Sunset magic on the Atlantic Coast. Arriving on our first island we headed for the west coast to watch the sun go down. 
Into the wilderness.  What would the coming weeks bring?  Several thousand photographs and journals recording locations visited, serendipitous experience and discovery.  Here is a sunset interlude,  whilst I set to work editing all those images, matching them to the journals. The wonder of digital photography is all you discover that you could not see at the time.

Black-headed gulls screeched and dived for the bread the kids threw for the swans. ' They're called cygnet' the helmeted little lad on the bike informed us. I tried to tell him about the preen gland but he wasn't having it. 'They are waterproof' he insisted. They just are.  His mother told him I was right but he wasn't having it.
We like a child with a spirit of inquiry and he biked about us beside Abbot Hall playground.

Kestrel are not clamorous birds, so something was wrong. A magpie perched on the ridge of a barn and a young kestrel clung to the wall below the eaves. The adult kestrel was shrill in defence of its young, and I watched their aerial combat.  The kestrel flew calling and came down briefly onto a wire, then launched another attack at the marauding magpie.  Through binoculars, I could make out the young kestrel now on a wire with the magpie. 
I can share the flowers of the morning, but little of  the kestrels- the adult was rapid in flight and the fledgling now too far off. There's often a discrepancy between the experience and what the images show.

 The floral fragrance of limestone grassland In July is delightful.  Lady's bedstraw is abundant, with a honey scent.  A sunny morning, with common blue butterflies, fritillaries and a ringlet.  Always meadow browns.  Once again, I came upon the stonechat family and spent a while watching them in the bonfire bush.  Last summer, I found dyer's green-weed for the first time on Scout Scar, in a single location. This morning I rediscovered it and took careful note of the spot. Genista tinctoria, the flower resembles broom to which it is related.  Frog orchid are now in full bloom.
So, the story of the bonfire bush.

Bees love Viper's bugloss and in early July there are banks of flowers of intense blues,  tall inflorescences whipped to and fro in the wind.  Nectaries deep within the corolla yield plentiful nectar and pollen,  released at lower temperatures than the white clover flowering in the grass. From May to September it offers bees a reliable source of food.  Viper's bugloss buds are pink, so the inflorescence is intense blues with hints of pink. 
In early July Viper's bugloss is striking, with massed ranks of tall flowers.

Goosander like the fast-flowing River Kent and they're here throughout the year.  Their red feet are often visible as they swim and the slight downturn at the tip of the long bill is distinctive.  The chestnut head is a feature of the female and of the tiny chicks and juveniles.  During late June, the river was high after days of rain and I hoped to see how the young birds would swim the weirs along the course of the River Kent.  Filming would give me the chance to study their behaviour.