Some pics from the Cairngorms now. Most people stick to the grouse and other highland specialties when in the the Cairngorms but I can’t resist a good toad photograph and at this loch there were 100s! They were in the water and on the paths. There were a few mating pairs. I I couldn’t resist…
On a trip to a reservoir in kefalonia we saw some interesting stuff. There were scarce chaser dragonflies flying around. There were greek marsh frogs. This mammoth wasp was on a flower. A blue tailed damselfly perched nicely. As did this beautiful demoiselle.
I had a quick dip in a pond at Wat Tyler CP this evening just before the sun had set. And when I say quick I mean I put the net in the water just the once! Along with a diving beetle larva was a small newt: I thought it was rather small for a…
A couple more species from my pond photos. First up an anopheline mosquito larvae. These larvae have the top of the body at the waters surface, unlike the culicine mosquito larvae which have just their breathing tube. This made a reflection shot easier. I also got a head on shot. I also got a couple…
Following on from the last post in Epping Forest, later on in the same day I came across some common toadlets in the leaf litter. They certainly qualify as cute in my book. I also found this Rosel’s Bush Cricket, this individual was one of the less common long winged forms. On a trip to…
When at thursley common back in June I tried some pond dipping off one of the board walks. When filling the tray with water before using the ent I scooped up a water spider, which is rather excellent considering Ive only ever seen 2 before. I caught quite a few in the end, they seeme…
Some more pond photos. For this broad bodied chaser nymph I used image stacking. I also tried some image stacking on some smooth newt tadpoles. And this damselfly nymph. I also took some typical macros of this hawker dragonfly nymph, which had just shed its skin and was light green in colour.
After visiting Epping Forest and Cornmill Meadows (see the last post) we headed for Bedfords Park. It rained for the first couple of hours before beautiful sunshine emerged. A quick look for wasp spiders was fruitless but we found this lovely common toad (Bufo bufo) crawling across the path. I sadly don’t see toads often,…
My final post from Rainham. The ‘other stuff.’ We saw 2 grass snakes, one of which I photographed. There were also a few wasp spiders, including one in a photographable position I got some nice photos of marsh frogs too And a nice one of a common lizard on the boardwalk.
Back in May I took some photos of a smooth newt tadpoles. This 1st one I entered into the BWPA. but didn’t get shortlisted. smooth newt tadpole looking over twig head on edited I also photographed one of the common frog tadpoles.