Still windy but that sunshine is v. nice indeedy

The Safari was out early this morning, as soon as the sun hit our neighbour's dry stone bank along the edge of her garden. Here there is a colony of Mining Bees, perhaps two or more species. However, it was the Gooden's Nomad Bees we were after. Little beauts they are.

The sting could possibly be a tibial spur, couldn't see it on any other pics though...are they 'retractable', lying flat along the tibia at other times? Might have to get more pics tomorrow - there is one shot we haven't managed yet

Struggle a bit with Bumble Bees, this one is Red Tailed Bumble Bee, they never keep still and invariably have their face down in the flower. That combined with black eyes on a black face makes them a tricky subject...must try harder!

The bank has some lovely trailing patches of Wild Thyme which is well liked by the bees.

After a cuppa and a bit of breakfast we attended to the moth trap...but where were the moths? All we got was another Codling Moth and this unIDd midge thingy.

Last night we tried some snaps at the crescent moon. Not particularly happy with the result and we were hoping to catch some of the 'earth-shine that was visible later on. Sadly it drops behind the trees at the end of the garden at about this phenomenon occurs...don't particularly want to cut the trees down just for moon pics but we'll try again tonight to see if we can improve on this one.

Where to next? Perhaps another early safari tomorrow as it's a bit warm during the heat of the day for Frank to be out...he really enjoyed an evening swim in the sea today and we can conform the water was warmer than it was in Greece last week.
In the meantime let us know what's not performing for the lenses in your outback.

Just a quick weather note - yesterday was the hottest 25th May so far; today beat the previous 26th May's best  (2008) by a full 8C...both days sending the digital mercury to 26C...didn't feel like that in the 30mph (50kph) wind...what will tomorrow bring, a drop in the wind would help the invert photography.

Oh; and we had diddy Dunnocks in the garden this arvo - nice!