North Coast sea watch - a Honey saves the day!

With Linda needing the car tomorrow, I thought I'd brave the weather and drive through the pre-dawn rain and darkness to see if any of yesterday's excellent Skuas and Shearwaters would be hanging around. I spent two hours in the shelters at Sheringham with just a few distant Gannets and Red-throated Divers to show for it, so I moved westwards to the Iron Road. Nothing exciting on the sea here, either: a Kinfisher and a bright (but distant) Wheatear were about the best.

A final seawatch at Cley gave very long-range views of a couple of Skuas, lots more Red-throated Divers and a probable Black-throated. An Arctic (?) Tern, several skeins of Brents and literally hundreds of Teal heading west was about it...

At around 09.30 as I was driving home along the Holt Road (just before the Roman Camp Inn), a beautiful pale phase Honey Buzzard flew low overhead: needless to say, by the time I'd found a place to turn the car it had disappeared.

Interesting crop of Sunspots

I've been photographing the Sun (using all the proper filters, of course!) for ten years or more, but I can't recall ever seeing a cluster of small spots like this before.

In between the showers.

Interesting to note that Greenfinches and Goldfinches are daily visitors to the garden in large flocks (often 40+) while Chaffinches have become quite scarce: we haven't seen one since the spring. My big brother Rob in Kent reports exactly the opposite!

Meanwhile a steady procession of Common Buzzards is passing westwards overhead...

Spotted Redshanks at Cley: the video!

Spotshanks!

A morning at Cley with Norman wasn't desperately productive, but a pair of Spotted Redshanks on Arnold's Marsh were nice and close for photography. Other birds included lots of Ruff, Marsh Harriers, Bearded Tits, a dozen Pintails and a bright Black-tailed Godwit.

The Moon and Jupiter

A spectacular conjunction of the Moon and the gas giant planet Jupiter, close together in the morning sky just before sunrise (Mars was nearby too!) Three of Jupiter's moons can be made out if you look closely!

The bombers may have gone, but the fighters haven't!

Although the USAF has apparently scuttled back to the US from Fairford, Lakenheath is obviously still active: Typhoons and F35s have been dogfighting high over East Norfolk all day...

The Moon, Mars and Jupiter

This morning the Moon was very close (in the sky!) to Mars: Jupiter wasn't far away, either and will be even closer on the 6th: if you're up and about, will certainly be worth a look!

Still a few Butterflies about

Despite the Buddleia having only a handful of  flower heads, it was visited by two Peacocks and two Red Admirals today: all in mint-fresh condition.

Even more astronomy!

Well: in response to quite a few requests, here are three more labelled images to finish off the 'lunar tour'!

More lunar astronomy...

Several people have contacted me to ask if I could post more named images of the Moon, so here goes! The last quarter Moon, with craters labelled in green, mountains in white.
The image of the Straight Wall shows that it is located inside an ancient lava-flooded crater.

Selenography!

The Moon was spectacularly clear in the pre-dawn sky, so I thought I'd label some of the most obvious craters - these can all be picked out with binoculars or a spotting 'scope.