Archived & Upcoming Images of the Day
The male chaffinches at this site really object to one another. This is a genuine un-fiddled single frame of the clearest battle we have ever seen. What a pity they both have bumblefoot and may not make it through to next year to enjoy their hard won territory.
You may already have seen the animation of the growth of the 'field' at http://www.moorhen.me.uk/the_field/the_field.htm. We are still taking the images, and in August 2002 we added one each left and right of the original centre section, slightly overlapping. For some reason we don't ever remember montaging these into a panorama. So here is a mid-summer view as a 150 degree wide montage.
Left - main pond covered in duckweed Middle - silver birch copse (and Round Pond now hidden) Right - Duck shaped pond, 'Meadow Post' and a CCTV camera on a steel pole.
We saw this Speckled Wood butterfly fly down to water level for a drink. To our eyes only about 8 metres away it was camouflaged so well we needed a monocular or camera zoom to see it.
The seed heads mean no more to this male Ruddy Darter dragonfly than a convenient place to perch to warm in the sunshine.
A male Common Darter dragonfly waits for the sun to warm him up. He is a hunter - not interested in the flowers for nectar.
Our only Lime tree (as opposed to Large-leaf Lime) showed a twig with the leaves completely eaten away. The culprits had moved to an adjacent twig where we found about 10 Buff-tip moth caterpillars continuing their search for food.
Finish your greens before leaving the branch!
Our only Lime tree showed a twig
with the leaves completely eaten away. The culprits had moved to
an adjacent twig where we found about 10 Buff-tip moth
caterpillars continuing their search for food.
Our only Lime tree showed a twig with the leaves completely eaten away. The culprits had moved to an adjacent twig where we found about 10 Buff-tip moth caterpillars continuing their search for food.
This male Southern Hawker Dragonfly photographed at 7 fps was hovering and drifting slightly left over the duckweed. So imagine the head just moving left at the same height.
An accurate montage about 140mS apart of this male Southern Hawker Dragonfly flying by at speed.
We heard the rustling of this male Southern Hawker Dragonfly apparently trapped in a tangle of grass. Untangling him revealed that he was hooked by his left forewing on a dead blackberry thorn (the brown stem middle left to bottom right).
After being freed the Dragonfly sat for a moment on the hand. You can see that both left wings got bashed about in the struggle, but real damage was minimal (the thorn simply pierced a single tiny cell) and he flew off perfectly a few seconds after this pic.
Fieldmouse (Wood Mouse) and bank vole in the same night with such similar poses and positions provided this opportunity to compare and contrast the 2 rodents.
A maturing young Robin arrives for an early breakfast.
Autumn Bounty: In the Winter, Spring and Summer we expect any food we
put out in the evening to be completely gone by morning. But in the glut
of autumn heaps of food get barely touched overnight and sometimes some
is left the next evening.
Warning: we have closed the bird to stump gap a bit for artistic effect.
The understated beauty of the Speckled Wood butterfly.
A Wild Rose shoot a few cm high in our 'wildlife friendly' gravel turning area contained 3 Robin's Pincushions - created by a Gall wasp's chemical on this species. This one is only 15mm across (half inch) and was this genuine red.
A Wild Rose shoot a few cm high in our 'wildlife friendly' gravel turning area contained 3 Robin's Pincushions - created by a Gall wasp's chemical on this species. These larger two are about 5cm (2 inches) across and more quietly coloured than the smaller one.
On a Dandelion leaf we made our first recorded sighting here of the tiny 22-spot ladybird.
"An Apple a Day keeps the ..."
Well, this apple had vanished along with the fox by the next frame!
Neither of our aging ears can hear the chirp of crickets anymore, but we spotted this female Roesel's Bush Cricket low on the ground looking wonderful in the sunlight. The antennae are at least as long as the body of the insect and would probably have carried on out of this crop if not hidden by foliage.
If we hadn't seen this male Brimstone butterfly land on the water lily flower, we doubt that we would have spotted him.
The duck-weed on the main pod is covered in these little trails. Where they don't vanish into the bank or under vegetation we will find a pond snail (details in the insert).
In this squabble between juvenile Dunnocks, the lower bird had its back to us, so we have focussed on this aggressive bird facing us.
A pristine Tortoiseshell butterfly feeding on our trusty white Buddleia flowers. After several years of very low numbers it is nice to see several again.
This Common Blue butterfly was perched on a grass stem amongst an impressive 'crop' of thistles. The colour shone out among the whites & Browns.
This Souther Hawker Dragonfly seems to be gliding on the rear wings while flapping the front pair. This image is the top right image in the following montage.
This was an unusual moment to photograph - the legs are down even
though it had flown non-stop for at least several seconds. At 4 fps the
insect was flying towards the camera and made a right angled turn
with little forward motion (all in 250mS) and then accelerated to the left.
Do the legs change the aerodynamics to improve the turn?
Had it spotted something to eat? Dragonflies sometimes predate small butterflies, catching
them in flight.
Photographing dragonflies in flight outdoors is very hit and miss. Lock the camera focus at 2 or 3 meters, lock shutter and aperture (camera Manual mode), about 135mm lens, point the camera at the darting little creature and hold down shutter on 'repeat' whenever you are pointed in roughly the right direction and distance. We get about a 1% useable rate but it is fun trying!
This heron made a distant flyby with the bird caught in the sunlight, but cloud shading the field and house below.
The female Blackbird is still collecting food for chicks somewhere. The nest in the Ivy on the house wall is now deserted but this may well be a different family.
Long after the foxes have gone (for a while at least), a little fieldmouse (wood mouse) ventures out to nibble a corn grain.
We always enjoy the way Fieldmice (Wood Mice) drape their tails, but this one seems to have an unusually long one.
This Fox pays many visits to the ground level sites. We know it is the same animal from a tiny nick near the top right of it's right ear (left and left as viewed here) more visible in the higher resolution originals
Stealthily stepping over the log with eyes locked on whatever it is targeting.
We once saw the badger doing this, and now it is a fox stretching up from the ground to reach the peanut butter smeared along the top edge.
The local Wasp formation flying Team?
No - we didn't cheat - this is a genuine, if bizarre, single frame.
Maybe the first apple this juvenile Great Tit has encountered.
Against the wall of the house, this juvenile Bluetit perches on some of the many blackberry branches that invade everything, but we allow to grow until the autumn clear-up unless they are a danger or in the way!
Chaffinches often squabble at this site, but this is much more an All Out Attack
Teasels have a wonderfully complex flowering pattern with 2 rings starting at the centre and moving upward and downwards. You can see the individual flowers here from which many insects take nectar.
This Knapweed flower is untidy but interesting. Another insect favourite.
This female Southern Hawker dragonfly spent a few minutes indoors for a some in-flight portraits.
This female Southern Hawker dragonfly spent a few minutes indoors for a some in-flight portraits. She was turning in flight here and partly out of frame.
This is a male Brown Hawker Dragonfly diving down.
This is a female Migrant Hawker dragonfly flying across our little indoor stage before we released her back over the meadow.
Our first record of what we THINK is a Smoky Wave moth.
Whatever - it is a beautifully subtle pattern on a translucent wing.
Not a single flight but taken as two flights in the same minute.
A Magpie moth in flight. The bottom of the wing doesn't include the orange markings you see on the top.
This vivid Canary-shouldered Thorn moth is - well - just beautiful.
Not a single flight but an impression
A very common moth here that 'disappears' when perched on bark - the light rear wing is then hidden under the forewing.
What we believe is a Ruby Tiger Moth montaged from 3 separate flights to make this impression.
We are not sure of the ID here, but the Marbled Beauty moth appears to be very variable.