No Moths at All

No moths in this post. Just good old birdy stuff.

A generous call from Alan Barrett this afternoon prompted a local twitch. Great White Egret is still a scarce bird here. I saw one last year, two together the year before, and now another single in 2022. Inadvertantly I flushed it upon arrival, so it was flight views only, and one unfocused burst of blurry shots that are not worth posting here.*

I hung around in case it returned, but no deal. Plenty of compensation though. A Hobby put in a couple of appearances, and there were more Swifts than I've seen anywhere else locally, perhaps 30 or more.

I thought I was photographing one master of the skies, but got two.

Hobby. Never close, but always wonderful.

And there was non-birdy stuff to look at, and creep up on...

Small Skipper

Marsh Frog. Ridiculously green.

My first Gatekeeper of the year proved a bit coy. Having unsuccessfully chased it around for a couple of minutes I asked myself why I was bothering. A really common butterfly, which ought to be out in profusion very soon - why this urge to photograph the first one I see? 'Good question', I replied, and stopped immediately. Moments later, the Small Skipper pictured above - another really common butterfly, and my umpteenth of the year - posed beautifully, right beside the path. I suspect I ought to be drawing some sort of lesson from this tale, but if it's that I am a bit lazy, I know this already.

For the last few weeks, nocmig reviews have gone like this...

Click, click, click, click, click, click...click...click...[loads more clicks]...click...ad infinitum...

Pausing to check out the odd blip invariably results in one of the myriad squeaks, wails and gurks that issue from the throat of every Herring Gull. It has been dire.

Finally, last night, this...

The characteristic Loch Ness Monster squiggle of a Redshank. Music to my ears!

I reckon conditions were a bit poor for moths last night. Cool, windy, the odd shower. Just 21 moths of 13 species bothered to turn up, but one of them was new. In the trap it looked a rather black-and-white thing, distinctly monochrome. But as with so many moths it seems, very different up close...

The Coronet. Not monochrome.

Did I say no moths in this post? I did, didn't I? Oops.

* See? A bit rubbish...