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I have had a busy past few days. I went insect hunting on Saturday and Sunday, spent a day taking cicada photos at the museum on Monday and had my MSc graduation ceremony on Wednesday.

On Saturday I met with Tristan to explore Rainham Marshes. This was the second time I had visited the marshes and unsurprisingly, they were much more lively than they were in March. I will write another post to cover what we saw at the marshes.

I spent Sunday at Imperial College’s Silwood Park campus with Malin and saw lots of hoverflies that I am yet to identify. We picked some nettles (Urtica dioica) to make nettle soup which was very tasty. We used a recipe from ‘Seaweed and Eat it: A Family Foraging and Cooking Adventure‘ by Fiona Houston and Xa Milne. I have not read any other wild food books for comparison, but it seems a reasonable book with anecdotes, history and folklore. We hope to try one of the seaweed recipes soon.

Finally, I wish to share a wonderful tool that Alan Phillips introduced me to: Grab a Grid Reference by Keith Balmer. If you do recording and need a quick site to look up grid references then this is the tool for you! It is easy to use and is much better than any other sites I have used (including the OS site). Thanks Alan!