Category: David

Early ducklings on the upper pool at Badger.

The grouping below is one section of a flotilla which included two broods which were being herded by both sets of parents.

Here is another of them.

I haven’t managed to identify which species yet.

Last weekend the bluebells finally came out in a carpet of flowers.

The view below is of a small wood just outside Rindleford, near Bridgnorth.

And here a view of a smaller patch of the same slope.

Finally from a little wood just a few hundred yards from Boscobel House. Although this picture was taken a couple of days after the others, the flowers are not quite so far out.

The swallows have now arrived from Africa. This pair were resting on the telegraph wires crossing over Badger pool.

One of them is also pictured below showing the brown “throat”. The wing feathers are ruffled in the breeze.

A wasp gathering pollen from a forget-me-not growing in the woods which fringe Highgate Common.

The picture below is of a plant in the same clump, showing the flowers more clearly.

Honesty flowers. The plant perhaps takes its name from the seed cases, which are semi-transparent and show the seed within.

The false oxlip is a cross between a cowslip and a primrose, which were blooming in abundance near to where this picture was taken.

To untrained eyes like mine, the plant looks like an oxlip. But that is much rarer, and in Britain it grows wild only in small areas of East Anglia.

A bee comes to rest on an earthen bank. The veins can be seen in its semi-transparent wings.

Like the comma and tortoiseshell in the past two days posts, this peacock was making the most of the sun on April 13th.

At least a dozen different individuals, including examples from all three species, were on a single five-yard stretch of embankment by the towpath of the Staffs and Worcs canal at the back of Aldersley stadium.

These catkins are a strong reddish-purplish colour – tending more to purple when they are knocked to the ground in strong winds then crushed.

This plant is a weed to gardeners.

The flower is tiny – just a couple of millimetres across. To the right of the flower there is an even smaller insect or spider (click on the picture to go to Flickr to see this more clearly on a larger version).

This butterfly was resting and warming itself on a sunny bank just feet from the tortoiseshell which featured in yesterday’s post.