Blossom!

Blue skies above Castor

I've never seen a sky like this before. Perhaps I never will again. Living on a crowded island, there are always planes flying over at some height, no matter where you are. So thanks, Eyjafjallajoekull, for giving us beautiful blue, quiet skies for a while.

It was a gorgeous spring day, warm and sunny. These are the eyes of a male Whitethroat, the first one I've seen this year.  We didn't catch a whole lot at Castor... the hoped-for surge of birds near dusk never quite happened. Despite that, it was a beautiful day to be outside, admiring blossom, listening to Blackcaps singing (not Nightingales, unfortunately), eating cake...

photos taken with Canon Powershot A640

Creepy-crawlies

Comma

Brimstone (mostly busy flying up and down at speed)

Watching ladybirds climbing up and down leaves is always amusing

Celandine

Blackthorn blossom

photos taken with Canon EOS 30D, EF 300mm f/4L IS USM

More garden stuff

Robin

Red Admiral

ladybird

Dunnock, the photographer's friend

Peacock nectaring on rosemary

More bees on blossom

muntjac

blackthorn blossom

photos taken with Canon EOS 30D, EF 300mm f/4L IS USM

Local birding

Green-winged Teal (right, front)

The above Green-winged Teal was probably the highlight of our day in the Peterborough area, today. It was first found at Woodwalton Fen NNR a couple of weeks ago but has only been visible intermittently, as the Teal flock it's hanging out with like to hide in the reeds. So that was quite lucky.

Male [Common] Teal

Chinese Water Deer

Chinese Water Deer are very odd-looking beasts. There's something rather teddy bear-ish about their faces. They seem to be quite tame - this one came wandering towards us.

The marks on its body are intriguing. Is it the result of fighting or just moulting? You can often see clumps of very coarse fur lying on the ground at Woodwalton - it almost looks like porcupine quills.

You can read more about them at the Deer-UK website.

We started the day at Aversley Wood - a few springy shots below.

Dog-violet

Blackthorn blossom

unidentified flowers!

new Hawthorn leaves

digiscoped photos taken with Nikon Coolpix 995 + Leica Apo Televid 77 with 20x eyepiece