On the gas tank, upstate NY in 2009 and never found out what it was...x-posted to I_heart_bug

Local boy.

Another load of youngsters from x-iron curtain countries. 2nd year male red-footed falcon, one of five, including an adult female that I didn't get a clear pic of.

Camargue last week: Little Stint bracing itself against the strong mistral blowing - note the angle of its legs!

Don't think they bite :-))
See what comes crawling out on the first really warm day we've had this year. Gryllus campestris

This was taken in the same place as one last year, but the markings are so different that you can imagine the over-enthusiastes trying to claim a new species!

Across the rhone from the Camargue is an area famous for bird watchers called le Crau. This is pronounced, I'm told, as Craw, whereas I'd pronounce it 'empty', except for this flower of degraded soils and bird-watchers and their telescopes everywhere. A few black kites fly over and decide to go somewhere else, like the rest of the wildlife.

Another Camargue photo - a water rail being watched over by its mate as it has a bath.

Seen more than once in the Camargue just now, Spotted Redshank in full breeding plumage...

Just back from a week in the Camargue. Migration seemed very slow -- less a trickle, more a drip! However these brilliant little birds were around, actually catching bees.