Thursday 6 August 2015

A 'Migrant' Morning

With some early sunshine forecast for this morning but clouds rolling in by mid morning, I thought I would have another trip over to a site near Reculver to see if I could find and photograph some more Migrant Hawkers. I duly arrived on site about 7.30am where I made my way straight to the sheltered area which has one side bordered by tall hedges and trees but thankfully at this time of the day, the sun shines into the area quite well. I was soon scanning the hedges and after a while I started to see the odd Migrant Hawker resting up. Some were quite high but I did find a few which were only about a metre off the ground, perfect for me. Most of the ones I saw today were females which after photographing a male yesterday, made a nice change. I was able to spend about an hour studying and photographing them at close range and they didn't seem to mind my close presence as I rattled off a number of shots from different angles. After a while I carried on to check out a few more areas and ended up seeing c15 Migrant Hawkers including a few more male which gave me another excuse to take some more photos. No doubt these will be posted in due course. With the clouds starting to move in, I decided to make my way back where on the way I noted 5 Black tailed Skimmer, 1 Emperor Dragonfly, 2 Small Red eyed Damselfly, a few Blue tailed Damselfly and lots of Common Blue Damselfly. Hopefully weather permitting, a trip in the next couple of days to Thursley Common to catch up with a few species we do not get in Kent and maybe a photo opportunity or two!











Migrant Hawker (female)

4 comments:

  1. You had more sun there than I did here Marc! Not a sniff of a Dragon today! Inspirational photo's again today mate :-)

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    1. Thanks Warren. This species can allow a very close approach I find. Hopefully get a few flight attempts in the coming weeks with these.

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  2. Interesting to see a number of females, I only ever see the odd one, but loads of males. Usually that is. Not seen any so far this year.

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    1. I have seen a few males so far this year and assume they emerge slightly earlier as to get on territory. I would imagine the females are maturing up ready for the season ahead.

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