More Tales From the Riverbank

Another Monday stroll along the Nene at Oundle though this time I went out past the marina and on as far as the A605 bridge. Not a great deal to report with the weather mainly cloudy with either the occasional drizzly shower or a brief burst of sunshine, in other words a typically English Summer's day.

Distant but I'm sure you can make out what it is.

At the Princess fishing lake across the river from the marina a Kingfisher and a couple of Cormorants were doing just that while a Mandarin broke the Mallard monopoly. A Common Tern was fishing in the marina whereas one of the grebe juveniles had taken to the river. In the fairly dismal conditions only a few damsels showed with Blue-tailed being the commonest and several of the colour forms of this variable species were observed. A few Azures were present amongst the Common Blues, their season will be coming to an end soon. Banded Demoiselle numbers are not at the levels that they were at a little while ago though there are still males amongst the waterside vegetation, the females prefer to sit out all the fuss on nearby nettles.

One form of Blue-tailed Damsel....


 

....And another one

Butterflies were also hard to come by, even the cloud tolerant browns preferring to hide themselves away. A few Gatekeepers were found while Speckled Woods responded to even the briefest burst of sun. These browns really do love a scrap and not always with their own species, one Speckled Wood even deciding that a passing demoiselle required chasing! Single Common Blue and Small Tortoisehell joined Small and Large White on the rather short day list.

Female Banded Demoiselle.

A comparatively long spell of sunny weather brought a few dragons out with Migrant Hawker, Emperor and Common Darter coming out to hunt. Two Red-eyed Damsels shunned such energetic endeavours however and opted for resting on lily pads instead, this is another species that will be coming to the end of their flight season soon.

Goldfinches.

Not much else of interest was seen, a vocal Kestrel and good numbers of Red Kites were the pick of the rest.