September

As per, been super busy with various volunteering tasks and work at the pub. I'll just make this a brief post with some September photos.

Garden carpet moth on our bird of paradise plant (11th Sept)

Raindrop covered hibiscus (12th Sept)

Raindrops on a large white butterfly caterpillar clambering along chicken wire (12th Sept)

My Dad and my Gramps were always very keen on keeping fish and reptiles and that sort of thing. In the past year my Dad has started this hobby up again with various beautiful fish, but more interestingly freshwater blueclaw crayfish (Cherax quadricarinatus). These are native to Australia and apparently they are a delicacy over there. I personally wouldn't eat one, being a veggie, but they are certainly very attractive! My dad has inadvertantly managed to breed them and tells me there are 7 young ones scuttling around the tank (I don't really like to advertise, but he asked me to write that they are for sale). Cute as far as crustaceans go! He also kept a recent exoskeleton to show me, and knowing that I am now making a little collection of odonata exuviae etc, he thought it would be a good addition to my collection :)

Adult male (15th Sept)

Juvenile

Exoskeleton

Underside

The first one Dad got eating a fish (taken in December 2012)

Little blue flower from a wild flower seed mat. Any ideas? Side view below...

Monday 16th I braved the M25 traffic and drove up to Whipsnade Zoo. I had a wonderful day, mainly due to having my own personal tour from a very lovely friend :) They have about 1000 free roaming animals in the grounds - the mara were pretty darn cute!

Mummy Mara and her 2 bubbas!

Mum and I drove down to Dungeness last weekend (21st) and purchased some new bins :) long overdue! We tested them out watching the skulking egrets and the wonderfully agile sandmartins. I never tire of watching hirundines skim the water for tiny insects, building up their weight ready for their long journey back to their winter residence. Some of my average attempts of photos are below.  

Little egret on land

Sandmartins

Cormorant

Grey heron

Mid week we had some lovely sunny weather and the cosmos flowers were bloomin' pretty. I thought the pinky purple colour complemented the hazy green of the plants behind. Most of the photos I hardly edited at all and I was pretty pleased with the outcomes.

Cosmos at lunchtime

Carder bee

Bracken enjoying chewing his new toy

Evening primrose

Fuchsia

morning of 24th

Cosmos in the morning

I cropped this slightly and changed the contrast a little bit

I only altered the contrast in this photo ever so slightly

I only cropped this photo very slightly, other than that unedited.

Anyway that is probably enough cosmos photos for now! I will hopefully post again soon with some interesting caterpillars I have seen on various walks and vol tasks. Thanks for reading all :) 

Sunny squash bug and jewel like rain drops

 Last Sunday I we were lucky to receive a bit more sunshine! Unfortunately I had to go to work! I caught a few rays before I had to go and also found this lovely bug! I took a few photos and consulted our insect book, to discover it is a squash bug! Very pretty. The diamond of iridescent bronze on its back was beautiful!

Squash bug

The days following the bank holiday weekend were not as pleasant, with lots of rain. You would  assume we would be used to it by now and just accept that we have crap weather, but we feel we are entitled to summer and therefore whinge about the rain and cold whenever we get the chance. Well I know I certainly complain about the cold!  Anyway a couple of days last week brought rain and then sun in the evenings. The photos below I took because the leaves on a climbing plant we have by our back door just looked so beautiful with the raindrops on them that I spent a little while capturing the jewel like drops!

That's all for now folks, hopefully in the next couple of days I will be out birding, providing our weather stays nice!

Hail and Blue Skies

I seem to have a bit of a back log of material for blog posts, mainly because I have been at work the last 3 days and haven't had a chance! Last Thursday I took pup down to Oare Marshes with my Dad. There weren't any people about, which seemed odd at the time. Later on we realised why! Anyway here are a few photos from the walk...

Sedge warbler

Sedge warbler

Linnet

Linnet

Linnet

Black-tailed godwits

 We were enjoying our walk that had already brought quite a few species, when the heavens opened. Not with rain, but indeed with hail. We were transported back to winter in an instant. Freezing cold and soaked. This weather was made slightly more bearable because the swifts and swallows were producing the most fantastic flight display. Hundreds of them. Swooping, gliding, darting, skimming over our heads and over the water. Breath taking!

The storm that we encountered passed on

Beautiful mute swan

After our extremely wet and cold walk, we headed back to my car where I had brought a flask of tea and ginger nut biscuits that Mum had made. Once warmed up, I headed home to dry pup off!

Typically the afternoon's weather was quite the opposite of the morning's. Beautiful sunshine and blue skies!

Goldfinch

Pup looking cute with his garden toy

I wonder if he is thinking 'why is she taking more photos of me, just play with me!'

From the earlier rain, many of the flowers and leaves in the garden had perfectly formed raindrops on them, which in the sun glinted like diamonds.

Symmetrical Valerian

Aquilegia 

Buddleia leaf

Valerian

'Our' pair of blue tits are being fabulous parents, constantly taking food into the nest box for their cheeping and chirping babies! We would love to have a camera in the nest box for next spring, so I will be saving my pennies!! 

Blue tit with the next insecty snack

Bracken had fun playing in the garden as usual so here I will leave you with a photo of him up the wrong way!

On Saturday we left pup at home and drove to Grove Ferry where we walked a circular route via Stodmarsh. Amazing walk!! Look back soon to see why we had such a fabulous walk!!