Birds, Leps, Observations & Generalities - the images and ramblings of Mark Skevington. Sometimes.

Thursday 17 May 2012

Yet more random stuff

The garden traps are still inactive, so yet again I was out dipping into everything else. Yesterday evening I had a very relaxing 2 hour walk along a disused railway line near to Cosby, which runs parallel to the M1. Despite the traffic noise in the background, it was actually quite peaceful with plenty of birdsong and, amazingly, not a single other person during the time I was there. I had fully expected a flurry of post-dinner dog-walkers. Something was singing from every stretch of shrubbery, including four Blackcaps, a Whitethroat, a Chiffchaff and a skulking Garden Warbler. Quite a few Adela reaumurella and Parornix angelicella flying, but with the conditions being a bit overcast there was not a lot of activity. Plenty of stuff picked out though as I ambled along, with Craneflies being most prominent for some reason .....

Tipula vernalis

Tipula varipennis

Tipula fascipennis - female

Tipula fascipennis - male

Tipula fascipennis - pair in cop

There were also a lot of Limonia phragmitidis about but I failed to get a decent shot. Very few beetles and bugs noted, but I did find a distinctive small one - Anaspis maculata - which escaped somewhere in the house before I could get a photo. Otherwise I found these ..

Cantharis nigricans

Agriotes sputator - many thanks to Mark Telfer

You'll have to trust me on this one, but the following shot is 100% genuine - no coaxing of the subjects to sit where I wanted them. I just went over to check a clump of White Campion and found these two sat side by side on the same flower.

Orange-tip (female) and Green-veined White

I've taken to looking at and under fallen rotting logs whilst out on these forays just lately, and this walk proved unexpectedly productive. I found this underneath one - a very common species to light but the first time I have seen the larva ..

Dark Arches

Meanwhile I found this growing on the end of another log ..

Pale Stagshorn??

Here's some random stuff to close the post.

Psila fimetaria

Hairy Snail

Aceria macrorhynchus - gall mite on Sycamore

Hawthorn Shieldbug

?? Which Spider ??

2 comments:

Mark G. Telfer said...

The click is Agriotes sputator. Mark

Skev said...

Many thanks Mark - that's one I was reluctant to attempt at this very early stage in my foray into beetles.