More Dragons

Work gave me another half day off so rather than sit at home waiting for the football to start I headed over to Barnwell CP. While the weather was fairly poor it was still quite an interesting visit, a few spells of brightness even bringing out some interesting insects.

New Mute Swan family and mayfly.

Things are moving with the swan nest on Mill Lake, the mother was sheltering at least five cygnets from the rain and another watcher told me that he had seen at least seven with two eggs still to hatch. Nine seems like a massive brood but it's unlikely that all will make it to adulthood. The Cetti's Warbler is still singing away and the Cuckoo is still present too. Only one drake Mandarin seen today but the ducks are probably incubating eggs at the moment.

Banded Demoiselle munching on a mayfly and Red-eyed Damsels.

A huge number of large mayflies had evidently hatched and the vegetation was sheltering thousands of them. Many appeared to have become ensnared in spiders webs while Banded Demoiselles were also taking advantage of the bounty. Red-eyed Damselflies are beginning to move to the lilies and at least one mated pair were noted. About eight Blue-tailed Damselflies were found and this total included individuals of both the rufescens and violacea forms. The other damsel seen was Azure with four or five observed.

Violacea and rufescens forms of Blue-tailed Damselflies.

There was a patch of reeds in the corner of the large lake nearest to Oundle that proved to be fairly productive. At least half a dozen Scarce Chasers were completing their emergences and they were sharing the reeds with my first Four-spotted Chaser of the year. Not for the first time this year a Hairy Dragonfly did not hang around long enough for a picture as an ovipositing female paid only the briefest of visits to the same area.

Scarce and Four-spotted Chasers.

Few other things of interest were observed today, an Orange-tip was the only butterfly seen today while the only mammal was a Grey Squirrel.

Azure Damselfly.