April 2018

Buckden Roundabout

April 2018

Buckden in Spring

Buckden in Spring

In the first of a new quarterly column, local author and naturalist Mark Ward highlights some of the exciting wildlife

to look out for in the Buckden area over the next three months.

Following the “Beast from the East’s” bitter east winds and

snow in early March, the arrival of spring was even more eager-

ly anticipated than usual this year by humans and wildlife alike.

April brings so much to look and listen for locally, including per-

haps the most unmistakable bird song of all – the Cuckoo. This

is just one of around 50 species of bird that migrate to the UK

from Africa every summer to raise their young.

Sadly, the sound of the Cuckoo has become rarer even in the

relatively short time I have lived in the village. One of the best

places to hear it is along the Ouse Valley Way. There are usually

at least two territorial males between Buckden Marina and

Brampton. Take a walk along the river from around the third

week of the month and you should get lucky. Paxton Pits is an-

other great place to see and hear these charismatic birds.

Cuckoos lay their eggs in the nests of a few host species, but our

local birds tend to target the Reed Warblers that you can hear

chuntering incessantly from the reeds along the river over the

next three months.

April also brings the world’s most-travelled bird to our part of

the world, but you need to be quick to catch it! Arctic Terns

complete a 50,000 mile round trip from the South Pole every year and flocks pass through Grafham Water on their

way north, pausing momentarily on their long journey. Don’t confuse them with the Common Terns that breed lo-

cally and patrol the river all summer long through. It takes a strong northerly wind, and rain, to force down mi-

grating Arctic Terns as they pass over and they are always seen between the third week of April and second week of

May.

Another star April species to search for is the

Snake’s-head Fritillary on Portholme Meadow.

Its purple flowerheads nod in the breeze here

every year - a real rarity in the wild.

Once May arrives and sun shines more often, it’s

time to think about dragonflies. We have a local

speciality, easily seen along the River Ouse and

in the adjacent meadows in May and June – the

Scarce Chaser. It is well-named because it perch-

es motionless on top of a piece of vegetation

before dashing off in pursuit of small flying in-

sects. Males are a lovely powder blue when ma-

ture; the females golden-orange with a black

stripe.

Continued on page 15

The Scare Chaser dragonfly

The Snake’s-head Fritillary