Another rainy day. So with no new invert news, here's a vegetative interlude.
First up some more garden weeds wildflowers ....
Procumbent Pearlwort growing on the edges of the front driveway
Shepherd's Purse growing on the kerbside
Creeping Buttercup - all over the garden waiting to flower be pulled/mowed
Daisy - a few always manage to evade the whirring blade
A Dandelion sp. - a few in the borders
Hert Robert now flowering
Also flowering, I noticed that on the embankment there are a few straggly sallows starting to show themselves - would be good if these manage to outgrow the brambles, dogwood and others.
And the rest are cultivated, after a fashion.
We planted this Oak from an acorn a number of years ago, and it's just coming into leaf. It was nurtured in a pot to try and limit it a bit bonsai style, and it gets pruned, though the pot itself was then semi-planted so the roots are probably broken through the pot by now. Either way it's never going to be a multi-hundred year old veteran!
Red Valerian - I nicked an errant plant from one of the neighbours gardens when the house was vacated, and we now have a load self-set/spreading on the front garden.
We have a variegated shrub on the front which has these nice but pretty well hidden flowers. Managed to find a label on it saying it's a Pittosporum tenuifolium [Irene Paterson].
Some sort of cultivated bluebell from bulbs planted last autumn
Today has been another wet dull day, though to be fair up until this week the lockdown weather has been pretty good. No garden trapping last night, and I forgot to mention that Monday night's effort was poor compared to Sunday.
Anyway, back to Sunday when we last had a properly nice day. I headed out to walk along the disused railway line (Bramble Walk), accessed from the road to Cosby and that runs immediately parallel to the M1. I walked down to a small copse at the end just before the track closes down a bit, swiping the odd hoverfly and hawthorn as I went. When I got to the copse, I had a walk through it and somehow ended up on a path that I had no idea existed.
The blue dot is the end of the lane out of the estate, and the cyan dot is the access point to Bramble Walk. The red dot is a point in the copse where I briefly stopped and took the following snap ....
The black dots are flies, and I've realised after the event that the line of shrubs and trees is the backside of the walk heading back down to where I started. What actually happened is that I found a small muddy pool, got distracted and then marched off down what I though was the same walk heading further down past the copse. I'd actually managed to find another track running roughly SW from the copse which comes out behind the golf course and carries on towards Broughton Astley. I knew after a few meters that I'd gone the wrong way, but carried on anyway as it looked good. A more shaded and damp-feeling track.
I carried on until I got to another dilapidated railway bridge which I think must be at the yellow dot on the above map.
I didn't go any further, but actually this looked like a good place to head for some out of the way searching regardless of lockdown. Along that track, I noticed a broken lying log with some cramp balls on it, and had a quick look ....
Did you notice them ....
Piss-common Fungus Weevil
During the walk the only people I saw were a bloke and two kids on mini-quad bikes coming along the track (maybe a local farmer), and one other couple on some sort of power walk who seemed to want to catch up with me at great pace, though before they reached me was when I took the side-track into the copse. I picked up a few bits whilst out, though aside from the hoverflies and larvae I've already posted I only took a few snaps - most bits were potted up for checking later. But here's a couple of beetles ....
Acupalpus meridianus - just loafing on a leaf slightly and keeping slightly out of focus
Anaspis maculata - 100s swept from hawthorn
I also saw Grammptera ruficornis, loads of Byturus sp. and I've got a couple of weevils, a carabid and an Aphodia sp. to check.
Here's a couple of flies ..
Yellow Dung Fly
Phaonia sp.
As for the title for the post, well you may have noticed the brown substrate for the last two photos looks, well, a bit shit.
Whether your main ento-interest is coleoptera, diptera, hymenoptera or lepidoptera (and probably other orders too) then around now is the time to be beating the living daylights of blossoming hawthorn. On the embankment I can see hawthorn bushes that are getting larger and fuller every year, and there is no way I can get to them regardless of social distancing / lockdown (unless I just nonchalantly flounce into or through one of the neighbours gardens with my beating gear and bravado).
I do have hawthorn in the garden .....
The twig on the left is a self-set hawthorn seedling that I lifted and potted. It is clearly some years away from being a blossoming insect attractant! The twig on the right is a sallow cutting that I borrowed from the neighbour's overhanging tree. Which this year he cut right back just as the catkins were coming out. Knob.
So whilst on my walk on Sunday (more on that another day) I was pleased to note that there was at least some hawthorn accessible along the ride to swipe at - although as I only had my light-weight butterfly net I was keen to not ruin it again so it was all a bit sedate. I found a few bits, despite it still being early in the hawthorn blossom season. Mainly I found a lot of lepidopteran larvae. I would normally have brought a few home to rear through but decided this would be a bit daft this year when I can't just nip out whenever I want/need to to collect more larval foodplant. So I snapped a few on my finger tip.
Two forms of Mottled Umber - quite a few of these noted
Dun-bar - just a couple
Winter Moth - 100s
Epirrita sp. - probably November Moth
Think this is Dotted Border / Scarce Umber - would have been good to rear
I'm glad I've got a bit of a surplus of stuff to post, as weather-wise it's gone a bit overcast and dull with less invert action in the garden during the day. That does mean some better potential for mothing and as the trap was relatively good last night I'll use that for now with one exception - the garden bird lockdown list.
Before all this started, I'd already highlighted that Red Kite, Raven and Peregrine were hoped-for garden ticks, almost expected if I spent enough time at home / in the garden looking out for them. So the fact that the first two have come along during lockdown is great, but not a surprise and I've then been expecting a flyover Peregrine to come along any time. But what I wasn't expecting was that I'd add another raptor first! Very early this afternoon I nipped out to the garden with a plate of salad (yes, real actual salady salad) to enjoy in one of the sunny spells, and as I sat eating it a Buzzard came very low over the garden mewing. I went and grabbed my bins thinking it would come back and circle around like they usually do, and to look out for any other birds whilst I was out. No more Buzzards or any other large raptors in the next few minutes. But then out of the blue, a falcon came tearing into view. I immediately knew what it was from the long slim-looking wings and relatively slight body, and I got the bins up in time to see a superb Hobby blast over heading north-west. Brilliant. Not completely outlandish as I've seen a couple over the years down the lane. Much later in the afternoon a flock of at least 15 Swifts came over the garden screeching, and they loitered in the vicinity for a good while feeding overhead before gradually drifting north-ish.
So to the moth trap. I ran the 125W MV last night as there was a potential for rain around dawn and my actinic trap is still electrically unsafe. The barbeque is currently sitting in the exact spot against the kitchen wall where I usually run the trap, so I had it positioned about two meters further out on an old curtain lining as a sheet over the pebbles. I had a good feeling when on the first check there were two Pale Tussocks and a Flame Carpet already in. When I went back out a little later, I noticed a movement on a low wall that was close to the trap (but would normally be a couple of meters further away from it). This is the wall ....
It is absolutley nothing special and it's been there as long as we've lived here (26years now I've just realised). The contents of the planting were culled along with everything else before the winter, so it's just got some scraggy bits that have come back up. The bricks have some fine algae and lichen bits on it, and somehow it has avoided being pressure washed to death by Nichola. The movement I notced was near the middle of the front face on the lowest brick .... here ....
So a quick look with phone torch and I could not believe my eyes ....
Luffia lapidella f. ferchaultella
How the actual F does an apterous parthenogenetic species manage to get onto one of my garden walls? Some lepidopteran larvae are thought to be able to 'balloon' to disperse but probably not this one. Surely it can't have crawled very far to get on my wall! Anyway this most unexpected event meant that I'd managed to add a new species to the garden moth list before emptying the trap. Species 699 - one to go!
Today I've had a good look around, and I can't find any other cases on walls, fences or trunks. I didn't collect this one as, quite frankly, there's not much point trying to rear one out as I don't think the female even bothers leaving the case before laying and dying. It's got a much better chance of surviving and multiplying if left alone.
The trap this morning was relatively busy, and happily it was bone dry. The total catch was 31 of 20sp., and of those there were 10 NFY species. I filled up lots of tubs to photograph a few moths for a change.
Pale Tussock
Flame Carpet
Small Magpie
Foxglove Pug
Currant Pug
V-Pug
Shuttle-shaped Dart
Brimstone Moth
Bee Moth
The moth trap is out again, and again there is a chance of rain pushing up from further south just before dawn. Hopefully it will pick up something before then. In the meantime I've got some sawflies and diptera to try and pin tonight.
Spent some time in the garden early this morning, too early for any real activity - just enjoying the relative peace, birdsong, morning warmth and plenty of coffee. I wasn't enjoying the largely empty moth trap. One of the Blackcaps showed itself a little better, and I saw a female in the garden which was nice.
I could hear a Skylark singing, and a very distant snatch of Lesser Whitethroat - I think the days of this being annual on the embankment are now over as it is probably too densely shrubbed over now. It sounded not far away, just beyond the end of the embankment where it turns to hedgerow along the field edges.
Early this afternoon, with left foot big toe much more flexible and much less painful than of late, I headed of for my first walk in over two weeks. I headed back to the disused railway line and I've got a few bits from the outing to share over future posts. Today though, I'll focus on the main activity in the garden yesterday with a couple of bits from today thrown in as they fit the topic - Syrphinae.
Having got completely fed up with the Eristalis pertinax disturbing anything, but having also noted a few smaller hoverflies in the garden, I decided it was time to swish the net and try to get them sorted. I'm not used to fondling hoverflies and clearly need more practice as getting hold of them was certainly not a refined and honed process - however all were released unharmed. Getting one-handed shots whilst hand-rangling diptera is also an art that I need to perfect. Turned out they're all female, I guess the males were too busy to be fanny about flying in sunshine.
First up, one that really should be exciting but again (having had one last year) a sense-check on the UK Hoverflies facebook group says sp. only. These clearly just need lumping ....
Female Pipiza sp.
Legs not yellow enough for P. luteitarsis, so probably P. noctiluca sl, but might not be ...
Female Eupeodes sp.
Another bugger, as markings not quite right for either E. luniger or E. corollae
The rest were more straightforward ....
Female Melanostoma scalare
Female Platycheirus albimanus
Grey spots on abdomen, extensively yellow legs
Female Rhingia campestris
Black edging to tergites
The following are all from the walk today ... same method, same clumsy handling ...
Female Leucozona lucorum
Female Helophilus pendulus
Female Syrphus ribesii
Note the hind femur is largely yellow except the base
