1. Birds of the month the house martins,swallows, and now the swifts!
These amazing birds spend nearly their whole life on the wing and have now returned from southern Africa to scream round our church spires – it is little wonder a more religious age called them ‘the devils birds’ !
2. Flower of the month:
The bluebell. Many of our small woods are now a glorious haze of blue. The wild blue bell ( much more elegant than the garden Spanish’ bluebell) 
is a truly British flower, thanks the warm wet winds we receive from the Atlantic west! It is absent from the dryer colder continent.
3.Mammal of the month:
Badgers; 
This is the month when cubs emerge above ground for the first time and if you are lucky enough to see them playing in the evening near their set it is one of the highlights of the natural year.
4. Insect of the month: the Orange Tip butterfly, 
they can now be seen along our country lanes looking for ‘Jack by the Hedge’ to to lay its eggs and start a new generation. The ‘orange tips’ are only on the male, the female look much more like a cabbage white - till she closes her wings and you see the lovely damask patterned under wings.
Les C
