A hot, hot day at the start of this month. Two broods of ducklings which had been about the ifrst to hatch this year along the canal, now getting their adult feathers. The two groups were together – and all alive. To keep cool, they were playing. Doing all the thinks kids aren’t supposed to do at the swimming baths. Charging at each other. Power-diving, submerging only for a second. Shaking like a wet dog to dry off.
Flag irises, growing at the edge of the small amount remaining of open water in the pond at Compton Park. Pictured earlier this month as the flowers were just about to open.
A swan family with half-grown cygnets, swimming by apparently serenely, on the canal at Castlecroft.
a rustic sailor beetle – confusingly, a type of soldier beetle – on a fern leaf.
Young wagtail on a fence by the canal. Not worried even when I got quite close, probably because of inexperience.
Tree bumble bee resting on the wooden railing of the footbirdge over the pool, Compton Park
Small, young smooth newt cooling off on a hot afternoon by almost submerging itself in a bird bath. The spider by its tail is probably not aquatic.
Goslings, quite well grown, almost under the shadow of Dimmingsdale bridge on the canal. The Canada goose parents were keeping a close watch nearby.
One lone duckling, so small it looked very recently hatched, on the canal near Compton Lock. The mother mallard was very near by, just out of shot.
Successive stages in the development, post flowering, of a jack by the hedge (meadow salsify)
Bantock Park: a starling searching among the closely mown grass of the formal lawn area for worms and other food to take back to young at the nest.
Lone poppy flowering by the brickwork of the bridge over the canal at Dimmingsdale, the first wild poppy I noticed this year.