
Teasels
Coastal
Shingle by Widewater
25
April 2017
On
Shoreham Beach (by Weald Dyke) I was surpised that Red
Valerian, Sea
Kale and Sea
Campion were already beginning to flower.
11 April 2017
Oxford
Ragwort
Shoreham
Beach
Wall Lizards
With the sun shining under a blue sky and the highest air temperature this year recorded by the Met Office at 15.5 °C, spring put in its first appearance and on the carnot walls and surrounds of Shoreham Fort, I spotted at least twenty adult Wall Lizards, Podarcis muralis,that were quite skittish but also had courting on their agenda. A dozen were spotted on the west-facing carnot wall, three on the normally favoured south-facing wall, and at least five on the east side, but not on the wall itself. I expect there many more unseen.
