Archived & Upcoming Images of the Day
A Jay at the hedge bottom.
After years of a couple of sightings a year, we think we have a 'resident' bird
for the time being, and will make the most of the opportunities.
Why the bird's change of behaviour?
All 3 mature Oak trees are smothered in Acorns - one of the staples of Jays.
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'Our' Jay continues to provide selfies.
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An almost classic portrait of the Jay.
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Always something more to eat at the hedge bottom.
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The current male Pheasant stomps his way across the woodland site. He looks a bit startled but the camera is too quick for this to be the cause.
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A celebration of Foxes visiting over a single night.
Judging from the tails and ear shapes we think this is three different individuals.
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A montage of the second Fox entering at the south gap.
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The third Fox crossing the hedge bottom.
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As the day fades this Jay arrives for his final 'round' of the site. Here outside the Kitchen window ...
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... and 8 minutes later a stop off for a final drink.
Despite an 20mm (just under and inch) of rain in the last fortnight there is
still no accessible water anywhere on our site except for our containers.
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Presumably the same Jay we have been seeing regularly takes a 'classic' Portrait on the tree-stump.
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Outside our East hedge several Hawker Dragonflies were zooming about over the grass margin. Their size and Jiz suggest that they are the most common species we see - the Migrant Hawker Dragonfly. later in the day 100m west outside west hedge of the orchard we find this male Migrant Hawker perched on a dead twig.
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As usual, the end of the Dragonfly season sees only Migrant Hawker Dragonflies. Here one flashes by - these accurately spaced set of 4 images occupy about 3/8 of a Second.
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As usual here, the end of the Dragonfly season sees only Migrant Hawker Dragonflies.
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At this time of year fruits begin to seep their sweet juices, providing a valuable energy source for the insects as flowers become rarer.
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A Good year for Comma butterflies.
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The Speckled Wood Butterflies are getting a bit tatty now, but still fly well and it is a pleasure to see them. This one is on the ground leaf-litter
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Against the outside of the conservatory window this spider has captured a wasp in their web, and is now wrapping up their prize.
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The saying 'With her tongue hanging out' can be taken quite literally here as this
female Reeves' Muntjac Deer already has her tongue out while still a metre from the water.
The camera in deep shade reported 22c, but the dark fur makes it quite hot in the mid-day sunshine.
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The Dish at the Duck Pond has been a great 'hit' during the drought.
Here the eyes of the fox advancing for a drink are caught as a reflection
in the still water.
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Ahhh!
A female Reeves' Muntjac Deer on the left shares a 'loving cup' with 'her' male.
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4 hours later at 2 minutes to midnight, this badger sips a little water before trundling on his way
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This Red kite in almost perfect plumage, glides majestically overhead.
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We don't see much of buzzards close by, so startling this one perched on the farm rails
just to the left of this crop took us by surprise as much as the bird.
The camera 'found' the bird quickly enough to catch the rising portion of his departure.
The white edges of the birds plumage suggest that the bird has been 'laid onto' the
background. but each (hopefully invisible) join in the montage is between the birds.)
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The leaves of Teasel plants finish the season by desiccating and curling
up into these lovely geometric shapes.
They remind us of shapes to be found in some parts of the 'Mandelbrot Set' -
an element in the fascinating study of Fractals.
An easy way to explore the Mandelbrot set can be found at
https://math.hws.edu/eck/js/mandelbrot/MB.html
and probably other site. It doesn't matter how much you enlarge
edge detail, there is endlessly more.
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The Bushy-tailed Fox is already in stealth mode just a metre from the ditch.
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We adore the way Foxes twist and turn in their never-ending quest for animate calories.
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This Reeves' Muntjac Deer (right at the edge of the camera frame as usual) is
on two legs as they explore the hedge bottom.
We Bipeds are fascinated by the multiple ways long-legged quadrupeds
maneuver their legs without apparently getting them tangled
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From a rare visitor, at the moment this Jay seems to pop up most weeks. These glorious colours have NOT been enhanced.
