Male Common Darter

Very dull on my way to work this morning, so I called into Roxton with no great hope of finding much to Blip. It was very quiet so I contented myself with a stroll around the lake before the rigours of the day. I did see a Kingfisher speeding off across the lake, it was very fast but the distinctive azure flash as it sped away was unmistacable. There was also a raptor that I couldn't id circling the lake. The badger invaded wasp nest is still struggling on.

Busy day at work, stuck in the office so was really glad to see the sun and feel it's warmth when I left. It felt like Dragonfly weather to me so I quickly made my way back to Roxton to see what I could find. When I arrived it was apparent that there were some dragonflies about but the first thing that caught my attention was a Heron, on the far side of the lake as usual. Unfortunately my fixed lense camera is not up to such distances but I decided to get a couple of captures while trying to get closer to my subject. Theres nothing better than crawling through thistles knowing that there is little propect of a decent capture - unfortunately I wasn't disapointed! The bird of prey now had a mate and I still have no idea what species it is!

Time was now pressing, there were Emporer Dragonfiles, Male and female Black Tailed Skimmers and male and female Common Darters. Mostly the dragonflies were hawking but occasionally they would bask on the reeds. I got a serise of captures from this very friendly Male Common Darter which kept returning to one of three reeds situated close together (apart that is, the time it landed on my hat). Some may recall that I Blipped what I thought was a Male Common Darter once before. I had my doubts at the time but am now pretty sure that it was a Male Ruddy Darter. Apart from anything else it's all in the legs, Ruddy Darters have black legs and Common Darters have a light line that runs down the back of their legs. I'm not an expert but I now think I've got it right.

Just as a postcript after picking up my partner from work we came back into Cardington over Smeatons Bridge, there are some road works at the moment so as we crossed the bridge at a crawl we both instictively looked down stream and standing in the middle of the brook was a Little Egret, this on the same stretch of water where I got my Kingfisher capture for my hundreth Blip. Truely amazing.

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