On Tuesday 7 July 2026 Wharfedale Nats had an exclusive visit to Rodley Nature Reserve. The photos are broadly arranged as Butterflies, Bugs, and Birds, and to a great extent this was also the chronology. Part of this was because we started with the moth trap but I think some of it is because once you are looking at Moths and Butterflies you see more. Then when you start looking at Birds you see more and don’t spot the Butterflies as easily. You have to tune your eye in, but that has the affect of tuning your eye out of other things.
The header image is of a female Emperor Dragonfly ovipositing in one of the ponds. One of the reasons for choosing this image is because its aspect ratio suits the header.
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Butterflies & Moths
The first part of the visit was a look at the moth trap. Quite a few were noted down. The Elephant Hawk Moth and Buff-tip were the stars for me.
Bugs
I am stretching the definition of Bugs a bit but these are a few of the little things spotted once I started wandering after the moth trap viewing.
Rodley Nature Reserve is recognised as a good place for Damselflies and Dragonflies and it did not disappoint.
Last year I spotted a Parent Shield Bug and this year a fellow visitor showed me a couple of Silver Birch leaves with a cluster of Parent Shield Bug nymphs. I have not seen these before so I can’t comment on how good a job the Parent is doing. Several of the nymphs have white eggs on them that will be from a parasitic fly. I don’t know what the Parent would do to protect its young from this.
Birds
The Swallow was actually the first photo I took during the visit, I spotted it on the wire during the little welcome talk.
At the river end of the path down to the river seems to be a good place to spot Whitethroats.
I have seen Little Egrets on many visits to the reserve but this is the first time I have seen them strutting about and calling. This also the biggest collection of them I have seen. I confident there were at least two others on site, possibly more.
The Kingfisher kindly came and perched on the scaffolding boards in front of one of the hides, but only for a second.
The curved sculpted shapes of the algae on the bushes is evidence of the warm, dry weather we have been having.
On most visits you can see several raptors. Buzzard and Red Kite often drift over and a resident Kestrel can often be seen over the scrub.
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The images are published under the Creative Commons, BY-NC-SA license. Feel free to share them, edit them, but please keep my name in the credits. And if I have got the ID of anything wrong please let me know, I don’t consider myself an expert but I have write something. It is often a best guess and it would take up too much room to say It could be this, or it could be… or perhaps.
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