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Nearly there on the Red Breast!
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As the day draws to a close this male Blackbird finishes with a shake-out after a bath.
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A poor year for Dragonflies here, so particularly pleased to see this female Common Darter landing on the top of a bunch of thistle seeds heads. It took a moment to find the insect remarkably well camouflaged against the vegetation.
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Not a great year for Ladybirds, but ALL those that we have seen this year have
been the UK native 7-spot Ladybird.
Not a sign of the invading Harlequins at our location, though it seems that
countrywide they are as prevalent as ever.
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With a chaotic web spanning the 30cm gap between window and a vertical plant tower, this Spider waits for the next incautious insect to get caught in their web.
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Bird tails are important parts of the bird's manoeuvring equipment. Tiny adjustments of the tail and wings steer the birds wherever they want to go.
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Buzzards are now less common sightings than in the previous decades. This individual gliding overhead looks a terrible mess during the moult.
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Hello again - another Jersey Tiger Moth in the hedge for once providing a view of the orange rear wing. Our 10 years old specialist Moth ID book shows this as strictly limited to the south coast and here it is, not even transiently, 100 miles north.
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The Great Willow Herb has had a good year, and producing masses of tufts of Pappus - the name of hairs that allow the seeds to travel on the wind At sensible sizes for internet presentation you can't see that thousands of specks of seeds in the pappus, so we include a 3 times zoom as an insert.
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Who's not looking their best then?
There is a water dish concealed behind the log.
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This female Blackbird looks really grumpy as she sits in the hidden bath water.
Birds faces don't have expressions - any assigned by facial features is anthropomorphism.
On the other hand the whole bird's posture can often indicate a state of mind.
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What we are fairly sure is a Wren shows a marvellous spread of feathers. They are about to land on the log with both rather blurred legs swinging forward to absorb the forward motion as they land,
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After months of absence a Kestrel returns to our patch.
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The female Sparrowhawk pays a brief visit to the Meadow Post ...
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... and one of the pair of Sparrowhawks has been busy, here leaving the characteristic ring of feathers where they pluck the prey. This looks like the remains of the Wood Pigeon - a rather large bird for the smaller male Sparrowhawk - so this most probably the females handiwork.
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Our first ever sighting of Red-legged partridge juveniles, here following one of their parents after entering at the south hedge gap.
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From another frame, the youngster in a bit more detail.
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4 days after seeing a single Red-legged partridge with youngsters at the South hedge gap, the camera catches this visit by a pair of adults without a youngster in sight.
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The new neck-ring deprived male Pheasant is a riot of colours.
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The new neck-ring deprived male Pheasant, here with head buried in the feathers as her preens, is a riot of colours.
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The recently harvested field lets us see Hares across the far side
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The recently harvested field lets us see Hares across the far side
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The Bushy tailed Fox walking down the Round Mound at the start of their nightly hunt.
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This badger appears momentarily distracted on their walk down the quite steep slope of the Round Mound, so we unusually get to see both front and rear claws digging into the clay to keep from slipping down.
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2 minutes later the Badger has reached Duck 'Pond' for a drink. The face is reflected in the water.
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Almost immediately looking north we have the first sighting of 9 Canada Geese in flight. Its many months since we saw any Geese, and this flock gave us multiple views as they made multiple passes on all compass points of our patch.
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This montage provides a measure of the speed of flight, showing the same group accurately montaged half-a-second apart.
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The 9 Canada Geese finally return to their lake to our west.
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We definitely have two male Reeves' Muntjac Deer visiting our plot, here drinking from the Water dish less than an hour apart.
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Over just 3 minutes the camera at the Duck Pond eavesdrops on this pair of Reeves' Muntjac Deer as the male tries to get the female to mate.
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Another moment from the assignation.
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The other Reeves' Muntjac Deer (with Bone Antlers) pursues 'his' female
through the south hedge gap, sniffing as he goes.
He also must not miss his brief opportunity. More later.
