The Lunar Eclipse

On the night of the 27th, I headed out with fellow photographer Max Thomspon to witness and photograph one of the autumn's most exciting celestial events: the lunar eclipse. Even in the early evening the moon looked impressive: rising just before sunset on the south-western horizon, it appeared a beautiful orange colour, and was magnified by the earth's atmosphere. I took this opportunity to get some more artistic images, before all ambient light was lost for this sort of approach. I tried a Dandelion and Harvestmen, silhouetting them against the orange sphere.

Our location for the eclipse was the Lizard: Kynance Cove. We arrived close to midnight, and took plenty of landscapes to utilise the amazing amount of moonlight that made the entire landscape appear very bright. 30 second exposure images resulted in images that looked identical to a bright sunny day! See below for this scene.

After a couple hours of landscapes, we set our prime lenses up and awaited the eclipse- after an hour we realised that we may have got the timings wrong, and so began heading homeward, keeping an eye on progress above. Half way back, we stopped in a lay-by and proceeded to capture the entire sequence of the event, as the spherical shadow of the earth blotted out the sunlight from the Moon's surface, and turned the colour into an eery orangy-red. It truly was a 'supermoon'. We had great fun photographing the event, especially watching as the sky turned increasingly star-filled as the moon's light effect was reduced. There were plenty of shooting stars to see too! Here is a selection of images from the night.

A composite image of the first half of the eclipse

Shortly after the moon rose on the evening of the 27th

A dandelion silhouetted against the moon

A harvestmen perched on some Ragwort

The moon before the eclipse

The moon during the eclipse!

Kynance Cove at night- 30 second exposure!

Thrift and Lepidoptera - recent sightings

I thought I might break the monotony of Cretztschmar's Bunting posts (as exciting as it is), and do a blog on some recent insects and lepidoptera on the island. The flowers around the Bardsey are truly stunning at the moment, and the Thrift in particular is carpeting many areas of the coast. This coastal and rather unique habitat is home to a variety of interesting species of lepidoptera. The most well-known of these on Bardsey is that of the Thrift Clearwing. I have managed to find a little over 10 individuals around the South End this year, and also another individual on the East Side. In addition to the clearwings, there are plenty of micros to be seen: Lobesia littoralis, Bryotropha terrella, Teleiopsis diffinis, Celypha cespitana and many more. It is also proving to be an excellent month for migrant lepidoptera, with daily sightings of Silver Ys, Rush Veneers, Rusty Dot Pearls, double-figure counts of Painted Ladies, one Small Mottled Willow and also a handful of Bordered Straw.

Away from the coast, and into the moth traps...on the calm and cloudy nights, my heath trap at Nant has been pulling in as many as 50 moths, of over 20 species. There hasn't been anything massively exciting, although a Small Elephant Hawkmoth in the trap today was a great surprise. Some of the commonest species present in the traps at the moment include Bright-line Brown-eyes, Brown Rustics, Flame Shoulders, Common Marbled Carpets, Small Square Spots, Broom Moths and Shears. Caterpillars have been featuring well around the island, although most of the Lackey nests have been abandoned as the large final instars seek more food and a place to settle down into a pupa. Yellowtails and Six-spot Burnet caterpillars are also all over the place.

The flowering Thrift near Ogof Ystwffl Glas (a minute away from where the bunting is showing). Here is one of the favourite haunts of the following species...

Thrift Clearwing. This is a Nationally Scarce (Na) species, which we have small numbers of on the coast 

Painted Lady

Purple Bar

There have been plenty of Hoverflies making use of the thrift- this appears to be some species of Eupeodes

Honey Bee on the thrift

A different angle on this Drinker caterpillar

The Spectacle

Brown China-mark

Common Marbled Carpet (white morph)

EQUIPMENT:

Canon 7D mkII

Canon 15mm fisheye

Sigma 105mm f2.8 macro