In copula

Somehow I didn't get around to taking any photographs yesterday. On Monday we had a night of amazing thunderstorms - I stood out in the garden at 2.40am admiring the lightning - and drinking in the scent of the rain soaked earth and the white jasmine flowering next to our back door.

We'd been due to do another day of fieldwork, but the rain continued for much of the morning so we had an enforced break - most of which was spent tidying and shopping before some friends came over in the late afternoon. As usual, lots of conversation and a splendid supper eaten in the garden, only marred by the many ferocious mosquitoes that we have at the moment.

Today Pete and I were back on our brownfield site - a beautiful summer day, though by 3.30pm the temperature had climbed to 28C and we decided we'd had enough. The butterflies this year are unbelievable - today the commonest species was the brown argus. I came across this mating pair this morning, low down in the grassy vegetation. I had to kneel and peer through a small gap in the herbage to get a half clear shot of them!

We called in at Pets at Home on our way back to buy small crickets and wax moth larvae for an orphan goldfinch that was bought to us yesterday. It was the casualty of a tree-felling - the contractors had carefully checked the tree to be felled, but the falling branches knocked the nest out of a nearby conifer. It was only spotted, still in its nest, as it was about to be fed into the chipper - hence we've christened it Chip. After a somewhat shaky start it seems to be feeding well, but raising orphan birds is always a tricky business...