More Images from Strumpshaw

 A few more images from Strumpshaw Fen -there were several Egrets on the Fen, the Shoveller and Shelduck have similar markings, the Black-headed Gull has a very large dinner and the goslings were particularly cute.

There were very few Dragonflies around. I did find this Hairy resting up in a shady sheltered copse. There were Blue-tailed Damselflies, Azure Damselflies and large Red Damselflies

Strumpshaw Fen

 The Marsh Harriers were performing well doing lots of food passes but at a distance. The fish were going down well with the Great Crested Grebes and Terns.

 This Pheasant was very tame and not very good at balancing on the fence.

Scarecrow Trail 2

 A few more favourite scarecrows. To see all the scarecrows and the four exhibitions inToft for the jubilee go to http://www.pin-sharp.demon.co.uk/photos.

Scarecrow Trail 1

 It was good of the Royals to spare time to visit Toft and her Majesty help with a bit of gardening and other things to get ready for the Jubilee while Philip did a spot of fishing.

Strawberry Fair Parade

On a quick visit to Cambridge yesterday morning, I got caught up in the annual parade that marks the official start of  Strawberry Fair in Cambridge summer. This year the theme of the Fair was Fairy Queens & Kings with lots of performers in fabulous costumes and on stilts.

Burwash Dragonflies

 Some images taken on a visit to Burwash ponds to see what is about - the answer was not a lot. There were a couple of newly emerged dragonflies Black-tailed Skimmer at top and Four-spotted Chaser below, an intriguing spider and a male and female Common Blue butterflies.
Spider identified as Tetragnatha extensa

Burnt Orchids

I accepted an invitation to visit a site in Bedfordshire with a colony of Burnt Orchids. Not an ideal day for flower photography as it was pretty dull with a strong breeze so getting enough shutterspeed and depth of field was a challenge. The site also has Pasque flowers and, in the beech wood, White Helleborines. Thank you Richard (http://richardrevelsphotography.com) for showing me these.

Last evening The Halfords Tour Series visited Peterborough. It  is a ten round city centre cycling race series with 50 minute race for women and 1 hour for men. I tried various ideas during the two races. Panning for the men's race was very difficult as they moved very fast and we are close to the action. I tried 1/40 second to 1/200 sec and found around 1/160th gave the most consistent results but not very exciting.The last two shots were taken towards the end of the race and you can see the effort that they are making 

Wicken Fen

Went to Wicken early to see if any Hobbies up catching the emerging dragonflies. No Hobbies but very acrobatic Black-Headed Gulls after the mayflies in the reeds.