Some you lose and then you win big time

The Safari had a good start to the week with some decent weather and a flat calm sea giving us an early morning Harbour Porpoise and a couple of Grey Seals. The tide was out and what we wanted to photograph was well out of range. 

Back in the office we had an email from SD telling us he'd had at least one Bottlenose Dolphin too. 

The following day we were out with the camera again to try to photograph our target species for the Year Bird Challenge but a scan of the sea didn't reveal any at all but there was a flock of lively gulls away to our north. A good look at those was called for in case any of our quarry were with them although they were too far away to even think about aiming the camera in that direction.

There was a reason for the commotion - a big splash and a dark shape burst through the water's surface. Still too far away but we fired the shutter off anyway.

We'd got Bottlenose Dolphins...but how many?

For the next half hour they came closer parallel to the shoreline but not much closer inshore. The best count we could get three, one in the lead and two following a good way behind.

The following shots are in the order they were taken. Right on the limit of our small lens.

Missed - not quick enough on the shutter button!

They were tricky to get pics off as they weren't doing any big leaps but let's just say we were grinning from ear to ear when we hot back into the office. Still no additions to our Year Bird Challenge though. That would happen at lunchtime when the tide was in - not the best pic though so we'll try to get another but at least Sandwich Tern (YBC #140) has been added to our photo album at last.

There'll be loads roosting on the beach in a few weeks time, big flocks of them, but by then they'll be in their winter garb.
This week we've played host to a young lad on his Work Experience week. One of the tasks we've being doing with him has been a lot of weeding in the Dementia Friendly Garden. The earlier part of the week was very hot and humid. On Wednesday morning we didn't notice any Ladybirds but as the temperature climbed and the humuditity increased there must have been a big influx around lunchtime as we spotted hundreds of  7-Spot Ladybirds returning to our thistle pulling after our break.

There was also a notable influx of Red Admirals flying through the works garden and on Patch 1 as well. 

Our first Swift (P2 #52) of the year here was heard screaming then seen overhead on Wednesday too.

Our young lad was a geography student and interested in climate change and all that goes with it so we took him to the nature reserve to show him how it is involved with the drainage system of the town and if sea-level rises too much then we could become an island. At the end of June 27 years ago we came for a job interview and before going in thought we'd have a wander around the reserve to familiarise ourselves with it as we'd only visited once or twice previously. That day was like this day with warm sunshine and we remember hearing a Grasshopper Warbler reeling away in the rough lower ground to the right of the track and thinking "Hey that's not bad, I could work work here" or at least something like that. Could it have been a descendant of that Grasshopper Warbler that was reeling away from almost the same spot today??? Little did we know way back then that a few years later we'd be instrumental in getting that patch of rough ground included within the Local Nature Reserve.

As well as the Work Experience lad during the day we've entertained Rainbows and Brownies in the evening. They've both had the nets out and ransacked the pond. The Rainbows pulled out a big surprise. Our pond is raised for safety reasons so we would never expect to find tadpoles in there as Frogs and Toads wouldn't be able to jump or climb the wall to reach the water so seeing three of these was a bit of a shock.

We can only imagine that some well meaning person with a pond at home, possibly one that was in danger of drying up in the hot weather has affected a jam-jar rescue and put them in our pond.

The Rainbows found several damselfly nymphs and a fair few dragonfly nymphs but just a couple of days later the Brownies only managed a single damselfly nymph but a great many dragonfly nymphs.

Probably Common Darter dragonfly nymph

All exciting stuff and then the weather changed from a lovely hot and humid, 28C must be one of the hottest June days ever recorded here but the following day was cold wet and windy back down to, a well below average for the end of June, 15C - it felt like 5C in the wind!

Wit the wet and windy weather coming the wildlife seemed to went and the last couple of days have been a bit sparse for sightings although it has grounded the 7-Spot Ladybirds and forced them to pause their journey to who-knows-where as we were still seeing plenty during our last bout of weeding yesterday afternoon.

Where to next? It's the weekend so there might well be a safari somewhere and next week we will be entertaining more Brownies, this time they'll be rockpooling on the beach so watch out for their super finds.
In the meantime let us know who's mysteriously appeared in your outback

It's hotting up so that means invertebrates

The Safari wasn't able to get out on Saturday until late afternoon. The sun was shining and it wasn't too windy so we smothered ourself in Clegg repellent took the short walk round to Patch 2. Insect repellent is the best thing to wear if you want to get close to insects! but it is essential if you don't want to be eaten alive by the little horrors.

We were immediately on to butterflies, there were Meadow Browns all over the grassland and nectaring on the few remaining Bramble flowers.

One pair were getting on down in the long grass

A little further on we came across an Early Bumble Bee which seemed to be a little worse for wear despite the warm sunshine.

It wasn't these low down insects we were there to see. We were looking up, high into the canopy where our quarry watches for rivals and drinks the honeydew. They were very active with two presumed males spiraling high above the tree in a dizzying battle before splitting apart and settling back down on their favourite leaves.

