Water crowfoot at Smardale.

Well the felt ball is made - just got to wait for the water crowfoot to come into flower and then I can place the ball in the crowfoot. Hopefully Scandal beck will be low enough to retrieve the ball!

Gower peninsula - insects galore!

Just got round to these...a great variety of insects ....from last weekend.

 

Left column: furrow bee sp, blood bee sp; large sharp tailed bee.
Right column: possible green-eyed flower bee; silvery leaf cutter bee.

Large skipper; crescent plume moth; small blue; marbled white.

Left; great green bush cricket; mining bee sp.
Middle; hunting wasp sp. Roesel's bush cricket
Right; western bee-fly, leaf beetle sp.

Smardale Viaduct and National Nature Reserve.

Having visited Waitby Greenriggs yesterday we then went on to Smardale - the sides of the valley were spectacularly dotted with rockrose and the northern brown argus was on the wing.

Rockrose; common lizard; greater butterfly orchid; the viaduct; spectacular hoverfly'; more rockrose; Scandal beck and   greater spotted woodpecker feeding young.

Northern brown argus and common blue - bottom right - ringlet. 

Woolfest 2016 - Cockermouth

A few pics from yesterday's Woolfest at Cockermouth...lovely sheep and rabbits - spent far too much! Textile pictures by Jackie Cardy.

Marsh helleborines.

A fantastic display at Waitby Greenriggs with so many more to come!

Many more to come.....

Waitby Greenriggs Nature Reserve

A splendid morning at Waitby Greenriggs - hitting it just about right for the orchids, although the marsh helleborines haven't yet peaked - and when they do it will be a true wildlife spectacle. Lots of twayblade; fly orchids (just going over); lesser butterfly orchids; fragrant orchids; northern marsh and common spotted orchids.

General views with globe flowers; tree bumble bee on thyme and common blue. 

Marsh helleborine; twayblade; northern marsh orchid; lesser butterfly orchid; fragrant and fly orchid. 

Maryport harbour

A short walk out this evening - not ideal conditions for photography as quite windy and cooler than at home.

Pyramidal orchids; common broomrape; bee orchid; purple broomrape and common spotted orchid. 

Bloody crane's-bill.

Latticed heath; small heath; five-spot burnet; ringlet. 

The Gower peninsula: Horton and Rhossili

The second day on the Gower peninsula...

Rhossili and Worm Head.

Long-horned bee, Western bee-fly and small blue at Horton Soft Cliffs.

Gower Peninsula trip - Great Tor to Oxwich Point.

Tom and Steve went off down to Swansea for the University open day; arriving a day early, it seems like they had a great couple of days out!

A mix of views of Oxwich bay and Oxwich Burrows looking towards Great Tor.

Left: Round- leaved Wintergreen,
Middle: yellow stonecrop, marbled white and green-eyed flower bee,
Right: small skipper on pyramidal orchid. 

Eycott Hill nature reserve art work.

Following this morning's visit and quick (midgey) field sketches ...the oil painting.

Eycott Hill nature reserve, north Cumbria.

An overcast morning, but that meant the small pearl-bordered fritillaries were happy to land and be photographed relatively easily. Small heaths and chimney sweeper moths also on the wing. The ragged robin and cotton grass was splendid and lovely panoramic views. A good mosaic of species - bedstraw and tormentil were abundant; mountain pansies and thyme too.

Biblical Diamondback moth influx in Cumbria

Last week in the trap we caught around 350 of these small micro-moths. We thought nothing of this influx until we saw the news headline of -"'Biblical' moth influx threatens to devastate crops". These small moths have been swept in in their hundreds of thousands from the continent and are a insecticide resistant 'super pest'... sadly the caterpillars have already started eating through our radishes!

The Diamondback moth.

Large skipper butterflies.

Lovely to see the first great skippers and meadow brown of the year!

Large skipper pair - love the symmetry - even in the crossing grasses in the out of focus background!

Large skippers; meadow brown;orange tip and tiger moth caterpillar. 

Procion dyes and bog bean!

Not sure how this will work out and I think there'll be a lot of hard work involved in the planning stages, but I want to make a quilt/hanging based on bog bean. Apparently bog bean is out at Eycott Hill - the Cumbria Wildlife Trust reserve in north cumbria, so a visit is required. I'm thinking lots of white - machine stitched/drawn view from Eycott, some lace and some printing......what ever I had a good morning dying the fabrics!

Eyed hawkmoth graphic

Love this design in the style of Belen Mena, Ecuadorian moth artist, that Tom has just completed.

Early June moths .....

A quick catch up, after a gloriously sunny week.....

Top; scorched wing; buff ermine
Middle: pebble prominent; pale tussocks
Bottom: angle shades ; gold spot 

Top : fox moth; iron prominent
Middle: engrailed; poplar lutestring
Bottom: miller : common lutestring

Alder moth.

Drumburgh Moss NNR

A lovely display of cotton grass on this North Cumbrian reserve....and associated wildlife. Lots and lots of azure; common blue; blue-tailed and large red damselflies with four-spotted chasers, buzzing around the pools. Also a lovely, fresh silver hook moth.

A mixed media experiment ....

I'm always a bit shy of trying things. Having been to Teesdale at the weekend and photographed the lovely globe flowers, I wanted to do something slightly abstract with them and so, in between writing reports, decided to go for it! The whole process didn't follow the route I'd expected, but I enjoyed it thoroughly - except for the fact I didn't have enough time and the paper was far too small - only A3. So here's the start of a new process that I can develop over the forthcoming weeks - with luck!

I started with pastel paper - would it have been better with cream rather than blue? ...added wax crayon, watercolour and then soft pastel ...not finished pieces, but working inspiration.

Foulshaw Moss across to Whitbarrow.

A large oil.....

Brown Robin Nature Reserve oil painting

A smaller oil of the view from Brown robing across to Arnside Knott and Ingleborough.

High Force sketch

I was pleased with this one - sat on the edge of the cliff overlooking the waterfall, slight vertigo, and people watching over my shoulder - no pressure then!

Green silver lines moth

A new record ...what a beauty!

Classic Teesdale flora..

A stunning walk from Bowless along the Tees from Low Force to High force and then up to the enclosures on Cronkley Fell.....rather warm today! Fantastic stands of globe flower by the river and good numbers of bird's-eye primrose and gentians (a few left in flower) in the enclosures. The mountain pansies were  spectacular too!

Globe flowers.

Mountain pansies

More globe flowers!

Bird's-eye primrose; spring gentian ; painted lady and spring sandwort. 

Low Force - High Force - Cronkley Fell.

A fabulously sunny walk up the river Tees today. I'll blog the flower pictures next as they were so spectacular they deserve a post of their own.

The Tees ; Low Force; View from Cronkley Fell ; a tributary of the Tees and High Force. 

The caltha meadows as you drop down into Harwood; riverside flora; the Green trod - up Cronkley and view up the Tees. 

A whispering kettle of hawk moths!

Just by way of explanation - googled the collective nouns for moths and hawks - whisper and kettle respectively . hence the title! 

Eyed Hawk Moth 

Poplar hawk moth ; Eyed hawk moth; Small elephant hawk moth and elephant hawk moth. 

June 3rd Moth trap ....

Left hand column: Beautiful golden Y ; Knot grass; Dusky brocade;Scalloped hazel .
Right hand column: Iron prominent; Small square spot ; Lychnis; Scorched wing .

Bistort and buttercups

I do so just love this time of year, the verges are so colourful : bistort, buttercups, red campion and cow parsley all at their best.

Just down the road from us - near Wigton, North Cumbria.