Swallowtails

Some photos of today's Swallowtails at Hickling NWT Reserve, as well as a Small Heath and a couple of Four-spotted Chasers.

Cley and Hickling: high-temperature birding!

An early start at Cley didn't produce anything desperately special, but close views of some common birds (Little Ringed Plover, Greenshank, Common Sandpiper, Lesser Whitethroat etc) were very welcome.

A walk along to Babcock Hide revealed that the Avocets on Watling Water have been more successful in raising a few chicks than those on the main reserve: they didn't seem to be particularly conscientious parents, though...

A move to Hickling gave us our first views of Swallowtails this season: at least four. Other species of interest included a pair of displaying Cranes, all the usual warblers and lots of Four-spotted Chasers

Baby Blue Tits!

A family of Blue Tits has fledged in our garden (or possibly Sue & Peter's!) They are regularly visiting the suet on the feeding station in front of Linda's office window. The fine weather has brought dozens of bees (and hornets!) to the garden, including these cute little individuals on the manuka.

Sunspots

A few developing sunspot groups this lunchtime: NB! I use special filters - never look at or photograph the Sun directly!

Garden tick for the year!

While Linda and I were enjoying a glass of fizz in Sue and Peter's delightful garden, a pair of Common Terns flew across: although I had my camera, I was too slow for a photo. Happily, though, a single bird flew west over our garden today!

First quarter

A couple of photos of last night's Moon. Some people have contacted me to ask why the phase below is called a 'first quarter Moon' when it looks like a half Moon. It's quite straight forward really: as the Moon waxes (grows) from a thin crescent it reaches the stage- for the first time in its 28 day cycle - when a quarter of the surface is illuminated. As it continues in its orbit around the Earth, it reaches full Moon and then begins to wane (shrink) until we see the 'last quarter' - the western hemisphere - illuminated.

Oh go on then: a few more!

The sunset sky was totally clear and bright last night, so I couldn't resist grabbing a few more shots of the Moon, Jupiter and Venus: all four of Jupiter's Galilean moons were on show!

The difference a bit of Sun makes!

Suddenly the garden is springing into life: the Clematis is the best ever, while the Wollemi has both male and female cones. Our guest Partridges seem interested in nesting in the centre bed, while Holly Blues are everywhere! Swifts seem to be doing well lo0cally: there was a gang of 20+ tazzing around the village today.

More astronomy

I couldn't resist taking a more shots of Venus, the Moon and Jupiter: the 'seeing' was good enough that Venus' gibbous phase was clearly visible, as were three of Jupiter's many moons.

Triple conjunction

Unfortunately it was cloudy here in East Norfolk last night when the Moon, Jupiter and Venus were really close together. Tonight the clouds parted just enough to see all three: apart from the Sun, these are the brightest objects in the sky!