August 2026

22nd. I was planning to go to Drift and Marazion and got to neither. I stopped at Boscathnoe Reservoir, and saw some great dragonflies.

Common darter

Black-tailed skimmer

Emperor males

Lesser emperor. A rare species that now breeds in Cornwall. First recorded in the UK in 1996 and in Cornwall in 1997, breeding in 1999.

Male

Female

I then went looking for the rare Perkins' mining bee Andrena rosae. Much of its favourite flower, angelica, has gone over now and I failed to see any at Woon Gumpus common. I did see the spider wasp Ceropales maculata however, a local species restricted to the west and north of Britain.

At Rosemorran/Foage I saw a spotted flycatcher and photographed some interesting insects. I saw a yellow-winged blacklet Cheilosia impressa.

Field digger wasp Mellinus arvensis

Lemon marsh fly Helophilus trivittatus

The striking tachinid Ectophasia crassipennis, a recent colonist that first arrived in the UK in 2019.

i eventually found a female Perkins' mining bee on an isolated angelica plant.

21st. A pale-phase pomarine skua off the Island and two other skua (pale and dark) that may have been Arctics. A redshank called.

20th. An excellent morning seawatch off the Island: 2 Wilson's petrel, 10+ storm petrel, 120+ Cory's shearwater, 3 sooty shearwater, 2 Arctic skua, 15 Sandwich tern, 3 common scoter, black-tailed godwit, 19 whimbrel.

14th. A flower crab spider eating a fly in the Bristol garden.

13th. A couple of pale waders flew East past the Island. Initially I thought they were sanderling, but the black behind the eye meant they were probably grey phalarope. Several were seen around Scilly and Pendeen about the same time. I also saw a whimbrel, an ocean sunfish and a leaping bluefin tuna.

12th. I was in St Ives for the solar eclipse, and watched it from Barnoon Cemetery in a relaxed and friendly atmosphere. I used a Daystar wrap-around solar filter attached to the 100-500mm lens with masking tape, and was impressed with the results. Sunspots are visible too.

Not done with mathematical precision, but a ca.10 min composite image with 5 mins each side of the middle arc at peak eclipse (ca.96% coverage).

I bought a Leica Q3 and love its simplicity and sophistication. Not great for wildlife, but I love the image quality, the fast lens gives great bokeh at f1.7 so will be great for landscapes. Some photos of the sunflower trail near Dorchester for Mona's birthday on 6th.

1st. Large scabious bees are still flying at St Uny's churchyard.

We found Peter Lanyon's gravestone there. The inscription reads

I will ride now
The barren kingdoms
In my history
And in my eye

Barnoon churchyard has abundant ragwort and valerian at the moment.

A Colletes bee, maybe daviesanus was also present.

I saw large white, clouded yellow, common blue, red admiral, painted lady and small tortoiseshell butterflies there. I've never seen as many hummingbird hawkmoths.