It all started last week when I missed out on the Grey Phalarope at Fairhaven Lake. I'd been working away and didn't get chance to get over their until Friday afternoon at which time it had moved on (it had been reported on the RBA light map on Friday morning). A second Grey Phalarope was seen by Bill Aspin on the River Ribble in Preston from the A59 bridge (near Penwortham), a bridge I crossed on the way back from Fairhaven!
With a busy weekend I wasn't able to get up to see it until tonight after seeing it reported at lunchtime on the Ribble Estuary facebook page by Colin Bushell.
I turned up about 18.00 parking in the car park by the alotments and headed upstream to where Colin had seen it earlier. Unlike other trips out to add to my life list I found the bird pretty much straight away feeding on the south shore about 100m infront of the bridge. I spent about an hour watching it as it drifted downstream towards the bridge before flying 300m upstream and returning back with the returning tide.
I haven't had much luck this year in adding to my Butterfly list but in the first week of September I called back in at Aston Rowant with the hope of seeing one of the most vibrant blues seen in the UK. The Adonis Blue is only seen in small numbers here and after switching on my camera on only to find the battery flat I wasn't holding out much hope. Most of the plants were putting to seed but there was a small patch were I found several mostly worn butterflies feeding and amongst them a Male Blue Adonis. Luckily my smart phone had packed in and I was using my trusty old sony C905 and with a 8.1M camera, with a little patience I managed to get a few shots. I counted 3 males during my hour visit along with 1 Siver-spotted Skipper, 6+ Small Copper, Small Tortoiseshell, 1 Painted Lady, Brown Argus and Common Blue.
Blue Adonis
Above Painted Lady
Above Brown Argus Below Common Blue
