We made a trip out today to Woods Mill Nature Reserve, the headquarters of the Sussex Wildlife Trust. It's a small, accessible reserve (with strong educational features), and boasts a wonderfully rich habitat. Well worth a visit if you're in Sussex. And take a camera!
Here are a few of today's highlights. I'll start with the Beautiful Demoiselle, one of the most elegant of the damselflies. I saw my first one of these about a week ago at work and had no idea what it was. Woods Mill, changed that. They were present in large numbers, and busy doing what all dragonflies do at this time of year.
Beautiful Demoiselle damselfly (male)
Those don't really do justice to the way they move, which is rather like butterflies, a fluttering light movement quite unlike the broad bodied chasers I photograph at work. Another graceful flyer is the heron, and we were lucky enough to see one glide in and settle in a tree beside the lake.
Among the other birds we saw were some warblers, a jay flying perfectly across open sky (but I was too slow to capture the moment), as well as various tits and other native birds. They have kingfishers there as well, but we were out of luck today. The biggest surprise though wasn't in the air, nor in the water. It was on the path as we were walking through a wooded area. Now I've seen this creature before, but never in the wild. And although not slow, I did have the camera ready.
I've since checked and confirmed that it's a grass snake (non venomous). It was probably a shade over 3 foot long, and glided serenely into the undergrowth.
More photos from today in the Woods Mill Nature Reserve album on my main site.
I was going to leave today's post at that, but I got one shot in the garden that I have to post (it's in the new June Birds album) and is one in an irregular series of 'fluffy birds'.
Camera note: the demoiselles were taken with the Sigma 105mm F2.8 EX DG macro and Canon 430EX flash unit. The rest of the shots today were with the EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L USM IS lens.
SittingFox
7 Jun 2008Wow, congrats on the grass snake picture – not an easy reptile to photograph when it's on the move. It seems to have quite a large bulge – I wonder if it's just eaten 😉
The fluffy wren is impeccably cute 😆
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7 Jun 2008Adele, I also wondered about a recent meal. The bulge is quite obvious in some of the shots. It was one of the first things I noticed and reduced my concern (I wasn't sure whether it was a grass snake or an adder) given that they're more docile once they've eaten. As for the wren, it's resident somewhere in the gardens here and seems to be quite happy to settle in good camera range now it's got used to me.
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7 Jun 2008Andy, thanks!
Dudley
7 Jun 2008Wonderful set!
cakkleberrylane
8 Jun 2008Great pictures!! Great shot of the male and female damselflies!! Yes, I wonder what the snake has just eaten!!:yuck:
Lovely bird photos!
sprogger
8 Jun 2008Beautiful shots.
Vulpes vulpes
8 Jun 2008WOW @ grass snake! How lucky you had the camera ready. Love the wren shot – cute!
gdare
8 Jun 2008Nice photos as usual. I have recognized that snake as "belouska", a name that could be translated as "white ears", after that white spot behind its head.
I have had one in my appartment for a few days, my father caught it in one of his fishing tours about 15 years ago. I was afraid it could starve so I released it back in forest near the river where it was found.
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9 Jun 2008Darko, apparently the collar or spot is the way to identify these snakes (in England at least). If they're attacked they 'play dead', and throw their head back with the tongue hanging out to be convincing! It must have been interesting to see one close up, but I'm sure it was pleased to be released back into the forest.
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9 Jun 2008Thanks Lois! As for the snake, maybe if I'd have been a few minutes earlier…..
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9 Jun 2008Sprogger, thanks!
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9 Jun 2008Vulpes, yes the snake was a big surprise!