David

Garden spiders, sometimes called cross spiders, become more noticeable at this time of year, often sitting in the centre of their orb webs. The females swell up as they get ready to lay eggs a little later in the autumn.

It had been raining heavily overnight, but the web was in a sheltered spot between the lower twigs of a hazel bush. The spider, indeed a female, was in the middle, undisturbed.

White water lilies on the surface of Old Nursery Pond. The first flowers had opened, most were yet still buds. They, too, should be open now.

A speckled wood butterfly resting on a sunny wall, or rather on the one sizeable patch of lichen on the wall. In a quiet alley by St mary’s church, Bridgnorth.

Candy-striped spider, still on guard under the two hazel leaves stuck together by the web-ball holding what I presume are her eggs. She is still keeping steadfastly on guard, though in a somewhat different position every time I look. But no signs that I have been able to spot of any changes in the appearance of the web.

UPDATE: Since these pictures were taken, the female has gone, with still no sign of developments in the web complex. She may have given the whole thing up as a bad job, or have been spotted by a predator.

Every seed on this sunflower is part of two different spirals; one turning clockwise as it moves away from the centre of the seed head, a slightly tighter one anticlockwise. If all the seeds were still present, the numbers in the two spirals would (probably) be two consecutive members of the Fibonnaci series. The sunflower is one of those in the Women’s’ Institute garden, in Bridgnorth’s Castle Grounds Park.

Hemerobius micans, a type of brown lacewing. I turned over an oak leaf, and there it was, on the underside.