FIVE DAMSELS AND A DRAGON

With the onset of sunnier and warmer days (it's about time!) the Damselflies and Dragonflies have begun  their annual immergence. A couple of days ago I went down to the riverside to see what I could find.... 

Large Red Damselfly (male)

 Common Blue Damselfly (male)

 

Common Blue Damselfly (female)  The pale colour and  the not yet fully hardened wings show that this is a newly emerged  specimen. The spine under section S8 of the abdomen also denotes that this is a female. 

Blue-tailed Damselfly (female)  The female can be one of five different colour forms...this is a rufescens colour form.

 Azure Damselfly (male)

Banded Demoiselle...one of the more striking looking Damselflies! These were out in good numbers with the males constantly patrolling back and forth along the tops of the riverside vegetation looking for avaliable females and having the occasional altercation with any other male that came within close range.

 Male

I don't know if this male was protecting the bug as a future meal or if it was just coincidence that they happened to settle in the same place!

 Female

This was the only Dragonfly species that I managed to see and I found four of these newly emerging Scarce Chasers. Three flew high up into the overhanging tree branches where they could wait for their wings to harden off, luckily this one stayed low on a Reed stem and posed for a photo call! You can see that it's wings still have creases and wrinkles in them and are not yet fully hardened.

Paxton Pits Awayday

    

        PAXTON PITS  CAMBRIDGESHIRE  9^th MAY 2011

I met Keith at his house at 5am. and we set off on our quest to Paxton Pits primarily in search of Nightingales. The sun was rising on what we hoped would be a rewarding day and we weren’t disappointed. On arriving in the car park at just gone 5.30 almost the first birdsong we heard was a Nightingale.........But in order to save wear and tear on my typing finger (lazy or what?) and as Keith has already posted the day’s events on his excellent blog I’ll let you read all about it there!

Here are some of my photographs from a wonderful day’s birding.

 The purpose of our quest, lots singing but not easy to see, this is the best I could do !

Nightingale

....other birds 'on show' 

Whitethroat

Willow Warbler

Garden Warbler

Cormorant

Graylag Geese

In the warm sunny weather Dragonflies and Damselflies were out in force.

Male and Female Banded Demoiselles

Red-eyed Damselfly (male)

Southern Damselfly (female) (I think !)

And the best dragon of the day.....

Scarce Chaser (immature male)

And for me the highlight of the day. and something I have not seen before, Cuckoos, up to three noisily chasing each other around the sky in what we assumed to be territorial disputes.

 All in all a most enjoyable day.