A good total of 48 species was eventually seen, but it was hard work. It was nice to see the two MUTE SWANS make another visit to the lake, but disappointing not to find any Garden warblers or locate the Spotted Flycatchers.
I made visits to the 7 nestboxes and can say that, in my area at least, it will be a bumber year for BLUE TITS. One box had 13 'ready to fly' youngsters and 12 in another, the other 4 had minimums of 9 in each, and the great tit had 5. Lets hope they don't fledge out tomorrow - the weather's going to be cold and wet - apparently.
A family party of LONG TAILED TITS gave good photo opportunities
Another Beautiful Demoiselle, this one was at the college pond. Apparently the white spot on the top of the wing (Pterostigma) makes this a female.
Azure Damselflies were around the same pond by the scores
The second Willow Warbler. This is the college bird.
7 comments:
Hi Warren. Some great shots today. Like the willow warbler, I tried to get a shot of blackcap today but failed as soon as they saw me they flew. You must have the knack. Cheers, John
Nice shot of the Willow Warbler Warren, still some good sighting down there, things are really quiet here, no young tits (we usually get blue ,great and coal each year only blackbirds so far.
Brilliant photos Warren. Interesting to hear about the white spot on the wing of the Demoiselle.
Thanks for the comments guys. My theory is ''if your out long enough, and snap away at everything,at least one photo will be ok''!!
Warren , enjoyed reading your blogs on a wet afternoon . Re. Demoiselle photos , habitat says this was a F. Banded not Beautiful Demoiselle . Banded will use ponds,lakes and muddy rivers , but Beautiful will only use fast flowing , clean , pebble or sandy bottomed streams/rivers . Both F. are very similar . The Ms. are much easier to tell apart .
Warren , I take the Demoiselle comments back - just found your Grey Wagtail shot - in a clean pebble bottomed stream .
Greenie,
Thanks for the advice. your observations on the demoiselles may both be correct. I have found some by a still lake, and some by the fast flowing stream/river. The ones by the still water may well be BANDED DEMOISELES and the ones by the stream - BEAUTIFUL DEMOISELLE. I'll have to look into it further!
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