Knepp revisited

For some years now, rewilding has been one of the hot topics in the UK environmental debate. Sometimes controversial, the attempts of different landowners to regenerate their land back to a state of "wildness" has had varying degrees of success. One of the earliest and unarguably most well known is at Knepp estate in Sussex. This large site has become iconic for two star species - the (re)introduced white storks and purple emperor butterflies. The land is "managed" by a selection  of wild pigs and cattle and has a very high biodiversity with turtle doves and nightingales thriving as well as many insects and butterflies. We have been many time before, mostly at this time of year to coincide with peak purple emperor season. This time we were meeting up with two friends who lived locally.

I will start with the storks. From 2016 a number of storks, initially not free-flying, were introduced into the estate. Gradually the storks were allowed to roam free and a nesting colony has now established on the grounds. Together with further introductions of young birds they are an important and sometimes wide-ranging flock.

We arrived about 9 on a vey hot and cloudless day. Within seconds we saw our first storks as a pair have decided to nest right by the car park!!!

You can see thew two youngsters begging for food from their parent. A bit later one of them came in with what we think was a frog which caused chaos as the youngsters squabbled for it!

Elsewhere on the reserve there were a number of stork families nesting in the trees or flying around. You could often hear them before seeing them as the clack their beaks together very loudly causing response from neighbours! The ones flying around came quite close over your heads including the juveniles, with darker bills, who seemed to be practicing their take-off and landings.

The families in the trees around the nests were a bit quieter perhaps as it was now getting quite hot. They certainly look very exotic for the British countryside. In mainland Europe they are often seen in cities nesting on chimneys and are habituated to people. These ones seemed very relaxed.

Away from the storks, the most sought after sightings are of the purple emperor butterflies. We found one oak tree, known as a feeder tree, where a run of sap was forming on the bark about 30 feet up. This was a magnet for the butterflies coming in to feed on it and then resting on the branches around it. 

There are 3 on the tree here lapping up the sweet, sugary sap. The ones in the tree were often very high up but did occasionally come low enough to get some record shots.

There are lots of other butterflies around including this rather distant purple hairstreak,

marbled whites,

large skippers,

and silver-washed fritillaries.

We never found the pigs or cows which roam wild at Knepp but some of the resident fallow deer did cross our path.

Despite the very hot day it was a marvellous walk around the estate and comes highly recommended.