Archived & Upcoming Images of the Day
Probably the last outing for the moth-trap this year only collected some 50 insects but some were new species for us. This is a male 'Feathered Thorn Moth'.
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You can here see the male antennae more clearly in a static image taken on blue card. Some references say that the antennae can detect the female pheromone from possibly a single molecule.
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Probably the last outing for the moth-trap this year only collected some 50 insects but some were new species for us. This moth gets the name Satellite Moth' from an interesting 'dot' pattern on the wing with two 'satellite' dots by each main spot marking.
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We found we had another with much less obvious marks in orange. A completely normal variation according to the 'book'.
 in flight (web crop)(r+mb id@576).jpg)
Probably the last outing for the moth-trap this year only collected
some 50 insects but some were new species for us.
First this quite large Ichneumon. It is a parasitic insect that
lays it's eggs in other species larvae (ugh!). Nature doesn't
think 'cruel' or not - it just finds ways to survive.
This preliminary image we took in an insect box shows the
amazing carapace and head/eye much better than the later
in-flight images.
 ichneumon id in box (web crop)(r+mb id@576).jpg)
A red & green mottled moth with a name that matches it's appearance (not that this helped us discover what it was called).
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A Kestrel flyby - we definitely felt 'watched'. Artistic layout only - just an 'impression'.
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The moved site is now properly adjusted and obtaining some nice portraits of small birds. Here a bluetit perches on a carefully positioned stone.
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13 minutes later a Great tit gazes upwards from the same place.
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The setup at this site got slightly disturbed by wind or an animal causing the camera to be triggered at random during the night. The dozens of otherwise identical frames showed us this snail spending 2 hours or so feeding on the top and side of the log. Start top right & go anticlockwise and then down.
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A Buzzard spent a glorious 20 minutes on the bridleway fence
posts about 100m from us, hunting from one and then flying along
a few posts to try again.
Here the moment as the bird is about to land on a post top.
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A Buzzard spent a glorious 20 minutes on the bridleway fence
posts about 100m from us, hunting from one and then flying along
a few posts to try again.
We tried a number of ways of presenting this sequence, and stretching
the horizontal separation about 50% was the most successful.
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A Buzzard spent a glorious 20 minutes on the bridleway fence
posts about 100m from us, hunting from one and then flying along
a few posts to try again.
Off the bird goes and we expected it to fly along, and instead down
it goes claws first on some unfortunate creature we never saw.
The first 4 images (from the right) are alternate frames about
300mS apart in order to prevent serious overlaps, while the
remainder are about 150mS.
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A Buzzard spent a glorious 20 minutes on the bridleway fence
posts about 100m from us, hunting from one and then flying along
a few posts to try again.
The whole sequence is accurately positioned over about 1 second
of real time.
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This is a Little Owl (actual species common name) launching itself from the perch viewed through the kitchen window. The previous frame on the automatic camera was for the evening before at 17:35 and was also of a Little Owl (we have to believe the same one) but with it's back to us. A little owl has since been spotted camouflaged as dead wood in an old apple tree.
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Sparrowhawks are generally seen flying at high speed in purposeful fashion, as here, but for once right by us, giving a chance at a portrait.
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This sequence over perhaps 1 second is accurately assembled to make this
montage. The maneuverability of the birds is fantastic.
View it as vertical slices from left to right.
In the 3 birds at the right the lower jackdaw broke off
the close pursuit and just tagged along while the other jackdaw
continued the chase.
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Its unusual for a kestrel to dive on prey where they don't get obscured
by a hedge or foliage before they reach the ground, but this
one obliged for us.
The top 3 and bottom 5 images are accurately montaged as groups but the
gap between them is a discontinuity and should be much larger.
Frame rate for the groups was about 7 fps.
The final image has the kestrel mostly hidden by grass with
just wing and tail tips showing where it spent about 30 seconds
with wings flapping. Inevitably the camera ran out of
continuous frames and missed the takeoff. A blurred fly-away
photo (not included) shows the bird with something mouse sized in it's talons.
