Meathop Moss and Arnside knott july 7th 2012

After a failed trip to Whixall moss to shoot Large Heaths , i decided to combine at trip to the lakes , and visit Meathop Moss in the morning , then go Back to Arnside Knot in the afternoon.
I arrived at Meathop about 9 am , was fairly warm which makes a change and forecast was for a warm sunny day!!!!!  it had rained quite heavy overnight and the main track onto the moss was very much flooded! 

                                                                    the warning sign :)

I made my way to the wooden boardwalk and almost immediately found the Large Heaths flitting around the heather and long grass .  as usual they just don't perch on a clear stem to be photographed , and only stay still for a very short time before flying off again,  they have to be the most frustrating butterfly to shoot!!!!!!!!   i walked along the wooden structure and then made my way onto the moss, it wasn't too wet actually . chasing the butterflies was quite tiring but eventually managed this reasonable image.

                                                       a view looking across the moss

walking further onto the moss i got the chance of another well perched Large Heath, this is the final image i got.

Now i will make my way over to Arnside knott , to hopefully shoot the High brown fritillaries.

   by now the sun has come out and it is getting very warm , makes a change to say that this year!
i make my way down to the 3rd lower level and find High Browns straight away, very active in the sun and feeding on bramble flowers.  this was going to be a challenge to photograph them!
first image one feeding on thistle flowers , and a low level image taken against the blue sky :)

this is the area they are found

High Brown Fritillary

 as a comparison, here is a Dark Green Frittillary .  note no red circle spots on rear edge of wing

                             as you can see they are quite similar unless a close view is taken

                                           here are a few more views of High Browns

The end of another good day fluttering , but with Arnside being probably the worst place for ticks, i had a few hitch hikers come home with me!!!!!!  Arghhhhh    counted 18 crawling up my jeans while driving home!

                                                         this one has had a huge meal!!   NOT ME!

Red colouration from blood!

             Tomorrow i will be climbing Green & Great Gable in cumbria with the twitterati group

South Stack Beetle Hunt July 5 2012

After leaving the mountain lake above Betws-y- coed i drove across to the isle of Anglesey and towards Hollyhead to the rspb South Stack reserve.   i didn't think it was warm or sunny enough to be able to shoot the huge number of wasp species that are usually present  on the cliff tops , but i should find something to photograph :)

this is South stack lighthouse which i visited in a previous blog  Here

Walking down the path towards the cliff edge , i almost immediately spotted a Rose Chafer beetle feeding on what appeared to be angelica florets. i shot this with natural light.

they really are a stunning colour, shooting anything on a pale or white flower is extremely difficult to get a good exposure , using flash makes it even harder which i found out later in the afternoon.
walking along the main path along the cliff top a huge beetle flew past me, very close! the sound they make is quite loud and i managed to follow it until it landed, it was a Cockchafer about 1.1/4 inch in length , which are often called May bugs :)     late this year with it being such a cold summer presumably.   it landed on a rock that was covered in pale lichen which made it easy to shoot as it was about 2 ft above the path.  these are the images i shot at different magnifications.

            it soon flew off into  heather but i managed one more head on shot .

along the cliff top there is virtually nothing to be seen , very unusual but a few of these tiny green flower beetles, approx 5 mm in length.

and a Digger wasp that didn't want its face photographed   lol

On way back to the car park i found another Rose Chafer , so tried shooting with mpe-65 and flash!  found it very difficult to get good exposure on both beetle and flower. in fact this is the only half decent image i got, you can see the difference in colour to a natural light shot of the beetle

                                                                       mpe-65 full flash

                                                   natural light 100mm macro , much more natural

Then just below the car park i heard a loud buzzing , after a few minutes looking i spotted a Hummingbird Hawkmoth egg laying , i watched in amazement for ages trying to shoot a very fast moving moth lol     here is the best image

i found an egg she had layed and took it home, here is the Caterpillar that hatched and is now in a pupae almost ready to emerge into a beautiful moth.

