Lift-off...

The hottest day for seven years, and I spent a good part of it surveying a relatively shadeless brownfield site - phew! It was almost foggy when we arrived at 8am, but by the time we eventually gave up at 1.45pm the mercury had soared to 32C and we were melting...

I spent the afternoon indoors, trying to avoid the heat. Alex, Ben and I baked a blackberry, lime and elder-flower cake - possibly not the best thing to do in the heat! As I hadn't taken any blippable photographs during my site visit, I popped out into the garden and took a few insect images.

My favourite was this female leaf-cutter bee Megachile ligniseca, which was feeding on the common knapweed that has invaded our patio. These bees use the hairs underneath the abdomen to convey pollen, rather than having pollen baskets on their legs. Amazingly I managed to catch it just as it was lifting off from the flower - they're quite difficult to photograph as they never linger very long, especially in such hot weather!