Flowers and Fly at Powerstock Common

I had a day off work on Friday and decided to take a trip to see what sort of state Powerstock Common was in this year, after the major changes done last year which had turned it into a mainly muddy/dusty wilderness in my uneducated opinion when the DWT where “conservation managing” the site.  Being early spring much has still not grown up and will be easier to tell how the deforestation has gone later in the year.  It still looks fairly bleak.  However there is a lane that goes down the side, which is so far untouched by the management.  Down this lane were some early spring flowers and I sighted a couple of Peacock Butterflies in flight.

I took the opportunity on a nice patch of primroses in the sunlight to have another go at taking these.  I think they are my best attempts yet, but that’s in light of never really capturing them satisfactorily before.

Primroses (Primula vulgaris) taken on Canon 50D with Canon 100mm F2.8 USM Macro Lens.  Natural Light.  ISO 400 F8 1/1000.  Tripod

Primrose (Primula vulgaris) Patch taken on Canon 50D with Canon 100mm F2.8 USM Macro Lens.  Natural Light.  ISO 400 F8 1/800.  Tripod.

Next up I found an unusual looking plant, which I later worked out to be Field Horse Tail.  This apparently is a very old species of plant, and can be found in fossilized as well as living form.

Field Horse Tail – Equisetum arvense.  Taken on Canon 50D with Canon 100mm F2.8 USM Macro Lens.  ISO 400 F4.5 1/1000 Natural Light.  Tripod.

Near the small pond some wild grass seeds were nicely lit by the sun.

Sunlit Grass seeds.  Taken on Canon 50D with Canon 100mm F2.8 USM Macro Lens.  ISO 400 F3.5 1/2500.

Lastly I found a common yellow dung fly that was resting on a flower.  I took some further away shots, but as the fly was quite happy for me to hold the flower it was sitting on and enable me to position it for the lens, which I slid along the holding arm/hand, I managed to capture a close up of its head at 4x magnification on my MPE-65mm lens.

Common Yellow Dung Fly – Scathophaga stercoraria. Head Close up at 4x..  Taken on Canon 50D with Canon MPE-65mm Macro Lens.  4x Magnification.  F11 1/250 ISO400.  Flash E-TTL Metered with Canon MT-24ex Macro Flash.

 

 

 

Map of Location

Dorset Wildlife Trust Reserve. Small car park here. Room for about 2 more slightly further up the lane in the reserve.