A new arrival at the pond this week was a lone mute swan. I expect it was just having a look round but it would be good if it decides to move in with a mate next year. After this year I would prefer swans to Canada geese.
There are still lots of common darters to be seen with plenty of mating pairs.
This is a mature male.
I also saw several fairly young looking common darters, including this female.
Ruddy darters are fewer but still around.
It has been a blustery week so catching a migrant hawker at rest wasn't easy, although I did manage one.
Just as I had decided to leave a male southern hawker arrived and spent five minutes hunting around the north hedge, coming as close as 1 metre away from me although it didn't stop for a photo. It is interesting how haphazard recording of uncommon species is. If I had left five minutes sooner or arrived five minutes later I would have assumed there were no southern hawkers left.
This week's butterflies included a red admiral feeding on honeysuckle.
And a fairly worn small copper on fox and cubs, a non-native hawkweed, Pilosella aurantica.
On the way out I came across a sparrowhawk kill, the remains of a pigeon, presumably taken by a female sparrowhawk.
No comments:
Post a Comment