A plant that favours the Water Meadow is The Milkmaid, a member of the mustard family it is also known as the lady’s smock or Cuckoo flower. The flowers; colour can vary from pale lilac to white. A food plant for the Orange-tip butterfly caterpillars – this female Orange-tip had found the Milkmaid flowers.
Today’s lucky spot was some Slow Worms. Mistaken by many for a snake Slow worms are legless lizards.
A female Blackbird.
What is odd about Mandarin ducks? They nest in trees often high above the water. Two drakes spotted today but no female ! not even up in the trees so they must be well camouflaged.
The Mallards on the pond were not amused!
Fort Nelson, near Portsmouth, is home to the Royal Armouries’ national artillery and historic cannon collection. The fort was built in the 1860s to protect against a potential invasion by the French, it was one of a ring of land and sea forts around the Naval base at Portsmouth. The invitation never came and the forts became known as “Palmerston’s Follies” after Prime Minster, Lord Henry Palmerston, who commissioned the forts.
I visited Fort Nelson today to see an art display “Standing with Giants” It is a tribute honouring those who lost their lives in the Falklands Conflict. The installation is silhouetted figures of the 258 who died in Falklands War in 1982.
#Wordless Wednesday
Every time I see a Kestrel in the hover it reminds me of the book by Barry Hines – A Kestrel for a Knave published in 1968. A book we had to read a school – set in a mining area in Northern England, the book follows Billy Casper, a young working-class boy troubled at home and at school, who finds and trains a Kestrel whom he names “Kes”.
What goes on the Water at nearly 60 mph and prefers to pierce waves rather than jump over them. The Very Slender Vessels concept is simple – instead of slamming across the top of waves, it is designed to slice through them. Adopted by several military and enforcement services around the world. It had a hull low to the water, making it harder to detect on radar.
Spotted in the Solent this afternoon.
The ancestor of most domestic geese, the greylag is the largest of the wild geese native to the UK and Europe. Nice to see some of this years 1st goslings.
Red-eared slider – kept as a pet in the UK many have been irresponsibly released into the wild. They are ill-equipped to survive in the damp British climate.- however, will global climate increases change this. What effect do these invasive animals have on our wildlife? What effects on our native waterfowl’s eggs and insects lava does releasing these unwanted pets have?
Red-eared sliders are considered an invasive species, they are seen as a pest in many countries including here in the U.K. the U.S.A and Australia as they can outcompete and predate upon native fauna.
Spotted in a local pond.
Continued Reflections from my World. 