Spot the bee!

A wonderful morning for a stroll along the river, a perfect start to a pretty chilled out day. The low morning light was perfect for capturing the stately blooms of Marsh Woundwort, a waterside plant that often vies for attention with the somewhat showier Purple Loosestrife. This member of the mint family is very attractive to pollinators - spot the bee!

After three hot days of fieldwork I needed some time to just bimble about at home, and catch up with emails and washing. In the heat of the afternoon I lay on the lawn in the shade and, after a short doze, just watched all the other creatures sharing the space with me. Swifts wheeling overhead, rafts of black-headed gulls gliding over, dunnocks and blackbirds in the shrubs and a cheeky young squirrel (one of at least four I saw running about in the trees) who was stealing unripe apples, carefully biting the stalk and removing the peel with its teeth before eating about half the flesh and then dropping the remains. It also had a go at eating the fat balls, though again, most was wasted. I think they're costing us a fortune!