Pulborough Brooks

 We are becoming regulars at RSPB Pulborough Brooks, not a bad thing with plenty to see, not to far from  home and it's pretty much a different experience every time! The Brooks were very dry on this occasion, which made waterbirds a bit on the thin side but we still managed some notable sightings. We walked out by the pond to look over the Brooks and Margie, piped up "there's a Crane"!!!, 😮😲I who had been fiddling with my camera settings, scrambled for my bins in panic, when with a sly chortle Margie said "oh my mistake it's a Digger!!!

The Digger, GRRRRRRRRR!!!

Now if another Birder had played that trick, violence may have occurred, however as Margie is the love of my life💘 and maker of my Pack Lunch I contented myself with a death stare that would of killed a lesser person!! Luckily for her, Margie, still giggling to herself at her hilariousness had turned her back and had wandered off, oblivious!!! 

Having regained my dignity and composure, I had a look in the Pond, the dull conditions made the depths impenetrable and a slight chill in the air meant a lack of Dragonflies, however there were some nice  Water Lilies and the extremely tame House Sparrows entertained!! 

We were told this is a Fringed Water Lily

Male House Sparrow

Young Sparrow

Mum and young uns!

 

Margie's pic of the Lily

Lily by Margie

View of the dry Brooks by Margie

We wandered down the zigzags, not much on view though we could hear birds in the undergrowth, lots of Gatekeepers Butterflies! The field next door had lots of Goldfinch feeding but they were difficult to get pics of!

Margie's pic of a Gatekeeper reading the info board!

Gatekeeper

Banded Demoiselle

Goldfinch, see them on our feeders but nice to see em "in the wild"

Young Goldie

Weren't all Gatekeepers

Speckled Wood

Female Banded Demoiselle

West Mead hide was dry and fairly dead, but Winpenny was much better with a Marsh Harrier which put on a good show but was a bit distant and a Cattle Egret which was closer but was quite good at hiding among the Cows!

Some Flyover Mallards

A Common Blue in the grass

Not sure on this one possibly a Meadow Brown

Goldfinch

Common Whitethroat

Grey Heron

Marsh Harrier

Distant Kestrel

Kestrel flypast

Lesser Black-backed Gull

Cattle Egret, doing what it says on the tin

Some of Margie's pics from around the trails!

House Sparrow 

Some hunk she took a fancy to!

We had a walk out on the Dragonfly trail but the weather was against us, but it did get us closer to the Cattle Egrets.

The cows were pretty frisky but luckily the fence held!

Cattle Egret

We headed out towards the hangar, we had a Wasp Spiders web pointed out to us, unfortunately the spectacular female wasn't on show, but there was a nice male showing well!

      Warning       Spider Pics below for those that don't like em!!!

Male Wasp Spider

Some kind of mining Bee, fun to watch them disappearing into their Holes

A friendly Robin

Green Sandpipers, managed to find a bit of water

Highland Cow

Big Fungus

A different friendly Robin

Red Admiral

Margie found some insects on a flower

Another interesting walk around the Brooks, It's always a nice walk around

Blackberry & Apple Pie

 Haven't done a cake post for a while. Today I made a Blackberry and Apple Pie, Gluten Free and Organic, which I realise isn't a cake, but close enough! It started yesterday where I went full Hunter/Gatherer and picked meself some Blackberries🏹! To be honest it was more the Gathering side of things,😏 although I did have to fight off a host of wasps and other fearsome insects, I managed to avoid being stung or bitten! I left plenty for the insects, not least because there were a fair few overripe berries, considering it's not even August yet, they do seem to be appearing earlier each year!! Certainly a good year for em though, there were loads of red uns so probably be out again next week after some more!!

Part of the haul

Pastry is my cooking Nemesis😱, even before going Gluten Free it was a nightmare, since, it's worse.😰😱 The problem isn't so much the making of the pastry which is pretty simple, it's more the rolling out and the transferring it to where you want it! I have discovered the trick of rolling it out between two sheets of clingfilm, which has reduced the swearing significantly😲 but there was still a lot of patching required today😲!! The recipe is a pretty basic one with a couple of egg yolks, butter, the plain flour swapped out for my Gluten Free mix.  I make this with Cassava Flour 50%, Buckwheat Flour 30%,Tiger Nut Flour20%, a couple of spoonful's of Tapioca Starch and a teaspoon of Xanthium Gum. I use this mix for pretty much everything it works well, the Cassava/Buckwheat Ratio is not that critical but the rest seems to be essential!! It's also good with Victoria Sponges !

Ready for the fridge

Rolled Out

The fruit mix, according to the recipe I had glanced at suggested 2 cooking apples and 4 eating apples, with the Blackberries. Unfortunately due to someone, who will remain nameless, forgetting to put any on the shop, I only had  3 Pink Lady apples to play with😰😱!! Ok it was me that forgot the Apples 😏😢😂

Pink Lady Apples seen here Post-Coring but Pre-Peeling

Post Peeling and Chopping

The fruit mix more Blackberries were added later with a bit of sugar!

Shiny new Pie Dish, brought for me at Christmas by my Daughter and shamefully not used until now!!

Managed to wrestle the pastry, into the shiny new Pie Dish

Fruit added!

Application of the lid, didn't go as planned with a dramatic collapse halfway to the waiting pie😢

Some repair work attempted but still looking rustic!

Application of egg white glaze and granulated sugar, along with some artistic camera angles and it's looking much better😁!! 

At this point the instructions were "prick with a fork" I felt Margie's comment " we've got one of them, what's he gonna do with the fork" was pretty harsh😲!!! Anyway, cooked at 200°C (Fan) for 10 minutes then 160°C( Fan) for 35 minutes and we have a Pie!!! Whoop!

Looks pretty good!

Bit of crackage and a slight leak but looks and smells tasty!

With the left over Blackberries and Pastry I made a Pasty, which was looking magnificent until I moved it onto the baking tray! Then disaster struck! I put it in the oven any way!! See result below!!

Looks an abomination!! Tasted blooming nice though warm with a dollop of Ice Cream!

The main event looked a lot better!

Pastry came out quite well, nice bright colour and very good flavour!

Nice with Ice Cream!!

Very Tasty!!!!!!