If you’ve been following me on Twitter or Facebook you will know I have had stag beetles Lucanus cervus in my garden recently. Ive had both stag beetle and lesser stag beetle, but I’ll cover the photos of the former from Friday in this post. 2 males were found in a bucket in the garden.…
I came home last night and was shown 2 male stag beetles and a couple of lesser stag beetles in a bucket in my garden. I’ve taken a few photos which I’ll hopefully post later, but here is a shot take with my 35mm at f11 with a 0.5second shutter speed, to show how still…
I started off today with a trip into town and had the rest of the morning to head to RSPB West Canvey Marshes. Or so I thought until I hit yet another standstill of traffic in Essex! I didn’t have time to get to Canvey, so I popped into a private reserve instead and found…
Yesterday I was pointed in the direction of a Cream spot tiger moth Epicallia villica. I tried some angles other than the typical top down one and was treated to some wonderful colours. Who said moths are dull? I also got a close up of the head.
I started today by heading straight to the spot where I saw the emperors emerging, but they were no longer there and just their exuvia were left. Hopefully they got away safely. At lunchtime I managed some shots of broad bodied chasers, a female hovering between egg laying. And a perched male. Yesterday I managed…
Today I came across the first dragonfly that posed for a photo, a broad bodied chaser. In an effort to get something different I put on my 35mm wide angle macro and got this.
Yesterday I had a walk through Denge Woods and Bonsai bank to look for some butterflies and orchids (more on them later). One bonus of the day was a green tiger beetle that ran across the pathha nd flew off ahead. eventually it sat still long enough for this shot.
The Lesser backswimmer Plea minutissima is often overlooked, being quite small (about 3mm long), resembling and often mistaken for a small nymph of the ‘greater’ backswimmer (Notonecta sp.). They are a real pain to photograph, rarely stopping long enough to find such a small creature in the frame, let a alone focus on them! I…
On couple of days ago, on a warm morning (before the horrible bitter cold wind returned), one patch of nettles near a large pond was teeming with invertebrates. Among them was my first Azure damselfly of the year. I also saw a number of red damselflies there and throughout the day, with 12+ seen around…
Another creature I photographed in my macro session was this Rhingia campestris hoverfly. It has the long ‘nose’ due to its extra long mouthpart which can reach down into flowers to get nector other hoverflies can’t reach. I need to find or think of a common name for this beast to tell the children I…