There is a moment in Wild America when James Fisher suddenly stops and notices what he has been missing: There are, he writes, no noisy colonial landbirds in America. And he was right;Europe enjoys nearly a surfeit of crows, a wide diversity of species exploiting virtually every habitat, and most of them so confident in their relationship to man as to be viewed generally with mistrust. For the birder, though, the rich corvid landscape is a highlight of any visit to western Europe.

Alison and I were especially eager to find Red-billed Chough, a rare and declining small crow that breeds on the cliffs of Pembrokeshire. And sure enough, a single individual dived over our heads at Trefin, giving that harsh sh’rring screech that gives these birds their (not entirely fitting) name. Common Ravens lived up to their epithet, too, on the coastal cliffs, honking and croaking as they played on the winds.

It was a very good corvid show all around, with Black-billed Magpies among the commonest of roadside birds

and Carrion Crows at every woodland edge. Western Jackdaws patrolled the lawns and churchyards,

and joined the mixed flocks of larids and Rooks on the fields.

Of all this corvid diversity, it was the Rooks that fascinated most with their odd, baggy-pants walk on the ground, their grating calls, and their occasional fits of acrobatic exuberance.

An aside over at PEEPS, the blog admirably maintained by Bill Maynard, reminds me that the Internet Bird Collection is up to something like 55% of the world’s bird species–videos, photos, and sounds. And it’s a lot cheaper than HBW, which I’m so fortunate to have in my office here at WINGS.

Alison and I were fortunate enough to spend the week after this year’s British Bird Fair in Pembrokeshire, right on the coast of the Irish Sea. We stayed in Penparc, halfway between Fishguard and St. David’s, and spent our time walking a tiny fraction of the 186 miles of coastal path, birding, and enjoying the sites on this my first visit to Wales.

Birding was relaxed, with less to be seen than hoped. But the landscapes and seascapes we enjoyed on our walks were nothing short of spectacular, incredibly green fields and hills dropping off as breath-taking cliffs. Some of the warning signs did little to soothe the worries of an acrophobe:

This one made me laugh each time I saw it–and step carefully back from the too-close edge….

If birds were sparse, the flowers and insects were dazzling. This one, David tells me, is called ragged robin, a wonderful name for a wonderful plant.

Heather was dense on the steeper hills.

The only purpler flower was this sturdy specimen, its name unknown to me so far:

All of this nectar was irresistible to the insects, even to insects in spe:

This 2-inch morsel was on–literally and dangerously on–the coastal path; I wonder what weird and wonderful moth eventually results.

We didn’t look much at butterflies, but some were hard to resist. This enchanting creature is named, somewhat disappointingly, the Wall Brown.

One of the most conspicuous leps in Europe is the Io Peacock, and it never fails to elicit gasps of admiration.

But what stopped us in our tracks every day were the bumblebees, beautiful, sluggish tigers drowsing in the flowers of a cold morning.

We truly do have two springs here in southeast Arizona, that first, often subtle one in February and March, and then this lavish, riotous, out-of-control bursting that follows the monsoon rains, so generous this year.

There’s a lesson in this abundance, as there is in most things. All of our scrabbling and tending and fretful watering has only uncertain result; but the lilies of the field and the weeds of the yard simply wait….

Late monsoon is the season for invertebrates in the desert: enameled lubber grasshoppers, flying ants, transparent damselflies, and all sorts of more sinister wonders, too.

We have bark scorpions in the house all year ’round, but only in late summer do we start to feel that we’re fighting a losing battle, with multiple individuals most days. This was a small one, an inch long; occasionally we find monsters twice that size. They’re reclusive and speedy, and not really that much of a problem so long as you don’t get stung. I’ve been inexplicably lucky these five years, Alison less so….

And  this is the time of year, too, when any night-time drive along our entry road turns into a spider slalom. Tarantulas as big as a cookie stalk the cool night ground, looking for mates. They’re utterly harmless to humans, of course, but an impressive sight all the same, and the sure sign that summer is coming to an end.