Author: David

The male and female flowers grow on different plants. I don’t know which these are.

A common butterfly on hot days in spring, but normally hard to photograph. Usually very flighy, heading off at even a distant human approach.

This one settled to feed where I was already standing looking for other subjects, and then spend some minutes feeding, giving me views of it from various angles.

Wings from above and edge-on; its incredibly furry-looking body, long antennae and, in some pictures, seemingly even longer tongue probing flowers.

This is a male – the females lack the orange mark on each wing.

This robust thistle was growing as a weed in someone’s front garden.

Once opened, the wild flowers look like dandelions on a taller, thinner but tougher-seeming stem. IIRC, they are indeed related.

Previously unposted images from one of the series posted earlier. Unlike the earlier sets, these have been cropped.

Another common hedgerow plant and garden weed.

The field maple flowers are inconspicuous like many trees. The flowers come out at the same time as the leaves.

The leaves of this tree were already showing galls (the raised reddish spots) from the mites which infest them.

The “eye” markings on the wings, supposedly reminiscent of the markings in a peacock’s tail, showed clearly in the bright sunshine.

Growing on damp ground.

Several different types of grasses flowering or coming into flower. The forms of the flowers are very diverse.

All but one of these grasses was spotted on roadside verges during a one hour stroll.

There’s actually a pair of swans here, mating.

Followed up by both having a good preen.

One bird (the female?) then built a nest one one of the small islands holding a pier of the bridge. The limits of the perfunctory looking nest are marked by a child’s hat which has been dropped from the bridge and an empty drinks can.

Later, and the swan is now preening a few yards away from the nest.

The lone egg will probably still be warming in the hot afternoon sun. But the pair give many signs they may be inexperienced. The river only needs to rise a few inches to sweep away the nest.