Flamin' June??  I don't think so. It has been a bit on the soggy side so far this week with successive fronts of heavy rain moving through from the south-west. It has been quite impressive at times and I for one was glad to be in side!

Ships of various shapes and sizes have been a talking point since last week and today the 295 foot long American Coast Guard barque, the ‘Eagle’ headed down river with the stars and stripes flapping around behind them.

'Eagle' - Jerry Hoare

'Eagle' -  HTV


It was interesting to note the contrast to the Mexican ‘Cuauhtemoc’ barque that came back past yesterday. The ‘Eagle’ was crewed by health and safety conscious persons in hi-vis life jackets and proper building site hard hats while the ‘Cuauhtemoc’ appeared deserted and there was definitely in full Tequila party music mode with not a hard hat in sight. .. oh and their flag was bigger.

'Cuauhtemoc’ - HTV

The ‘Eagle’ has an interesting origin... Built as the German sail training ship ‘Horst Wessel’ and launched in 1936 with Rudolph Hess and Adolf Hitler to see her off, it served to train German sailors in sail techniques until decommissioned at the start of World War II. At the end of the war, ‘Horst Wessel’ was taken by the U.S. as war reparations and is now used as a US Coast Guard officer training vessel.  Although looking similar in age (and appearance) to the ‘Eagle’, the ‘Cuauhtemoc’ was only built in 1982 as one of four ambassadorial vessels for four different New World countries constructed at the Bilbao shipyards in Spain.

Meanwhile down on the marsh a few additional Shelduck, Pochard and Shoveler broods have been appearing and a Red Kite headed through at lunchtime today.

Shelduck family - Jo Collins

Jerry H managed some Bee time in between showers and captured this lovely Bombus vestalis – the Southern Cuckoo Bee and it would appear that we have at least one (probably quite bedraggled) male Banded Demoiselle on the marsh!

Southern Cuckoo Bee - Jerry Hoare

Banded Demoiselle - Colin Robinson

Let’s see what else the week holds?