Archived & Upcoming Images of the Day
The main pond is totally overrun with Iris plants, some of which have formed seed capsules
that burst open to release the rows of seeds.
They look rather appetising, but the WWW tells us that they taste bitter and are
mildly poisonous to humans and most animals.
Both native and Harlequin Ladybirds have appeared in unusually low numbers this year. Here this 7-spot Ladybird was one of two on this thistle plant - the first of any Ladybirds that we have seen for weeks.
In the gloom under a conifer we find several clumps of Fungi.
This one night saw multiple visits to both the Meadow Post and the perch outside the Kitchen. This seems to be a new visitor since the moult - the Vee shape above the beak being distinct from the more recent visitor.
It is very rare to get more than 1 Owl image per visit to the kitchen perch because the camera controller electronics isn't 'clever' enough. So we guess that the 4 pics we got, at a spread of times, is actually separate visits within about 20 minutes. Here are 3 of the images are here montaged along a ridiculously 'stretched' perch.
Transient sightings of Hawker Dragonflies are supplemented by perched Darter Dragonflies who at least keep still in photographable places. This is a female Common Darter Dragonfly - long past breeding condition but still helping keep the midges under control.
The IR sender pole seems to be a favourite hunting perch for what is probably a regular visitor. These two frames about 140mS apart do portray the delicacy of this little creature, here landing after a brief hunting excursion.
Here is the male Reeves' Muntjac Deer with the full antlers ...
... and here is another male Reeves' Muntjac Deer with new Antlers growing in their 'velvet' sleeves.
We haven't managed to ID this Moth, which flew past us, and then upwards to land on this decades old disused Telephone cable insulator where from the ground it 'disappeared'. The camera zoom found it - what camouflage!
A second brood female Green Veined White butterfly has hopefully laid per eggs to overwinter as Chrysalises for next years emergence. Meanwhile this adult ends her days feeding on some also 'past it' Ragwort flowers.
This Red Admiral Butterfly resting quietly on a thistle seed head opened and closed their wings several times.
At the end of the season several butterfly species feed on the juice leaking from overripe Blackberry fruits
Here this Buzzard spends a couple of minutes on the Meadow Post, photographed automatically without us knowing at the time.
Half an hour later stepping out of the house we were not expecting to see this Buzzard, now perched on the top of the wood power pole about 30m south of the Meadow Post. The Buzzard wasn't pleased to see us, and quickly vanished.
Hours later walking outside the south hedge disturbed this (possible the same) Buzzard from the young Lombardy Poplars along the Farm Road down to the buildings. Having got 'caught out' by this happening in past encounters, the camera was for once ready to catch the departure, clearly giving us a jaundiced eye.
These three pics of a Buzzard in flight cover about 1 second, the 'approaching' effect is real - the bird came quite close to us.
This Heath Grasshopper (Crickets sport hugely longer antennae) on the top of his sock.. Trying to sweep the insect in to the long grass resulted in it instead landing on an arm.
Eventually getting this human tolerant creature onto the corrugated iron sheet, we caught this dramatic moment.
Moving round to the sunny side found this more conventional and detailed view.
We only see a tiny fraction of the Horse Chestnut Conkers that get cached by these seemingly inexhaustible Grey Squirrels.
Yet another conker taken by a Grey Squirrel from inside our patch (we have the only Horse Chestnut trees for about 100 metres around). We watched this Squirrel take it onto the grass verge some 100m away and bury it.
One of the Grey Squirrels here seems to prefer collecting corn ears from the field to the west - we expect that different individuals have different food preferences, just like humans.
These two Grey squirrels seem to be having-a-go at each other.
The overall impression reminds us of 'helmet cam' footage now a common
part of motor racing coverage.
We have 'seen' this Tawny Owl visit the meadow post dozens of times in the last
few weeks, and despite seeing the Owl bringing a Rodent to the post have
not seen any related activity at the nearby Meadow photo site until this sequence.
The Tawny Owl spent about 4 minutes on the post, in the last photo casting
their gaze in the direction of the Meadow Photo site about 10m away to the right.
The camera at that site caught what looks like a passing swoop by the Owl, possibly
touching the ground (low enough anyway to break the photo trigger beam a few
centimetres above the ground) that missed the intended prey.
The Fieldmouse (Wood Mouse) is a montaged illustration of a possible target taken a few minutes before the event.
A single visit by a Tawny Owl to the Meadow Post.
Enter the Fox through the south hedge, already in hunting mode.
Next morning we think a different Fox stops off for drink at Duck pond before continuing their stealthy hunt.
In the dark of the night this Fox checks out the stone at the hedge bottom in a slight confusion of legs, tail and head.
For the second time we see the post that mounts the IR trigger beam sender used as
a Darter Dragonfly hunting post.
