A NATURE WALK. (07/08/13)

I always loved nature walks when I was at school. I like walking and used to love running. Regulars will have noticed that if any information was offered then I can’t have been listening. Just getting out of school was a relief, I hated it.

I took the dogs out in heavy rain and cursed them and encouraged them to be quick. They found some otter crap so by the time I got them back to the van we were all soaked. I was on the ball this morning and saw it at the same time as they did so at least they didn’t get the chance to squabble over who was having first roll in it.

By nine things were looking good so off we wandered to look for Dragonflies.

   This is a Yellow Dung Fly. I spent ages, well ten minutes, trying to get him magnified in a water droplet. It’s a good job I took this one first. The little blighter wandered about a bit and I went this way and that way and then it flew away. I like these, for something that lives on shit they are remarkable clean and smart.

I gave the dogs a run and then we settled down in the undergrowth to look for Dragonflies. Not a sign of them. Where they go at night and on really wet nights, I don’t know.

   There were hundreds of these. This is a normal run of the mill Crane fly. I was sitting with my feet in a ditch with a damp bum and still couldn’t manage a clear shot of one.

I was rooting around in the ditch trying to find some exuviae. Ta Trevor, it’s a magical word. For folk not familiar with odonatarists and the words they use it’s the little nymph case that Dragonflies creep out of. I’ll find one doing it one day. I was doing my bit for natural history. I must have fed half the breeding female midges within a mile of Loch Ewe…..Bastards!

   This is a pretty spider but isn’t in my book. It’s got very small eyes and moves like greased lightning.

I got fed up with sitting around, I needed a tiddle and the dogs were getting restless so I thought I’d wander up to Loch Kernsary. I did a big circular walk the other day but barely saw it through the driving rain.

It looked grand today. I wish I'd taken a wider lens. All images today were shot through the 100mm Canon macro lens. It’s far from ideal for landscapes. Back we went as the world was warming up.

  There weren’t as many as yesterday but this lens does a better job.

I’ll believe that they are all Common Darters. Enough of you have kindly put me right but could we settle on Loch Ewe Common Darters?…I know that my readers aren’t as daft as I am. Can’t I have a bit of slack for effort? Everything I find has ‘Common’ in front of it.

This is the best from todays nature walk.

  If this is a frog I’ll stand hanging it’s the Loch Ewe White Bibbed Natter Jack Toad. The dogs wouldn’t go near it. They usually give frogs a nudge to watch them hop…Not Toads they don’t. Well, only once. They gave this a wide berth. Whatever it is it is a cracker.

Thirty seven images I had to plough through from today. I will have to go through them again but I didn’t find too much trash on the first look. It’s at times like this that I don’t miss film.

All images will enlarge with a click. The originals will print at over a foot square.. I am going to concentrate on little things for a while. Tomorrow it looks to be set middling fair so I’ll take the MP-E65mm and a load of off camera flash out. I’ll return the favour and give the insects as much grief as they have given me.

The darters don’t have clear wings with a dark oblong. The black mark on the leading edge goes red, black, red and where the wing joins the body or ‘S’ Whatever, It’s yellow. I bet you already knew that, I love looking at these. I’ll print a few and pin them up…Sorry Uma Thurman you had your chance.