Beauty and the Beast

As this title came to me, I remembered this year's Countryfile calendar competition of the same name...and then realised I've missed the deadline by a couple of weeks. Ah well.

I noticed that the border below the kitchen window is awash with insect life at the moment and spent a happy spell trying to photograph them, including this fellow on the Hydrangea and, if you look in Extras, what I now know to be a snakefly - something I had no idea existed until I noticed it this morning and identified via my trusty DK Pocket Nature British wildlife guide. If you look in Large you might see that it was caught in the act of predating an aphid, something they do quite a bit I gather.