Whats your most memorable wildlife encounter 2010

[david156]

Hi all wabbers,

Now as mid november is here and the year end is approaching, with dark evenings and rainy days, I thought it would be good to start a thread where we could all tell of our best wildlife encounters of the year so far. (pictures optional)
For me , I have seen some wonderful species of bird this year, including the Fabulous Lesser Kestrel near Minsmere, Trumpertor Finch at Cley, Pallid and Alpine swift together at Kessingland and about a dozen more life species for me and not forgetting the large flocks of Waxwings.
Other interesting wildlife this year was a Hummingbird hawk moth and silver washed fritillary at Holt country park, Small red eye damselfly at Wheatfen Reserve, Willow Emerald Damselfly at Strumpshaw, Kelled Skimmer at Holt lowes and Red veined Darter at Felbrigg and photographing mating Norfolk Hawkers at How Hill.






But the most memorable species this year would be the Emerald Damselfly. Not spectacular but I found a male and photographed it (picture below) on a broadland reserve where it hadn't been seen there since 1935.


Four days latter I relocated it about fifty feet away from the original sighting, and a few days after that I located at least another 8 including 1 mating pair and managed more pictures. Needless to say the warden was chuffed!





Which just goes to show that your most memorable sightings are not always your rarest.

So its now over to all you out there to reveal your memorable moment so far.


Cheers David

[Tobyh]

Good idea!

I have no photos of mine unfortunately (of this specific encounter) but one evening I decided to go out and sit with the foxes in my garden. I sat on my summer house decking, back against the door, hidden under a bag hide to see how they would react. Around 20 minutes or so of waiting, the vixen came through the hole in the fence with a cub, had a sniff around and then plonked down about 6 feet away. The cub climbed onto the decking and was playing and rolling around within arms length of me and didn't have a clue I was there. Fantastic experience.

Similarly, we stayed in the New Forest at a beautiful place that had Fallow Deer visit most evenings. They were very wary and would be off if they saw you. Again, I decided to go out in my camo gear (no hide this time) and hid myself near a gate not far from where I knew they would approach but wouldn't be able to see me. About 30 minutes or so pass and I start to see movement in the dark of the trees. Sure enough, not only did the deer come over the fence, but they were only around 20 feet away. It was such a still night that I couldn't move an inch even though I was getting eaten alive by midges. The deer did sniff towards me but decided I wasn't anything to worry about. Amazingly they were spooked by...my stomach rumbling....never been so close to wild deer. Well worth getting bitten for.

TobyH

[STYRBJORN]

200 + pairs of Aeshna dragonflies mating along the bank of a big shallow pond.

Ric

[artdemole]

A kingfisher flying along Cam brook at Camerton .Somerset.This was the first time my wife saw one.

[loripo]

A small collection, from when I visited my daughter in August (near Cardigan)... A red kite flying along the hedge as we were motoring, a leafcutter bee carrying a piece of leaf to it's nest, Small Tortoiseshell butterflies and Magpie moths everywhere I looked, a whole herd of jumping spiders on a sage bush, an skein of geese flying over the garden, honking early one morning.

[violaceus]

Most magical moment ever - hubby and me walking in local park where there is a small pond, spotted two kingfisher chicks low down in an overhanging bush. We secreted ourselves behind some bushes and a few minutes later one of the parent birds must have caught a fish as all of a sudden there were six blue flashes as all the chicks left their cover and flew towards the parent bird - left me breathless!

[Farplace]

My first whales! A few years ago we went up to the Moray Firth and spent a glorious day whalewatching. The weather was warm... the sky was blue, the water was very clear. We saw a pod of about 6 Minkie whales, some very close to the inflatable. The smell of their breath will live with me forever. Magnificent wonderful animals.
In addition, we saw a group of harbour porpoises, including a very new baby, who came alongside to see us. There were also swarms of jelly fish, black guillimots, and seals.

Edit: Sorry I just noticed it was for 2010 ..... My best one this year was the tawny owl being mobbed by a group of jackdaws. Fantastic display from the owl in his bid to out-fly the jackdaws. My best Rescue for 2010 was a merganser chick.

[Gill Catton]

Going to the Farne Islands for me, to be so close to such lovely seabirds was utterly amazing....

Oh and a very good year for butterflies for me with my first ever purple emperor, white admiral, Silver washed Frit and live white-letter hairstreak!

[earthdragon64]

I've had a few memorable encounters this year, I can't just choose one, but I've managed to restrict myself to two.

I led a field trip to Glenfeshie looking for Dingy Skipper Butterflies in an area they hadn't been seen since the early 1990s, probably because no-one had looked.

We found them, which was the first time I'd seen the species, but what really made it special was also unexpectedly finding a colony of Small Blue Butterflies in the same area. They had also not been seen at that site since the early 1990s.

I also went to Mull for the first time this year and saw my first White-tailed Eagles, which was an amazing sight.

Regards, Audrey.

[slimrbp]

Quite a few this year but also restricted myself to two!

One was in Shetland looking for otters, we had been to one spot we went to munerous times with no luck. The on the last visit an otter crossed over a small quay, a great view but of course it was the one time I hadn't got the camera ready

The final one was sightings of Large Red and Azure damselflies mating, fairly commonplace but made all the sweeter as it was in my newly constructed pond.