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For some reason a few Swallows seem attracted to the mounds of clay & rubble outside our south boundary, and we caught this moment as a Swallow suddenly dived down onto some insect in the air below them. These images about 125mS apart, but with no static reference position is for 'artistic effect.
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Another sighting of a few Swallows, this time over the harvested field to the south. Lovely to watch but hard to photograph. With no static reference we choose the spacing for effect.
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This Wood Pigeon is perched in the top of metres long Hawthorn hedges smothered in red Haws.
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A Perky adult Great Tit at the hedge bottom.
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NOT a montage nor adjusted - an unusual paring of the juvenile male Green Woodpecker next to a Wood Pigeon.
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Having a chat at the water cooler the bird bath?
What is it with these two bird species seen together 5 days apart?
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This Sparrowhawk attack was an atypically lengthy affair, long enough to catch on the
'grab' camera on the study desk.
This single frame was taken a few seconds after the initial attack.
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Here is the same image montaged from a few seconds of action.
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The Sparrowhawk then spent what seemed to us an eternity, but was probably about a minute, waiting for the Great Tit to die. We did actually wonder whether the bird was somehow caught on the steel bars.
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But eventually the Sparrowhawk released his grip and to our amazement the bird started to fly off apparently not mortally injured. We think that the Hawk was only trapping some feathers against the steel wires. About 2 metres away there is a tangle of Buddleia and blackberry that Tits 'hide' in while waiting to use the feeder. Maybe he made it to a safe place, maybe not. but we could find no evidence of a successful kill here or in the bird's other favourite dismembering sites.
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Emerald Damselflies are infrequent visitors, only previously seen by natural arrival in 2021.
This species rests naturally with wings partially open.
In the [Image of the Day (View Archive by Subject)] and the [Ultraviolet (UV) UK Survey ...]
(both linked from the home page) you will find images from 2010 for an insect brought to us
by the Bucks Dragonfly recorder for some technical and in-flight photos
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From the opposite side of the stick we catch this beauty opening and closing her wings while perched. The montage is 'accurate' and the insect was perched for both instances rather than preparing for flight.
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A chance portrait of the new male Reeves' Muntjac Deer. The ears are immaculate strongly suggesting that this a one of this years Fawns from another site starting his way in the world.
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A few hours later in the same night we catch this view of our young female Reeves' Muntjac Deer drinking from the water dish at Duck 'Pond'. If you look at the top left corner you will see two eyes glowing in the dark. One minute later our new male Deer has arrived at the water dish. These two opposite sex youngsters seem destined for a romance (well, same effect).
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10 minutes on one of the young Deer takes this selfie at the Meadow site, possibly about to
take a drink at the hidden water bowl here.
When you have 4 legs there are so many ways to arrange them!
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If the conservatory this 'Garden Spider' dropped down from the roof. Here running about on Maries finger we got this one sharp image before we shooed it into a bush outside.
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The mesh of spider silk is NOT upside down!
The downward pointing spikes below the web are attached to single threads
attached to a few horizontal threads.
There is no implication we know the species of spider responsible.
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The Fox is grateful for some artificially provided water as the ponds dry up in the drought.
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The land is now completely parched, and its rewarding to see that a little effort putting out and refilling water trays and troughs is appreciated.
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The 3 a.m. drinker.
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A slightly cookie view of this Wood Pigeon.
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A Close look at a Wren making a rare visit to the Meadow site. The bird's tail is in the classic vertical position.
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The juvenile male Green Woodpecker looking down at the hidden water trough.
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Over a bit more than a day juvenile Green Woodpecker(s) made several visits to the Meadow Site. In the centre image he is still drenched after getting out of the hidden bath.
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Jays are infrequent sightings here, but there were several sightings this week.
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Blackbird juvenile (left) and (most likely) Mum visiting the Meadow Site bird bath 20 minutes apart.
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A nice soak in the bath before emerging a drenched mess.
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Mrs. and Mr Blackbird sharing the Bath water - 2 Hours apart.
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