Bishop Middleham Quarry - 27th July 2010

I was working in the North East of England and decided to take my lunch brake at Bishop Middleham Quarry as I'd read that it was a good area to observe both buterflies and orchids.
Having now looked at the map the area seems to cover quite a large area which is why I missed the Northern Brown Argos which I'd hoped to see. The area I covered was around NZ329325 and I only managed a brief visit so more than likely missed quite a lot that can be seen in the area.

SMALL COPPER

MEADOW BROWN

BELOW SMALL SKIPPER

ABOVE SMALL WHITE BELOW GREEN-VEINED WHITE

Other butterflies included Peacock and Gatekeeper. Also in the area I came across 2 species of orchid, Common Spotted which I've seen at several sites including Stags lodge though the plants do have a slightly different shape here than the ones I have seen before. The other orchid I found was the Chalk Fragrant-Orchid (Gymnadenia conopsea)  the first time I have come across this orchid.

ABOVE COMMON SPOTTED ORCHID

ABOVE AND BELOW CHALK FRAGRANT-ORCHID

Gait Barrows - 4th July 2010

The plan was to search for the Dark-red Helleborine Orchid  that (again) Mike had told us about the previous day and then try and search for the two fritillary butterflies that are resident there. Well all started off well as we set off mid-morning but as we parked up at Gait Barrows the rain started, that fine stuff that soaks you through! So all plans of butterflies went out the window but a Orchid hunting we went. The Dark-red Helleborine (Epipactis atrorubens) is found in exposed limestone areas such as Gait Barrows and with it being restricted to these sites isn't common through out the UK. On our visit we only managed to find 3 specimens but with the rain on the limestone it was getting very slippy and the added danger of the deep clefts (grikes) we didn't search as long as we'd liked.

ABOVE AND BELOW DARK-RED HELLEBORINE

On our continued walk around Gait Barrows (we never seem to go back the same way we enter!) we came across this white form of the Common Spotted Orchid and in the meadows 20 Common Spotted a much paler pink variety than the ones found at Stags Lodge, CVP.

ABOVE AND BELOW TWO DIFFERENT FORMS OF THE COMMON SPOTTED ORCHID

Brockholes Nature Reserve - 26th June 2010

Not much going on bird wise at the moment so I'm trying to learn a little more about other wildlife including Butterflies, Dragonflies and Orchids (as shown in previous posts). The Butterfly and Orchid books are on order so my identification of both should improve, if only slightly in the coming months. I spent the afternoon down at Brockholes not looking for anything in perticular but hoping that something new would pop up in the afternoon sunshine. Dragonflies included 4 Empreror, 1 Black-tailed Skimmer, Blue-tailed Damselfly and Common Blue Damselfly.

ABOVE BLUE TAILED DAMSELFLY BELOW BLACK-TAILED SKIMMER

Common Spotted Orchid were in abundance across the reserve, more so than last year from what I remember. Butterflies included Large White, Small Tortoiseshell, Meadow Brown and Large Skipper.

ABOVE COMMON SPOTTED ORCHID BELOW LARGE SKIPPER

ABOVE MEADOW BROWN BELOW SMALL TORTOISESHELL

Of course there where some birds around including this juvenile Whitethroat singing over by the fishing pond.

                          

I also spent some time trying to photograph the Sand Martin over the River Ribble with this being my best effort.