Catch up of photos

I've not had much time recently to post stuff, so here's a catch up.

I quite like the colours of juvenile Black-headed gulls and there are plenty about enjoying the unusually sunny summer

Amongst all the diddly little froglets hopping about the damp edges of a pond, I found a little newtlet. It's about the same size as the tiny froglets but a lot longer! It's a poor photo but it wouldn't pose for me.

A juvenile Lesser-black Back Gull idling around

 It's been so hot, even the Woodpigeons have been cooling off

Certainly this toad didn't stay in the hot sunshine long.

A GCGrebe doing the equivalent of a wheelspin in a quick getaway...

These are the Psychedelic Grebes but sadly they failed to nest successfully again this year even though they started much later..

The local Lapwings seem to have a good year. Lots of juveniles about.

The chocolate lollipops have recently appeared in the garden. It will be a while before they become properly strawberry flavoured!

I'm still probably taking more photos of insects than birds at the mo', including this Green-veined White

And this little moth (I'll add it to the thread shortly)

There is one local park that is particularly good for Ruddy Darters, Emerald Damselflies and Small Skippers, so I went last weekend hoping for all three. Got the Ruddy Darter almost immediately.

A freshly minted Gatekeeper, still with crimped wings, posed happily.

And its colours are glorious in the sun

Then I got the Small Skipper

How do they get such a long tongue to bend at right angles half way along???? Lovely little butterflies though

Still no sign of the Emeralds, though … until I spotted just one in the last pool. These are my favourite Damsels and this is the only place I know locally where they are so I was glad to find one and it completed my wish-list for the day - remarkable :)

Fortunately, it wasn't going to be disturbed by any photographer no matter how close I got. If this had been a normal summer I'd've had wet feet taking this, but I had no such trouble getting to it as everywhere is so dry - at this point we'd had one day of rain since April. Now we've had two!!!

I'm not sure but I guess it was egg-laying as you don't normally see them curled around like that. Anyway, it gave some beautiful shots (I think).

Well, that's me all caught up. Hope you managed to stay awake :)