Warnham LNR

A rather cold and wet Common Blue Damselfly, Enallagma cyathigerum, with a damaged tail.

Mallard and ducklings.

Juvenile Great Crested Grebes.

The path down to the Sandpiper hide was covered with a large number of small Common Toad

toadlets. The resident Marsh Frogs were calling loudly around the reserve, and I had a brief view of a basking Grass Snake.

Moths

Two interesting Geometrid Moths seen recently in my garden.

This is a Small Dusty Wave, Idaea seriata.

This is an Engrailed, Ectropis crepuscularia. Huge thanks to @Arlyres for the help with identification.

Pevensey Levels and Warnham LNR

The marvellous hot weather has gone and June can be very disappointing.

The fantastic landscapes of the Pevensey Levels, looking northwest from near Chilley Farm.

Clover rich meadows on Hankham Levels.

Pett Level and Rye Harbour

The Common Tern colony at Rye Harbour was a fantastic spectacle today.

Adult birds were constantly arriving with supplies of fish

A fish was definitely the must have accessory.

Hungry Tern chicks were very mobile on the island, pursuing adults persistently.

These chicks are anticipating the immanent arrival of food from above.

Which soon arrived. 

Often the adults would bathe after delivering food to the chicks.

Some of the adult birds were still exhibiting courtship behaviour. The bird on the right is Begging for food from the other bird.

Black-headed Gulls feeding in the flooded vegetation at high tide.

The tide at Rye Harbour was the highest I have ever seen, with water right up to the path.

Displaying Oystercatchers.

Oystercatcher with chick.

Oystercatcher chick.

Black-headed Gull chicks.

Older Black-headed Gulls.

Avocet.

Juvenile Wheatear.

Ringed Plover with chicks.

A real highlight of my visit was three brief glimpses of a Quail, before it went to ground in some grass in the northeast corner of the Ternary Pool reserve.

Hunting male Marsh Harrier at Pett Level.

Common Pochard.

Mute Swan with cygnets and an interloper.

Abbott's Wood

The management of Abbott's Wood is generating a range of different habitats. I saw these Roe Deer in an area that had been completely cleared about ten years ago, and is now regenerating.

Common Figwort, Scrophularia nodosa. The unpleasant smelling flowers attract wasps and flies.

Song Thrush, still singing like mad.

A female Nursery Web Spider, Pisaura mirabilis.

I think this is a female Great Green Bush Cricket, Tettigonia viridissima. The short wings are confusing, as this species has characteristically long wings, but I think it could be an immature individual.

Scarlet Tiger

The Scarlet Tiger, Callimorpha dominula. What a fantastic moth! A new species for me, I thought I was looking at the more widespread Garden Tiger Arctia caja.

Just look at those fantastic underwings!

Midsummer's Eve

Midsummer's Eve is the perfect time to go looking for Glow Worms, Lampyris noctiluca, a type of beetle. The very warm weather meant a walk on the Downs, above Hill Road Eastbourne, was very pleasant in a cooling breeze.

Looking east over Eastbourne as the sun set. The dark line above the horizon is the shadow of the Earth.

Late sunset looking west across the Downs. It stayed light until after 10pm.

The section of the South Downs Way that runs west down to Jevington is very wide, with some longer grasses at the sides of the track. Walking along as it got dark I began to see several little points of greenish light. These were the glowing underside of the abdomens of the Glow Worms.

A Glow Worm.

A female Glow Worm in a Characteristic pose, clutching a grass stem. The camera flash obliterates the glowing abdomen.

A total of 19 females were seen between Jevington and the round barrow on Willingdon Hill. I have submitted these sightings to the UK Glow Worm 2017 survey.

A beautiful emerald green beetle in my garden at Hill Road. I think it is a female Flower Beetle Oedemera nobilis.