Some Southern Success!

With sun forecast until lunchtime today and quite light winds, I made a visit over to Oare Marshes where I hoped to find and photograph the Southern Migrant Hawkers that had been seen there a few days earlier. On arrival at 10am, the sun was shining and I made my way over to the west flood ditches. I had been told that they were quite overgrown and this was the case as the paths could barely be seen. Getting down to the waters edge was also overgrown and if it wasn't for where the cattle had been down to drink and had flattened some vegetation, I think I would have struggled to see what was there. Thankfully this is why the Southern Migrant Hawkers are here as they prefer to egg lay near the waters edge and where the cattle have stirred up the mud and made some deep holes, this will provide some excellent ovipositing sites. After an initial walk around briefly looking for Hawkers, I eventually found up to 5 Southern Migrant Hawkers with a few on territory which allowed me to try for a few photos. They didn't land at all which meant my only options were flight shots. With a few being quite uncooperative I kept on walking around hoping that an individual would allow me to grab a few photos and eventually found a willing subject. I spent some time watching him and where he often hovered and then set about rattling off a number of photos. As ever, the majority were not much but there were a few in there which were not too bad. I was also aware that the cows were making their way towards me and not being a favourite of mine, I thought I had better make my way back where on the way it was nice to see a Norfolk Hawker patrolling. I also saw 2 Emperor Dragonfly, 1 Brown Hawker and plenty of Common and Ruddy Darters. A pleasant few hours but sad to see parts of the site being neglected and left to just grow out of control. Hopefully this will be rectified in the near future. 

Southern Migrant Hawker (Aeshna affinis) - male