Black throated diver, Farmoor,16th may

Spent a few hours over farmoor today in the company of a few Oxon birders photographing the diver. The bird didn't look that well but it was diving, preening and wing flapping quite a lot.

 Black throated diver

 Black throated diver

 Black throated diver

 Black throated diver

 Black throated diver

 Black throated diver

 Black throated diver

 Black throated diver

 Black throated diver

2 Dunlin
2 Sanderling
1 Turnstone
all seen along the causeway

 Sanderling

Asham meads BBOWT Reserve Wed 13th Eve

Thousands of Green Veined Orchids in flower in the meadow.

 Green veined orchid

 Green veined orchid

 Green veined orchid

 Green veined orchid

 Green veined orchid

 Green veined orchid

 Green veined orchid

 Green veined orchid

Hartslock BBOWT Reserve,13th May

I went along to BBOWT'S Hartslock reserve today as I had heard that the Lady x Monkey orchids were in flower. About 200 hundred were seen on the slope, also a single Lady orchid and a few Monkey orchids just coming into flower.

 Lady x Monkey Orchid

 Lady x Monkey Orchid

 Lady x Monkey Orchid

 Lady x Monkey Orchid

 Lady x Monkey Orchid

 Lady x Monkey Orchid

 Lady Orchid

 Broad bodied chaser

Butterflies seen today:-
Dingy Skipper
Orange Tip
Brimstone
Large White
Green Hairstreak
Common Blue

Bentley wood, Hants, Sun 10th May

Saturday was a DIY day so Sunday was my day. I hadn't been to Bentley wood for a few years so I thought we could head there and catch up with the Pearl-bordered fritillaries. We arrived about 9.45 a.m. It was quite cloudy with the odd sunny spell breaking through which brought out a few fritillaries.The breaks didn't last long so they soon settled which made it much easier to take photo's.After taking a few pics I had a walk around the clearing and came across a mating pair of fritillaries that were very obliging.At this point Peter law arrived and got some shots of them for himself.I took quite a lot of photo's of them as this was the first time I'd come across a mating pair.The only other butterfly seen today was a Brimstone. I also had an Argent & Sable moth looking like a miniature Marbled white in flight.

 Mating pair on Bluebell

 Pearl-bordered fritillary

 Pearl-bordered fritllary

 Mating pair on Bluebell

 Pearl-bordered fritillary

 Mating pair

 Mating pair on Bluebell

 Mating pair on Bluebell

 Argent & Sable

 Woodland sign

Otmoor,Thurs 7th May

I spent a couple of hours on Otmoor today,my main aim was to see if any Hairy Dragonflies had emerged yet. I started off along the roman road at first but no Hairies were seen, although I did manage to see my first Large red damsels of the year here. I then thought I may as well carry on along the bridleway up to Noke to see if could find them there. While walking along the bridleway I was slightly distracted by a Turtle dove showing very well, feeding near the cattle pens, so I never made it up towards Noke for the dragonflies.So instead I enjoyed photographing the dove with Terry!

 Turtle dove

 Turtle dove

 Turtle dove

 Turtle dove

 Turtle dove

Marsh harrier was seen over the reedbed, also at least 6 Hobby feeding over the reedbed  and Greenaways. 1 Little egret flew out of Greenaways.
Lots of warblers were in song.

Butterflies seen today:-

Green veined white
Small white
Orange Tip
Brimstone
Peacock
Speckled wood

Bison Hill, Bedfordshire,4th May

Made the most of the nice weather today and headed to Bison hill to catch up with the Duke of Burgundy and the other spring butterflies I'd yet to see this year.

 Duke of Burgundy

 Grizzled Skipper

 Duke of Burgundy

 Green Hairstreak

 Duke of Burgundy

 Tortoise Shield Bug

Butterflies seen today:-

Grizzled Skipper 6+
Dingy Skipper 12+
Large White
Brimstone
Orange Tip
Green Hairstreak 5
Small Tortoiseshell
Peacock
Duke of Burgundy 10+

Hudsonian Godwit, Somerset, Sat 2nd May

As the Hudsonian Godwit that was found last weekend in somerset reappeared on Wednesday I decided that if it was still present this weekend I would make the journey down there.It was still there on the Friday so on Saturday morning at 7.30 a.m I checked birdguides to see if it had been seen and it was the first bird on there so it was off to somerset.
When we arrived,we parked up and then walked the 300 or so metres to where the bird was.The Godwit was seen right at the back of the pool amongst the flock of Black tailed godwits. At first it spent most of it's time asleep but eventually it started to move around a bit, had a wing stretch showing the black on the underwing, and then walked around for a short while before sleeping again. Shortly after this the Godwits took to the wing briefly before landing again. While in flight the Hudsonian godwit stood out a mile being so dark. They settled for a while before flying off again,the reason being a Peregrine falcon. The Peregrine stooped at the flock but didn't catch anything. The Godwits managed to keep above the Peregrine getting higher and higher with the peregrine trying it's hardest to get above them,but couldn't.In the end it drifted off and the Godwits returned about 5 minutes later and landed back on the far side of the pool.