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A completely new species for our cameras - a common shrew. We knew they live on the plot & have been surprised not to see them on camera. They are very small and the IR trigger beam here is unusually low (about 2cm) over the stone, so this may be the reason for missing them before.
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A lot less damaging to the rodents and birds than the feral cats who also clamber up here, but a lot more damaging to the trees.
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The first jay was spotted a week before this, but a re-arrangement at the tree-trunk top camera setup bagged with portrait.
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And at the recently relocated site 1, probably a different jay gazes up from a feed on the ground.
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A buzzard making a flyover.
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We like to see buzzards, but the carrion crows are a lot less keen and mob them, usually without much success beyond a minor evasion. Although only one bird is in this frame, 4 of them were wheeling round the action.
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To our delight we still have Southern hawker Dragonflies on the wing in mid October on sunny days even when chilly enough for coats. This one was sunning itself in a stand of pine trees near the pond. Both its right wing tips are a little the worse for wear, but he appears otherwise immaculate.
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Our initial planting included only 3 Horse-chestnut trees, but they grew so well we added another 30 or so about 15 years ago. Most are healthy and producing conkers. Here a husk has dropped one of its conkers but not the other.
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A strange bit of behaviour with feral cat and what we think is a polecat. About a minute before this the cat went left to right across the shingle followed a couple of seconds later by the other creature. The cat then returned, looked back, sat down and waited a few second until the second creature paused on a rock & then walked towards the cat who turned and continued unhurriedly on its way with the other following along. There seems no doubt they were companions on the night time forage/hunt.
 to catch up with it 4 of 6 (web crop)(r+mb id@512).jpg)
This is a sequence of 6 images from the CCT at reduced resolution. The untidy time block is moved from the top left of the original frame and is in format yyyy/mm/dd hh:mm:ss.
 to catch up with it 1-6 of 6 (montage)(r+mb id@768).jpg)
This is an accurate montage of a kestrel diving down off 11KV wires. Missed the start as seems inevitable with conventional cameras, but this makes a rather pleasing sweep.
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Another Long eared bat this time flying straight at the camera but veering off well in time.
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Above the tree stump two chaffinches squabble in the air.
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This year the Rooks are harassing the kestrels again, but there are now more kestrels and they seem determined to stay. One distant encounter presented here as a montage. The 3rd frame overlaps 2nd & 4th so have left it out. All the positions are accurate at about 150mS between the first pair and 300mS the second pair.
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A visitor spotted a 7 spot ladybird hiding in the depth of one of these fir cones, and search revealed several out and about.
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A lovely surprise was 2 female kestrels flying overhead within the same minute - first a 'normal' and secondly our 'blonde' bird. We have montaged two similar aerial positions together to show the different colouring.
 flyover (montage)(r+mb id@768).jpg)
But the TOP view of the blonde bird is much more striking than the bottom.
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At 09:20 on a breezy and chilly (11C) early October day this
little beauty unexpectedly fluttered down to this thistle leaf right
to sun itself.
It is a variant of the normal Small Copper butterfly that has
with blue spots on the hind wings.
 blue-spotted form (caeruleopunctata) 11 deg c on ground(r+mb id@576).jpg)
The fragments of this Grass snake skin add up to about 0.5 metres.
The head end is intact though the top of the head is dented or was pulled down
as the snake extracted itself.
It may not be obvious that the top and bottom jaws are separate and can be
'opened' as when attached to the snake.
The amazing part-spheres of the eyes are intact and appear perfectly formed.
Judging from size this snake is probably the one Shown Here
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This a montage of 5 images showing a common darter dragonfly
taking off from a branch. The spacing of the first 3 is forced
horizontally because they would overlap, but the vertical rise is
accurately montaged.
The transition between still and having left the branch takes
66mS (2 frames at 30fps). Hooray for a camera that can store what
happened before you press the button even if the quality is not
'premium'.
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