Here are two 'return to base' moments for the insect to wait for another midge
Yes, this insect really did fly backward to judge a good landing!
This female Common Darter Dragonfly basks in the ever weakening daytime sunshine on the warmed corrugated iron. An unidentified fly seems to be enjoying the same moment.
A few sightings of Fieldmice (Wood Mice) at the hedge bottom taken over 90 minutes.
We have no idea whether this is the same or different mouse.
We notice 3 slugs on the ground - all from the right hand mouse original.
Over the decades we have seen many direct mouse-on-slug interactions, many of which
seem to be mice licking the apparently sweet (we haven't tried it!) mucus that coats
the slugs. Our best effort at catching this behaviour can be found at
http://www.moorhen.me.uk/imgofday/arch 2011 dec.htm#31
A Darter Dragonfly perched on the vertical tip of a broken-off Blackberry stem.
Darters normally choose more sloping stick end, so this one has to grip the wood
by wrapping the legs around the twig.
We have watched these lovely little creatures for decades, and never perceived
the legs as being this long!
A few hours later we see a male perched on a stick at a preferred angle.
This male Common Darter Dragonfly caught an eye perched on one of the mains cables on its final span from concrete pole to house. We don't have any reference to a similar sighting. The Dragonfly was behaving normally for a Darter - sitting quietly before leaping out to grab some, to us at the distance of perhaps 6 metres, invisible prey item, before returning to the same perch. When the perch is a stick or similar you can keep the camera firing images until the hoped for return, but hundreds of twists of copper wire look the same to both man and beast, and the Dragonfly never landed in the same place twice!
Suddenly what seems to be this single Tawny Owl is making multiple visits to the camera sites set up to 'see' their visits. Here are two visits over one night about an hour apart.
Next night are these two visits about 3 hours apart. This Tawny Owl has brought some sort of rodent to the top of the Meadow Post. Unfortunately the bird turned their back to camera while consuming his prize.
Most of the Tawny Owl sighting are at the moment distant Meadow Post where the camera takes pics for up to 5 minutes. Here the Tawny Owl brought back some sort of Rodent catch to eat, and then turned back to camera to eat the unfortunate Rodent.
The sequence of Squirrel importing corn ears seems to have stopped, but collecting the kernels of Conkers (Horse chestnut fruits) as become quite intensive.
A week ago the Squirrels where mostly collecting Wheat ears from the harvested field to the West. Now the dominant subject for caching is Horse Chestnut 'Conkers', some transported in their green outer husks, and some as just the nut kernel.
Continuing the theme, this Squirrel has climbed to the top of the Meadow Post with their latest plunder.
A slightly unusual looking Fox stops and looks back for a moment after entering through the south hedge gap.
What's that?
This 'long muzzled' Fox makes a pass over the Mound on the next night of the same day.
English language is very awkward when talking about different days overnight.
This Red Kite graced us with a flyby.
Starting at the detail frame above, the flight speed and camera speed means we have to montage alternate images. Here is one set of odd numbers from the sequence ...
... and here the even numbered frames.
A bit later on in the flight the magnificent bird starts to turn away.
We don't have an positional references here so the positions are strictly eye-candy.
A fantastical leap by the Squirrel on the left. What's actually happening is difficult to even guess.
Committed.
No changing the Squirrels mind about the 1.5m drop now!
This grey squirrel must be leaping across to the IR sense beam box about 1.5 metres to the right. No wonder these boxes keep getting knocked out of alignment!
The male Reeves' Muntjac Deer appears to have completely shed his Velvet covering to his right (our left) Antler, but still with fragments of fur stuck to the 'inside' edge of his left antler.
Here is what seemed to be the (at that time) only male Reeves' Muntjac Deer visiting. His antlers have mostly shed the velvet that allowed them to grow, but a few bits of dead skin are still stuck to the far antler.
OK - this sweetie moment is a montage about 1 minute apart - but we regularly see them side by side in poor photo quality night-time moments.
A new adult male Reeves' Muntjac Deer arrives on our site.
This one has antlers in Velvet about half grown.
These deer can apparently mature in 6 to 12 months, so this may be
one of the male Fawns we showed you earlier in the year.
Although from the USA, this fact sheet seems very relevant
https://idahofallsidaho.gov/DocumentCenter/View/5065/Reeves-Muntjac
The idea that this species has been around for maybe 35 million years gives
us real pause for thought.
This Grey Squirrel is carrying part of a Conker to his cache.
How do animals 'know' that they must store food against months of cold to come?
Those that don't have less chance of surviving to pass on their genes next year.
So its 'in the Genes' - but its still an amazing feat.
Two days later the Wheat field to our west has been harvested (the only nearby source of corn ears), and this Grey Squirrel is picking up some of the crop that the combine harvester dropped.
