Sunday 5th August

Another extremely hot day today- I visited between 6.30am and 10am today.

I decided to park by Alders Lake today as I had a bit more time than normal. The first bird of the day was a Kingfisher calling and flying low across the lake. Walking on from here I added Jay and several young Chiffchaff and Willow Warbler, also Green and Great Spotted Woodpecker. The scrape was quiet apart from a noisy family party of Reed Warbler. I decided to look around the round pond for Wasp Spider and amazed myself by finding one almost straight away. A really spectacular looking spider with an interesting zig-zag section to it's web.

WASP SPIDER - BOTTOM PICTURE SHOWING THE ZIG ZAG LINE IN THE WEB

Over through the West Scrub I stopped and looked for Roesel's Bush Cricket and managed a few snaps. A few Gatekeeper here but nothing like the numbers of recent weeks. Also 5 Slow wrom in the East Scrub. I then decided to try and stake out yesterday's Purple Hairstreak as it was such a warm morning. I was not disappointed as they were already active in the Ash tree by the railway line - next to the Oak they were in yesterday. There seemed to be 3-4 here - unfortuntately it was only the most worm individual that ventured to the lower branches where I fired off a few pictures. A Cettis called nearby and 2+ Kingfisher were very noisy fishing close-by.

PURPLE HAIRSTREAK (QUITE WORN)

ROESEL'S BUSH CRICKET

There were quite a number of Red Eyed Damsels, Brown Hawker, Common and Ruddy Darter, Emperor, Red Tailed and Blue Damsels around. But no Small Red Eyed here.

Walking back towards the car I at last added Small Red Eyed Damselfly near the dipping platform on the round pond. This species is expanding it's range rapidly and just a few short years ago was a extreme rarity in this country. Also around the pond were half a dozen or so Buff Tip Moth Caterpillar.

SMALL RED EYED DAMSELFLIES