Some pictures from Friday's visit to Rainham Marshes.
A male Bearded Tit posing obligingly on a reed stem.
Black-Tailed Godwits on the river mudflats.
A Little Egret preening.
A female Teal preening.
A Little Grebe in one of the narrow waterways.
Collared Doves.
A Hobby eating a dragonfly.
There were still plenty of dragonflies, such as this Migrant Hawker.
A Brown Argus butterfly.
A Knotgrass Moth caterpillar.
A Brown-Banded Carder bee.
A Grass Snake swimming.
A Marsh Frog.
Sunset over the City.
Sorry Ralph that isn't a Southern Migrant Hawker (though now established in the Thames Estuary still few records from Rainham) but an "ordinary" Migrant Hawker. Markings on the side of the thorax are wrong for the rarer species.
ReplyDeleteThanks. Changed.
DeleteExcellent pics Ralph, especially the Bearded Tit.
ReplyDeleteThat was a real bit of luck.
DeleteThank you for the Rainham pics.
ReplyDeleteBack at Hyde Park, the Black Swan was at the end of the Serpentine, getting annoyed by a big Mute Swan who kept chasing him away. He stretched out his neck along the water in his threat display, but it was a wasted exercise because the big Mute was looking the other way!
Thanks. The Black Swan was in a pretty stroppy mood today. After a tentative return he is regaining his position in the hierarchy of the lake.
DeleteGreat pìctures! Lovely view of the city in the fading daylight.
ReplyDeleteThe distance from Purfleet to the pyramid-topped tower of Canary Wharf is about 10 miles or 16 km. Distance lends these horrible towers a certain enchantment.
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