Over 4 days we see 4 passages of Grey Squirrels carrying another Ear of corn from the field to our west. How many actual passages the Squirrel makes without triggering the photo evidence is impossible to even guess.
A male Ruddy Darter Dragonfly.
This female Migrant Hawker Dragonfly hangs up in a sun-warmed hedge.
This female Common Darter Dragonfly was perched on the rather unattractive top edge of an old Satellite dish of pierced grey-finished steel that serves as a safety lid to our incinerator ring of weldmesh.
A male Ruddy Darter Dragonfly perched on the top of a seed head, ready to dart out and grab some passing midge.
The week brought a flurry of Dragonfly activity. Here a female Migrant Hawker flew between a couple of twigs. The order is the slightly counter-intuitive top left to bottom right.
The first male Southern Hawker sighting this year 23 Aug 2024. Here he is hanging from leaves of the Lodgepole Pine trees facing south.
This female Common Darter Dragonfly is perched on the arm rest of an old bench.
A pair of Fieldmice (Wood Mice) mingling their whiskers must be the nearest thing they can reach to a good snog.
It's hardly the Grey Squirrel mating season, but males of most species go on 'having a go' as long as they can.
Imagine our surprise when checking/refocussing the camera that 'watches' the Meadow post showed us this first ever visit, that we know of, of a Red Kite visiting the Meadow Post at about 5 p.m.
This about half-a-second after the pic above. Stopping a bird this big isn't easy.
The bird stayed for at least 5 minutes (the camera stops photographing after 5 minutes of continuous photo-trigger beam break) so we got this little sequence of the bird sometimes quite intensively studying the ground below.
A detail from the 3rd from the left image in the montage.
We have 3 Oak trees mature enough to produce Acorns, but this year almost every 'Acorn' has been parasitised to make a Knopper Gall (right). On the largest tree (35 years old) are also Marble Galls growing from leaves, another insect parasitisation. So far we have found just one unspoiled acorn, but these trees are huge and probably contain many more.
Its the time of year for plant Galls.
This one on a Thistle was made by the aptly named 'Thistle Gall Fly'.
A Common Darter Dragonfly returns to their previous perch after a hunting excursion Intermediate in size between Hawker Dragonflies and Damselflies, Darter Dragonflies hunt by 'Darting' from perches to catch passing Midges, often returning to the same perch. Very convenient for a photographer!
The return flight from the second excursion is caught on camera.
A Migrant Hawker Dragonfly stops long enough to catch a photo.
A female Southern Hawker Dragonfly resting on a vertical stem
We belive that this moth is a Mint Moth (pyrausta aurata).
Originally identified as pyrausta purpuralis (which matches
our ID book photos better than P. Aurata) the ID was corrected by Mike Kelly
of the Seaford Natural History Society (https://www.seafordnaturalhistory.org.uk)
with the following (paraphrased) explanation:-
The wings are well apart - a spot on the hind wing that would be
present in pyrausta purpuralis is missing - Hence pyrausta aurata.
Thanks Mike.
The Brown Argus Butterfly has appeared in most recent years.
The bottom-side of the wing is lighter and differently patterned to the side you see here.
This Butterfly is classed as a 'Blue' despite the dominant colour of brown.
There are a few images of Brown Argus butterflies from previous years, including images
in-flight, starting at https://www.moorhen.me.uk/iodsubject/butterflies_04.htm#13
or the pages that follow.
The two white dots inside the black spot say 'Gatekeeper Butterfly'.
A period of very few sightings of Kestrels in the last few weeks is brought to an end by firstly this immaculate female Kestrel making a short visit to the Meadow Post.
2 days later we were delighted to spot this male Kestrel perched on the 11kV power cables over the bridleway to the north.
This Fox was wandering about on the grass between the main pond and the house. From upstairs we watched this apparently sleepy Fox quietly sit down for a drowse in the sunshine.
As far as we know we didn't disturb the Fox, but something alerted the fox who looked right and then quietly got up and walked right until disappearing behind one of our screening hedges.
As the Fox began to walk quietly out of view the cameraman followed the Fox with the camera
taking about 7 frames per second for 46 frames - that's about 7 seconds.
This animation is displayed at about the real speed once fully loaded.
We wouldn't want to be some small creature with this Fox bearing down on us.
Compared to Foxes, Badgers are blundering creatures, but every creature has to find their niche. Power is the badger's forte.
Fieldmice (Wood Mice) have 'invaded' the outdoor sites. Here is the meadow site montaged from 41 pics over 7 hours, the Fieldmice (Wood Mice) taking a distinctly different route from Voles across the site who are slightly nearer the camera.
At the hedge bottom a few nights later more twee Fieldmice (Wood Mice) on either side of midnight. We judge this as two different individuals.