This morning we had a visit from an osprey. I saw that it had rings on its legs so I wanted to get some decent photos. Typically, the ring numbers were facing towards the bird and the colour of the ring was indistinct too.

I've been looking forward to this week as it is the week we usually see the migrant birds on their way back south. The osprey was a good start, but it has been rather ruined this year as the cows arrived this evening.

It was a really nice day today and I was hoping for a good day for butterflies and birds. I was a bit disappointed to be honest. There were hardly any butterflies and, although we had 24 species of bird, there really wasn't anything very interesting except for this female pied flycatcher. I always think it is going to be difficult to spot a pied flycatcher, but they're such a pretty bird, they stand out a mile.

There were four buzzards around the valley today. I'm constantly hoping for a honey buzzard, but today was not the day.

I spent a few hours watching the birds as there were no butterflies flying. There wasn't much interesting bird activity either but I've put up the 'highlights': a song thrush, a raven, a juvenile goldfinch, a spotted flycatcher and a couple of swallows. I've also included a photo of a chaffinch as I don't usually bother photographing them, but this one had a bit of a moult on and looked quite unusual.

At one point there were several hundred house martins flying around the pond.

I haven't had a lot of time to watch the birds and insects this week, but I got out for 10 minutes today and photographed a new beetle, Chilocorus renipustulatus.

I thought I also had a new butterfly species as this one seemed unfamiliar. However, it is a female sooty copper which I've recorded many times in the garden although I'm more used to seeing males.

There was a juvenile white wagtail down by the pond. Here's a photo of him looking away from me.

In contrast to the rest of this week, today was a beautiful, warm day. This brought out the butterflies.

It was great to see a great banded grayling gliding back and forth across the valley. Very difficult to photograph though as it didn't settle. Here are some BiFs.

As well as sooty coppers, mazarine blues, common blues and silver-washed fritillaries, this high brown fritillary was enjoying our buddleia.

For some reason, the buddleia has flowered really late this year and has only just come out in the last week. That's two or three weeks later than in previous years.

The bank vole was out and about today too. He seems quite fearless.

It was a good day for birds too. I saw two white birds fly over the house early this morning which I'm sure would have been new a new species for us, but I didn't manage to identify them. Here's a photo of a kestrel that was hovering and diving over the valley.

I'm finishing with a sequence of photos of one of the squirrels I mentioned yesterday. They're being extremely wasteful with the hazelnuts. As you can see here, they are taking a few bites and then dropping unopened nuts when they get bored. At one point there were five squirrels in the tree - and it isn't a big tree.

The weather has been pretty terrible recently and there hasn't been a lot going on around the garden. That said, our hazel tree is currently being decimated by squirrels.

I spent a bit of time watching for birds but didn't really see anything interesting except two ravens and this chiffchaff.

It's been quite a quiet week in the garden. Even today when I spent a few hours watching the birds, there really wasn't a lot to see. Maybe this sparrowhawk was keeping the birds away.

Yet another rodent is living in our shed. In addition to the garden dormouse and mouse, today this field vole was running about.

The early afternoon sun was being enjoyed by this chiffchaff and blackbird who where both basking.

Finally, here's a photo of a pair of bullfinches which have been visiting a few times this week.

Yesterday, I'm convinced I saw a garden dormouse running around the shed in the twilight. I spent a hour tonight in the hope that he would show himself again, but instead I got this mouse. This was taken in semi-darkness, so the photo's a bit grainy.

Earlier, we'd had at least four red-backed shrikes flying around the house. The photo shows three of them.

I've got a couple more photos of butterflies for today. A beautiful high brown fritillary on echinacea and another speckled wood - this time showing the underside of the wings.

The other photos are of various birds. I included a couple of close-ups of a spotted nutcracker as I liked those legs.

Lots of photos of birds today and lots of young ones too. There were two highlights - seeing six red backed shrikes and then having a spotted flycatcher sitting just opposite me for a few minutes.

It's turning out to be a great year for butterflies too. Here's a photo of a summer generation speckled wood.