Meteorological autumn may have started with the advent of September, but in today’s lovely sunshine it felt like a welcome return to summer after the unsettled spell of the past week.

Along the seawall past Barrier Marsh, the scrub is again getting a foothold among the anthills, home to Goldfinches and Linnets, while Hornets, Migrant Hawkers and both Common and Ruddy Darters hunted for their increasingly scarce insect prey. A few overhead Swallows and Meadow Pipits represented respectively the departing summer and coming winter.

Looking seaward it was high tide, so few signs of returning autumn waterbirds, at least close up; over in the distance, hiding in the heat haze and the sun-twinkled water, as the tide dropped away there were Black-tailed Godwits, Redshanks and Grey Plovers, identifiable by their distant calls.

By the Sailing Club, Strawberry Clover is having a good season, seemingly spreading, and at this time of the year in flower and fruit:

The saltmarshes are assuming the purplish wash of their autumn colours, with Annual Seablite especially turning into a visual feast, from fresh green to deep purple and every shade in-between, while the Glassworts have not yet picked up the cue of the advancing year:

And fringing the sea wall, the Shrubby Seablite too is rapidly assuming its autumnal glow:

At Grange Wood, fungi were showing, in the form of Birch Bracket and Ergot (on the flowers of Sea Couch), but too early yet to see whether the recent rains will trigger widespread fungal fruiting following our hot, droughty summer.

But no such shyness among the fruits of  the hedgerows. Everything seems to be producing in abundance, from Dog Rose and Blackthorn to large and numerous acorns:

And now of course is time to look closely at the Oak leaves. There were a few insects to be found, including this Caliroa species, one of the oak slug-sawflies…

… and most obvious of all, galls everywhere. Common Spangle galls, normally the most abundant, seemed pushed into second place by Smooth Spangles, in a range of colours from white to deep red, but seemingly, at least not in the stretches we walked, no Silk-buttons, normally the second most frequent oak leaf gall…

… while other leaf galls included Oyster galls, and the woody, bud galls included Marble and Cola-nut galls.

So much to see in just a couple of hours, boding well for a productive autumn in #WildWivenhoe!