A little rabbit was here to greet me this morning, sharing the grassy area with the juvenile green woodpecker:

There was also a solitary cinnabar moth caterpillar on a ragwort nearly stripped bare by it:

These guys turn into beautiful red and black day-time flying moths which are poisonous. The caterpillars feed off the poison in the ragwort and store it in their bodies and this gets transferred to the moths as well. A study shows that with all of the ragwort clearance in horse fields and pastures, the cinnabar moth is declining.

The smell of the water mint was very strong today - a few butterflies were about, mainly green-veined whites but also this ringlet:

A very tatty looking small tortoiseshell:

And a few meadow browns by the river. The usual mix of birds were around but no sign of any Canada geese today. Three lapwing flew very high up overhead and there were also a couple of juvenile mistle thrushes.

By the woodland, there is now a mass of wild parsnip which wasn't as widespread last year:

And a long-tailed tit family were busy in the trees:

 

The mute swan couple were busy looking for water weed this morning:

There was also a green woodpecker hopping nearby in the grass. It was by itself  - I haven't seen or heard any signs of a family this year which was very active last summer.

In the wood, a froglet was crawling among the leaf matter:

A few damselflies were around and this black-tailed skimmer:

 

 

These are quite common around the lake but I made the mistake of looking at my dragonfly book at other species and saw what looked very similar, a keeled skimmer. It isn't really the right habitat as they like damp heathland but there are a few localised patches of them in Berkshire. I would say this is a black-tailed skimmer as it has faint orange arcs around the edges of its tail if you look carefully.

Again, very few insects around - this small tortoiseshell:

And the common soldier beetle was everywhere today. These are also called blood-suckers:

The garden warbler family were in their usual spot making a lot of noise calling to each other. Other warblers seen and heard were chiffchaff, black-cap and willow warbler. These will be off in the next few weeks as will the swallows who regularly come here to drink from the lake.

The kestrel was hovering over the grass when I arrived but kept getting in the way of a group of swallows who were visiting. The kingfishers were also very active scooting past me but as usual, I couldn't seem to get a good shot:

Again very few insects around, although I did see a solitary small tortoiseshell. The pyramidal orchids are doing well:

And there are still a few patches of ragged robin:

Self-heal is everywhere on the grassy areas. There were a few in the woodland as well - I presume it is self-heal as I can't identify it as anything else, but it was much taller than I was expecting which threw me a bit:

The mullein plant has flowered as well:

This is in the same area I watched a female terrapin dig her hole for eggs last year:

 

 

 

My favourite area is looking good at the moment and is usually teeming with warblers, tits and kingfishers. I couldn't spot any tadpoles today but it was quite weedy:

Further along there were a family of garden warblers. These sound very similar to blackcap but their song is longer and I think, scratchier. The family were busy looking for insects, preening and just enjoying the sun. They appear much yellower in these photographs - they are much browner than this: