My natural highlights for 2022

TL:DR – A few natural highlights from a year that’s been rather miserable in too many ways for me, but peppered with music and photography and nature.


You can find the photos I took of these highlights littered around the Sciencebase website, in my Imaging Storm galleries, on my Instagram, Twitter, Mastodon, and Facebook.

Thousands of Pink-footed Geese, North Norfolk

Water Rails – RSPB Lakenheath

Frogs (20+) and frogspawn -in our garden wildlife pond

Cranes – RSPB Ouse Fen

Grasshopper Warbler – RSPB Ouse Fen

Otter on the river bank of the River Great Ouse or is it the Great River Ouse, ouse means river so could be the Great Ouse River too…

White Stork – Earith and Smithy Fen

Chiffchaff – bathing in our garden wildlife pond

Puffins, Shags, Razorbills etc –Farne Islands

Kittiwakes, Eider Ducks – Seahouses

American Black, Arctic and Sandwich Terns – Long Nanny, Northumberland

Hooded Crow – Northumberland

Wall butterfly – Seahouses

Lizard Orchid – Devil’s Dyke

Bee Orchid – WARG Field, Cottenham

Black Hairstreak and White Admiral butterflies – Monk’s Wood and Brampton Wood

Purple Emperor, Purple Hairstreak – Gamlingay Wood and Woodwalton Fen

Grizzled Skipper – Woodwalton Marsh

Chinese Water Deer – RSPB Ouse Fen

Adonis Blue and later Chalkhill Blue butterflies, also Green Hairstreak and Dark Green Fritillaries – Devil’s Dyke, Cambs

Marbled White – Edwards’ Wood, Dry Drayton

Small Blue butterflies – Trumpington Meadows

Brassy Longhorns again – Cottenham Lode

Discovering two previously unreported colonies of White-letter Hairstreak butterflies – Rampton Wood

Discovering a previously unreported colony of Purple Hairstreak butterflies – Rampton Wood

Encountering an irruption of Clouded Yellow butterflies – beyond RSPB Ouse Fen and two other patches of the same species elsewhere

Rosy Footman and Light Crimson Underwing moths – New Forest

New Forest Ponies – New Forest

Huge flock of Common Buzzard in a field on Soham Road

Numerous Convolvulus Hawk-moth – to tobacco plants in our garden

Sighting of Osprey and two White-tailed Eagles – Poole Harbour

Sika Deer, doe and fawn – Wareham

L-album Wainscot moth – Corfe Castle

December Moth at long last – to actinic light in our garden (64th new moth of the year for me.