My Cuckoo.

 The latest BTO bulletin indicates that my tagged Cuckoo, Jac, has now not only crossed the Mediterranean but also the Sahara.

 

When we last updated you, Llangollen Cuckoo JAC was nearing Barcelona. He has made very good progress since! By 18:45 on Friday night he was in or around the Hoggar mountains in the central Sahara, southern Algeria. The highest peak in this mountain range, Mount Tahat, is 2,908 m (9,541 ft) high. Isn't it extraordinary to think of the sorts of landscapes our Cuckoos pass through on their incredible journeys? By 09:23 Saturday morning, he had made it as far as eastern Mali. By 7pm on Monday evening, he had covered the remaining 560Km over the Sahara in southern Mali and had arrived in Burkina Faso.

Over the last 24 hours he has flown 98km (60 miles) south east, and is close to Arli National Park in eastern Burkina Faso. He'll have elephants, hippos and lions for company as he stocks up on hairy caterpillars! The temperature there today is 24° with a high probability of thundery heavy showers.

Cuckoo Jac moving south.

 

Jac.

 

The BTO have just issued a bulletin on the movements of this year's tagged cuckoos, including mine.

A series of updates from JAC's tag on Wednesday showed that he had flown 672Km (418 miles) south from his last location near Maintenon, France, over the border into Spain. He was on the slopes of the Sierra de Manga mountain range, close to the village of Ainet de Besan. He was approximately 8Km north east of the town of Llavorsi. Subsequent, low quality signals showed him pressing on further and by late Wednesday night he was 25Km north west of Barcelona. Will he carry on to Africa from here, or stop for a rest?

 

Jac's track from Wales to spain

 

Valley Orchid.

 

Pyramidal Orchid.  Photo. John Elliott

 

Every so often a new species is added to the valley flora, and it was exciting therefore to find last week the first orchid that I have seen here, a Pyramidal Orchid Anacamptis pyramidalis.  It doesn't seem to have been recorded here before. The nearest ones I know of are on the Weymouth Relief Road where the Pyramidal Orchid was the first to arrive after the road was constructed. Orchid seed is very fine and produced by the million and could easily have been wind blown from the Relief Road. There the Pyramidal was quickly followed by Bee Orchids which have proved prolific and now number in their thousands. Are we about to be invaded by a horde of Bee Orchids?

I am not disclosing the exact location of this flower as, all to often elsewhere, keen gardeners have dug them up and they do not transplant.