Dorset in July. There are Scarlet Darters, Red-Veined Darters, Balearic Shearwaters ... and there are the simple pleasures of walking through the Dorset countryside with Ms D and Derek the dog and seeing what pops up.
A couple of trips to Wareham Forest. Bird-wise very quiet now. A couple of burst of song from the Redstart near the car park on the first visit, silence on the second. But insects step into the breach; a couple of Clouded Yellows got me excited until I realised people elsewhere were seeing many more. Painted Ladies still going strong. Silver-Studded Blues have now all disappeared to be replaced by Grayling Butterflies; there is a wide variety of sizes in this species, with some really large specimens. A Beautiful Demoiselle, still a treat for me, some Small Red Damselfly, and I twice had the pleasure of adding Black Darter to my list before twice realising I had seen mature female skimmers. But that's one of the joys of the activity, learning the pitfalls.
A walk by the sea from Cogden Beach ( nice Lesser Whitethroat, no Cirl Buntings again) to Burton Bradstock saw us at above the edge of the beach directly below the car-park with a huge colony of Bee-Wolf. There was a constant stream of bees laden with prey looking for nest holes, and in amongst them was another bee species constantly going into and promptly leaving nest holes. This may have been Pantaloon Bee, based on the furry legs, but then again it may not! And once again that strange feeling of seeing people blithely walking past whilst this insect carnage is happening right by them. I resisted the temptation to give them sleepless nights by telling them exactly what horrors of insect life were happening in all those holes
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| Bee Wolf with Prey |
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| Small Red Damselfy Wareham Forest |
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