        That was the end of a long day , not the best for photography but enjoyable all the same :)

                                  tomorrow i will be in the lake district butterfly hunting :)

Scarce blue tail Damselflys in snowdonia july 5th

A quick trip up to the mountain lakes above Betws-y -coed early one morning , before making an afternoon visit to one of my favourite shooting areas, South Stack on Anglesey.  the weather as usual for this summer is not looking very good,  cool , breezy and fairly dull!  not very good in other words  Arghhhh.

any how i arrived and went in search of the Scarce Blue Tail damsels , it is only the beautiful orange "aurantica" form i am interested in photographing.  last year i shot them almost a month earlier , see last years  Blog
this is my second visit, the previous time i didnt see any so hopefully they will have emerged.  after about 20 minutes i had yet to see one, not good!  there appear to be quite a few newly emerged Keeled skimmers and black darters which shows how late everything is this year!  since the area i am looking for them is only very small after a third search i finally find a "Aurantica"   stunning damselflies to look at.

                                  this is the area , shallow water with very boggy margins

a quick shot of a Keeled Skimmer

as you can see, its very dull.  after squelching around for another 10-15 mins i found 2 more "Auranticas"  one of which looked like it had just emerged this morning as there was hardly any colour.

these are the best images i could get , even with high iso could not get a fast enough shutter speed to get really sharp images.

They really are beautiful :)

i finished of with an Emerald damselfly

sorry it was a short blog, but today's story will continue :)

Arnside Knott Butterflies pt 2 july 3rd

My second visit to Arnside knott to shoot the beautiful fritillaries . Hopefully might see my first High Brown of the season, but weather has still been cold so not holding my breath!   it looking quite misty but is forecast to warm up considerably which is just what the butterflies need to fly :)
The view looking towards the cumbrian fells shrouded in mist.

I start off walking up the shale path towards the area where i was shooting the small Pearl Bordered fritts the previous week.  Grayling should be out now, amazing camouflage they have and sit on the shale soaking up any warmth , almost straight away i spot one sitting on the rock, my first of the year. i could spend ages watching them , they have so much character ( for a butterfly anyhow! ) flitting between rocks changing there wing angle to face the sun.

i search all the usual bracken looking for High Browns but only Dark Greens are flying , thistle flowers give a good nectar supply so those areas the best to concentrate on.  a very damp bumble bee is first subject i shoot!

Moving up to the top of the Knott there is a large abundance of thistle, with plenty of Dark Green Fritts and Grayling  all feeding , i must say i have never seen a Grayling feeding before so spent quite a long time watching and shooting them:)

i then noticed an odd looking Dark Green frittilary , i chased it all over the place before getting this image , an aberration where one wing is almost white , with no colour! very odd.

then a female Dark Green , slightly larger than the males with white spots around the wing edges.

there is a steep shale scree  nearby which looks very promising for High Brown with tall trees all around

 but after quite a long time i have only spotted Dark Greens . but i did find a really beautiful jumping spider ,about 4 -5 mm in length ,  they are so cute with their big eyes.   time for the canon MPE-65 macro lens

a nice view from here , but really need to find a High Brown, there must be one here somewhere!

I make my way down to the opposite side of the Knott where i saw my first ever High Brown fritillary last year so i know its a good area.   And would you believe it, A High Brown straight away!   newly emerged this morning by the look of it. absolutely stunning.

i follow this one and make the most of a pristine specimen , taking quite a few images on different surroundings.perched on the shale really shows off the colours well :)

and on a white thistle flower, what a superb butterfly :)

after this shoot the cloud came over and the light levels dropped , i found a Dark Green perched up which happily sat for over 15 minutes while it had its picture taken .  you can see it is very similar to the High Brown, but the 3 rd spot on the fore wing is off line in the HB , more central in the DG. and of course the HB has spots on the rear under wing , which are clearly visible in the above image.


                                                              Dark Green Fritillary

What a super couple of hours i have just had , now its time to take a look at Heathwait meadow to find a few Northern Brown Argus .  through the gate and make my way around to the meadow.

And here is where i found these tiny butterflies , it is quite windy so really struggled to shoot these images , they are definitely not sharp enough , much more detail should be showing.

the end of another superb day on Arnside Knott , a really special place , except for one thing!

Ticks!!!!!!!!!!!!

                          images shot with canon 5d2, 100mmLmacro & mpe-65 macro lens