We watched and waited but they never dropped any lower - just as well as our first Brown Hawker dragonfly of the year was patrolling just above the Bramble thickets. Frustrated we wandered down to the rough field where there were many more Meadow Browns, a few Small Skippers and our second first of the year, three Gatekeepers.

We found one Large Skipper too and a fairly fresh one at that rather than an aging tatty one,

At the very bottom of the field there are a couple of scratty Dog Rose bushes, one of which was showing a good growth of Robins Pin Cushion Gall, made in response to a tiny wasp.

Time to return to the scrub for another neck craning session, but this time we were in luck. Almost straight away a movement on a flower caught our eye that wasn't bee-like. We moved in for a closer look and flushed the tiny butterfly. Thankfully it didn't go back up to the canopy but landed on a nearby leaf.

After a while the White Letter Hairstreak decided it was dinner time and more nectar was needed.

Once it was settled it gave us some good photo opportunities.

Phone camera

The White Letter Hairstreaks are a sign of hot summer days but all around were the  ripening signs of autumn.

That night we put the mothy on. Not a great catch 11 moths of seven species.

Chrysosteuchia culmella - again

Bramble Shoot Moth - New for garden

Dark Arches - quite a pale one

Dotted Clay

Dotted Clay - with tufts

Marbled Beauty

 At work we've had a school group investigating the pond.

Ramshorn Snail

Water Boatman

And the best if the lot several of these monsters, the children witnessed one catch and eat a small 3-Spined Stickleback fry and another eating an unfortunate damselfly nymph. Horror, shock, incredulity that that could happen to a fish, glee, the emotions and comments were quite revealing.

Common Darter nymph

So there you have it some brilliant bugs, far more brilliant than any Pokemon character and with more impressive REAL super-powers too.

Where to next? Just two children's groups tomorrow at different locations so there should be something fascinating to find.

Non-stop safari-ing

The Safari has had a hectic start to the week with young Beavers coming to visit and a school group all day today. More Brownies tomorrow evening - can our ears survive the strain all those excited young children make a lorra lorra noise!

Late on Sunday afternoon realising we weren't going to be able to get out we had a last mooch round the garden at Base Camp looking for the Blue Tailed Damselflies to see if we could get any more super close-ups. They weren't playing ball as the sun had gone in and a cool wind had picked up so we had to be content with flowers. Last summer there was hardly any Herb Bennett in the garden, this year there are a few plants. That's one of the joys of having  a wild garden you just don't quite know what's going to come up where year by year.

If there were any hoverflies about they'd love it but we've seen very few so far this summer.

Herb Robert is much more forthcoming and maybe you can have too much of a good thing when it starts invading Wifey's special planting tubs.

We noticed some had little orange specks on them, some times just a few and others had several. They were randomly placed so we deduced they weren't something the plant had produced.

 Then we spotted this tiny fly which may or may not be the culprit of what we suppose are eggs.

Big eggs if that little insect did lay them. Maybe they only lay two as most seemed to be in pairs and several insects have laid their eggs on one flower - isn't nature great there's always something new to see and learn, one question leads to a whole bookful of others.

Last night we were with the youngsters on the beach looking in the rockpools, it was a lovely summer's evening warm with hardly a breath of wind - a perfect evening for exploring on the beach. The recent offshore winds might be great for keeping the sea calm and helping our Dolphin spotting but it does mean there's not a great deal of shells and the like washed up. That didn't stop us finding some good stuff though like this Thornback Ray egg case.

Lots of the Common Prawns were in berry - except this one!

Star find as far as the Beavers were concerned were a couple of medium sized Common Sand Stars.

After we'd got back to Base Camp and had tea we were chatting to our Extreme Photographer on the phone when we notciced the sky start to build up some odd looking clouds. He had similar ones too 200 miles to the south. Once we'd finished chatting we got a couple of snaps with the phone, apparently they are Cirrus fibratus and Twitter friend @MaryJasper2 had similar all the way down in SW Cornwall.

Impressively wispy but were better than this a few minutes earlier

All day today we played host to a local school doing pond dipping and mini-beast hunting. The pond is still a bit slow probably due to the iffy weather in May and early June but they caught a reasonable selection of snails and plenty of 3-spined Sticklebacks, none as bright and energetic as 'Spineless Simon' though. The biggest surprise came in the form of a small dragonfly nymph, we very very seldom see adult dragonflies in the work's garden but there must have been some last year

Of the terrestrial invertebrates this bright, long and skinny Centipede was our favourite but the kids' favourite was probably the huge spider they found and many were brave enough to gently hold it - well done them!

Talk of our Extreme Photographer he's sent a few pics from his garden out in the wilds in the last week or so

Drinker moth caterpillar

Hedgehog

Great Diving Beetle larva - you wouldn't want to mess with those fangs!

Where to next? More Patch 2 dolphin hoping - there was a Humpback Whale not so far away just out of sight over the horizon last week!!!!!!! and there be more netting shenanigans with the kids too.

In the meantime let us know who's sucking the juice out of who in your outback.