All a bit of a do

The Safari was at a summer fair entitled A Bit of a Do today and great fun it was too in the summer sunshine. Shame the gusty wind kept blowing all our leaflets all over the place despite being weighed down with a variety of objects like a lump of coal and a heavy bunch of keys.

In between chatting to the public we kept an eye out for any wildlife on the move. Overhead the local gulls were supplemented by just one Swift, this is the second nearest we've had to Base Camp about a mile away!

The rough field adjacent to the festivities was well worth a look in the lulls when folk were being entertained by activities on the stage. We caught a female Common Blue butterfly in a disposable drinks cup to show the children. A male was also out there with two Meadow Browns, Large and Small Whites and numerous Silver Y moths. A striking Emperor dragonfly also put in an appearance to the accompaniment of a Meadow Grasshopper.

There were plenty of Bumblebees were out too attracted by the plethora of wildflowers.  

One there we couldn't identify, we weren't sure if it was a wildflower or a garden escape even. Apparently according to our good friend and gardening guru KS it's Triteleia laxa known by several common names, including Ithuriel's spear and Grassnut. It is native to California where it is a common wildflower. Bonny looking thing where-ever it comes from.

Nearby was a tiny Wild Pansy, the only one we found despite wandering over most of the field.

But it was the clovers that were top of the bill. After trying in vain, maybe we were a week to early, at the nature reserve to find a couple of species recently there they were right under our feet in abundance today.

Hop Trefoil was the first we came across.

A little further into the field was a drier sparser patch that had lots of clumps of  Hare's Foot Clover

More mooching about had us finding a Kidney Vetch, a species we've not seen at the nature reserve for many years now.

Another sparse patch gave us find of the day, a single flowerhead of the now quite scarce Cornflower. A beauty! It's amazing what's in the seedbank if it's given a chance to show itself. Shame this area is earmarked for re-development. It was a school that was demolished and the ground leveled out and then had a thin layer of soil graded over it and subsequently left to its own devices.

Last but not least was a Speckled Wood butterfly that flew over our display table as we were packing up at the end of the afternoon.

A great day in the sunshine letting folk know how great our local wildlife is and how we really need to take up renewable energy much more that we're doing so far. 

Where to next? A family bereavement has forced last minute changes to whatever plans we may have had for tomorrow.

In the meantime let us know what was hiding in plain sight on a plain site in your outback.