Hither and thither for wildlife

I had the usual trip over to the London Wetland Centre today. Although it was generally very light on birds, we did see a Redshank and 4 x Little Ringed Plovers (one seemed to be a juvenile) out on the scrape; they were kept company by 3 x Snipe and there were several Lapwings about - they've been rather thin in the ground recently. A few swallows zipped by and the Sandmartins are fewer in number but some still around.

Mostly the wildlife was of the flora, insect or flutter variety. The crickets/grasshoppers were noticeably audible and one variety was so well camouflaged it looked like a piece of dried twig (no picture as it was too well hidden!)

Best I could do of the far-away Snipe!

Yesterday in Bushy Park, there were again, few birds but...

This Mallard was resting..

and I was surprised at the number of young ones (and some VERY young ones) about

A Pochard being lazy enjoying the sun..

Underwater photography!

A Red-crested Pochard (female)

And a case of being in eclipse for this one

Seeing double where this Coot was concerned..

Just two very young Egyptian Geese

And this very young family of Mallards number 15 - but I couldn't get them all together in frame!

A bee (unknown type) on Ragwort

And my one and only Painted Lady so far this year - albeit a very battle-scarred one.

Masses of Banded Demoiselles around

and tomorrow.... hopefully something very local ;)