Moths at home

First moth trap of the summer and only second of the year. Deafening fox noise in the early hours but luckily it/they showed no interest in the trap and most of the mains cable was inside the garage well out of chew range!

The downside of attending moth events elsewhere with lots of individuals of many species is the expectation of such at home only to find that there's little to disturb the ten year average of just 23 moths per catch!

Today's  catch was 33/17 and not too surprising with last night being the coolest and windiest for a long time with even a few spots of rain at 07:00.

Three Jersey Tigers and one Garden Tiger were the most obvious; I was surprised that there weren't any Elephant Hawkmoths.

Cabbage, Turnip, Toadflax Brocade (only the third here), Tree Lichen Beauty, Cydia amplana (2nd) and Cloaked Minor were best-of-the-rest.

No Swift calls so presumably most will have left for the journey south.

Friday - more moths with Ed and Zoe

Arrived, as before, with half an hour for a Harbourside coffee and some time with about ten recently returned Turnstones mostly still tortoiseshell coloured.

A dozen of us enjoyed two traps full of moths. Nothing new but plenty of the usual crowd pleasers. Waiting for the full list in the days to come. A Sawfly, Hemichroa australis was the best of the interlopers.

Dewick's Plusia was new for me and Bordered Straw and Drinker were species I've never caught; Four-spotted Footman is a species I've only had once in the garden trap.

The east side produced a GWE with Little Egret close by and a Sparrowhawk escorted away by twenty or more irate Common Terns. A juvenile Sparrowhawk was calling from the scrub behind walkway pond and a few Willow Warblers were calling. Very quiet for insects but Volucella inanis was NfY and another Leptura quadrifasciata 'jumped ship' just before I could press the shutter and finally, below, a Long-winged Conehead.

On the west side a brief chat with first Mark, then Tony and finally David - with four or five Common Common Sandpipers and one Spotted Redshank plus some very tiny Common Terns chicks. Two of this years Marsh Harriers were distant.

I finally managed some nice views of Norfolk Hawker just to the west of MSH but with only the OMTG7 pictures were out of the question.

Others had a couple of drake Common Scoter offshore.

Local stuff - mostly pretty absent!!

The only things thriving locally are reeds, Achillea (a very drought-resilient plant all over the field) and Orthoptera with many grasshoppers in the longer dried grass. So far I've only had Lesser Marsh but I'm sure other species are there. 'Butterfly Alley' is done for the year and the Ragwort has all gone to seed. A Cetti's in the pond side vegetation and a couple of audible Willow Warblers, a few Swallows, a day-roosting Little Egret and a fishing heron were it for birdlife.

A couple of female Volucella zonaria were on Hemp Agrimony.

Most of the dawn to dusk gull noise is down to Herring Gulls and their offspring but last night's calls felt different and, lo and behold, a medium sized raptor gliding away southwards at 2015 hrs was neither buzzard nor kite and, despite having five pairs of binoculars in the house, none were to hand. Dammit! I guess Marsh Harrier was the likeliest culprit.

Irecord

No birding today nor til Wednesday at the earliest but an email from Irecord today was an acceptance of Hybomitra distinguenda from the unrecorded day at WWT with PW on the first of July.

SHP briefly

Very little insect variety beyond Meadow Browns and Gatekeepers other than these bugs - Mirid (Plagiognathis arbustorum) and Ant Damsel (Himacerus mirmicoides).

Male Stonechat still 'chack-chacking' from same bush as last visit, single Red Kite and a few 'heard-onlys' but otherwise very quiet in the continuing heat. Grass everywhere now is yellowish-white and crispy - oh for some rain!!

A smart Lily along the garden wall.

A pack of two third party batteries arrived today, obviously Chinese, but neatly packaged with both batteries in 'click-lock' plastic containers, a charger taking both batteries and appropriate USB-C lead but surprisingly with both B and C inputs.

Austria comes good!

Off to Chi today to collect the Swaros back from second re-armouring. Almost tempted to put them in the back of a cupboard to prevent another failure. Ten years old next Spring and not sure whether Swaro would go through this a third time. EDIT As well as re-armouring it appears they replaced the eye cups and damaged focussing wheel.

Back home the Heron was surprisingly close and confiding near the library corner. No sound of Reed Warblers for ages so presumably all gone, although a brief Cettis call was the first for a while. 

My first Jersey Tiger Moth of the year flushed off the south-side Hemp Agrimony and perched up in a tree but not long enough for a picture.

Emperors and Southern Hawker Dragonflies were obvious plus three Common Blue butterflies were new here this year. Essex Skippers were very much reduced and little in the way of Ragwort ensured few inverts.

This Vespa germanica was wood-stripping.

The Portsmouth 100 art trail features 45 of these decorated lions with one here, one on the Eastern Rd and the rest available via a downloadable map.

Kevin printed me off a manual for the OM TG7.

A few days ago TH was pretty birdless other than 160 or so Avocets (thanks to IM for the count!) and reasonable numbers of Common Terns, some with young.

Leptura quadrifasciata was the best of the insects. North and South Scrapes are starting to look very dry.

Mid July and still roasting!!

Still no sign of any break in the weather and just too hot for birding and indeed the birds. 

A trip over to Chichester saw Curlew, Med Gull and Little Egret from the car and later at least one noisy young Peregrine on the cathedral.

Later still at home a number of gulls, four species, mostly Meds were hawking overhead - maybe a flying ant day.

Yesterday, Saturday, a walk around the Stansted conservation area produced lots of Gatekeepers, Meadow Browns and Small Skippers with a few of Red Admiral, Comma, Marbled White, Holly Blue and a single Small Copper. A Small Fan-footed Wave was more unusual with just two trapped at No 8 both ten years ago!

Still one or two Downland Villa egg-laying at the bottom of the bridleway path.

A few Marsh Tits and noisy Nuthatches were all invisible as were some noisy young Buzzards. The male Stonechat was very obliging on the roadside bushes and footpath signs; hopefully his noisy presence is indicative of breeding.

Today was first day out with the new camera.

It's going to be hard to adjust to lower quality macro shots after the G9(i) with Oly 60/90mm macro lenses but portability is key here. A cheap JJC lens cover and a semi-soft case arrived soon after and I think the non-Olympus flash diffuser might be the next purchase.

It's certainly better than the camera in my phone although the similar lack of eyepiece will take some getting used to. Not sure but might be better for the occasional digiscope pictures depending on light. Time will tell.