It's only rock & roll!

But I like it! Come and listen to some great sounds and support a totally worthwhile cause, None of the performers are being paid: it's a genuine charity gig!

Incredible week for butterflies!

Nothing rare, but our garden has been absolutely full of butterflies: mostly Peacocks and Small Whites, but also Large Whites, Commas, Meadow Browns, Gatekeepers, Red Admirals, Small Tortoiseshells and a couple of Painted Ladies.

Lunar Clearwing Moth - in the garden!

Since the Buddleia in front of my office window has been crawling with butterflies this week, I thought I'd hang last year's pheromone lure for Hornet Clearwing on it. To my amazement within an hour a Lunar Clearwing zoomed in! Since we're in a village in the middle of open arable land this was quite a surprise: only my second encounter with the species. (Incidentally, I removed the lure as soon as I'd taken a few photos)

'Buck' Moon!

Last night around half past ten the full 'Buck' Moon rose over the rooftops. It being close to the Summer Solstice, the Sun is riding high in the sky, while the Moon never gets far above the horizon: this is accentuated at the moment because of the Major Lunar Standstill phenomenon, when the Sun's gravity increases the tilt of the Moon's orbit around the Earth to a maximum.

The mysterious case of the moving ornaments

When I first met Linda (40+ years ago!) she was an avid collector of English Wade ornaments. Not the little 'Whimsies' that you could buy for 20p, but the rarer, older sets, some of which have sold for hundreds of pounds. After her divorce, Linda sold her collection, but years later she and I started rebuilding it at fleamarkets, antique fairs and car boot sales. Eventually we managed to find virtually every one, apart from a few that were too ridiculously priced even for us!

The collection is housed in the dining room in several glazed cabinets: naturally we enjoy looking at them as we pass every day. A couple of years ago we noticed that the items in one cabinet would occasionally move overnight - sometimes by a few centimetres! There is no obvious reason why this should happen: the cabinet is on an outside wall and not subject to any more vibration than either of the others... The 'before' photos are first in each pair below: this is one day's rearrangement!

International Space Station: July passes

Plenty of bright passes this month, albeit some are late at night / early in the morning. I've omitted a few dim passes and those that are at 'silly o'clock'

Spoonbill flock at Cley: the movie!

From these two clips you can see how much the variously-aged  juveniles harass the poor, long-suffering adults! ( I did see one male clout a Teaspoon with his beak!) 

The night sky in July

Unfortunately (for family reasons) Jules has had to reschedule tomorrow's chat on Suffolk Sound: it will probably take place in a week or two's time. So, to keep you in the loop, here's this month's 'what to look out for'!

North Coast: Spoonbills, Egrets and a few waders

Brian, Norman and I made our usual early start, hoping (to be honest) to catch the recently-present Caspian Tern: sadly, it failed to put in an appearance. As we were waiting to cross the road to the reserve, however, the bird of the day - a Quail - called a dozen or so times from the field to the east of the car park.

 A flock of ten Spoonbills (the majority being juveniles) spent an hour in front of the Centre Hides, while Cattle Egrets, Little Egrets and Great Egrets came and went continually. Several mixed flocks of Curlews and Whimbrels flew through, the latter performing their famous 'seven whistles', while both Little Ringed Plovers and Ringed Plovers were present. After coffee we walked out to the sea, but, apart from more Whimbrels and a few terns, that was about it.

Norman needed to be home early afternoon, so we left the north coast around midday and headed south, stopping at Warham Camp on the way: lots of butterflies (including several unphotographable Chalkhill Blues) - photos later!

Nightjars and Stone Curlews

An invitation to join  Sue and Peter for supper at the lovely home of friends Joyce and Andrew in Suffolk provided the opportunity for a twilight walk across Westleton Heath. Although photo opportunities were few, we did hear at least fifteen Nightjars, as well as two or three Stone Curlews, a Little Owl and a pair of Tawny Owls. As we returned through the woods we came across a single Glow Worm: that's it below, honestly!

The short video clip of  chirring Nightjars will need the sound on your device to be turned up!

Fancy a 'jar or two?

As mentioned in the previous post, the object of our visit to the North Coast was a Nightjar vigil on Kelling Heath: following a thoroughly enjoyable supper at Byfords in Holt, we were in our favourite spot by half past nine. We didn't have to wait too long before both male and female Nightjars began calling and quartering the Heath (allowing some dreadful high-iso images!)