Friday, the Day

Bird News: Very quiet generally, although the clear highlight was a Marsh Tit near the Centre, the first in over a year.

After Thursday's rain Friday dawned bright and the Dockens Water was right down to the level of a benign stream again. I decided to go out and clear the path beside Rockford Lake and just to prove it here are the before and after pictures. I also took down the height of the brambles to improve the view of the lake.

There was a green sandpiper and 9 common tern on the shore of Rockford Lake but no sign of the black tern, which must have gone now.

I was over by Ellingham Pound int he afternoon and found this egg-laying emperor dragonfly, the females only get blue like this when they are quite old. Hovering just beside it is a male red-eyed damselfly, I think there must have been a fresh emergence of these as there are lots more about now. I also saw black-tailed skimmer and a single common darter, these have definitely not lived up to their name this year, being decidedly scarce.

Lastly there was a swarm of pond skaters, running to at least several hundred. Both the skaters and the dragonfly were taken by the "digi-bin" technique, not as good as digi-scoping but ok.