Popping Pills on the Garden List

Wednesday night whilst pottering about the garden with a torch, I noted and potted up a relatively bland looking Pterostichus sp. - which I've not looked at yet. This prompted a targeted five minutes or so looking in various nooks and crannies, and I was surprised to easily find another four beetles - three of which were clearly new for the garden. One of these was lumpy and boring looking, two were streamlined and relatively colourful carabids ....

Pill Beetle - barely awake and very docile, a beetle photographers dream.

 

Anchomenus dorsalis - swanky looking, bloody well stay still!

Agonum muelleri - green / bronze / green / bronze / bloody well stay still!

Also from the same night, but found in the moth trap. It's not unusual to find Nicrophorus spp. in moth traps - they are usually docile, stinky and covered in mites. The most exciting thing they normally do is fall off the egg box.

This morning I found one ravaging a Pale Tussock - literally eating it alive. Gruesome but compelling. The Tussock was frantically flapping and kicking, whilst being chewed.

Nicrophorus humator - covered in Pale Tussock whilst eating it.

More typical Nicrophorus humator - doing feck all apart from smell.