That's a bit galling

Okay, I've not suddenly gone all-out bonkers on looking at leaves but whilst pottering about in the garden after work I noticed some bits. And what it reminded me is that looking for leaf-mines will inevitably present a variety of galls, smuts, mildews, rusts and other on-leaf oddities that might be just as difficult to identify.

Some are obvious and easy to ID like these 'spangle calls' from the asexual generation of the wasp Neuropterus quercusbaccarum that are all over my oak sapling.

Some are obvious to see, but take a bit of tinterweb searching to ID like this fungal disease on a cultivated rose that I am sure is Rose Black Spot (Diplocarpon rosae).

And some are going to be hand's-up with no idea, like this 'thing' that looks like a nipple that I found on the garden silver birch on the underside of a leaf. It looks very regular, and very much like it should be a gall caused by either a wasp or mites although there is no sign of any disruption to the leaf. But I can't immediately find anything like it on the tinterweb so far. One suggestion on a Facebook forum was 'spider poo' ........

Planes, Galls and Whitearses

Had a good night out mothing at Watermead CP South with Adrian Russell last night, and the garden traps have been ticking over nightly with a couple of interesting firsts to report - however I'm going to save the moth trapping posts for the moment and go with other stuff.

First up, whilst out on my bike on Thursday night looking for leaf mines I also found some very distinct 'spangle galls' on the underside of oak leaves.

This is the type of thing you see all the time and ignore, but I decided to check them out and found that they belong to a very common gall wasp - Neuroterus quercusbaccarum. Also found out about the alternate sexual generations of this and similar species. These galls host the growing larvae of the wasps over the winter, and the adults emerge in the spring as both males and females. Once they've mated, the fertilised eggs develop into a completely different type of gall (a currant gall), and the adults emerging from these are parthenogentic, laying unfertilised eggs which develop into the spangle galls to start the cycle again.

Of the leaf mines, not too much success with ID. I found Caloptilia stigmatella on sallow, and this is Phyllonorycter corylifoliella on hawthorn (vacated blister mine):

Today saw the return of the 'Victory Show' at Cosby, the neighbouring village. Still amazes me how a local rural village manages to arrange a military and air show! We headed up to Huncote Embankment again in the afternoon to watch the flying display. Whilst up there I noted at least two Wheatears, neither of which was very accomodating for the camera - they refused to come close enough and kept facing away, like this:

As for the airshow - all very good with great displays with aircraft including AT-6D Harvard, Lancaster, a couple of Spitfires, P-51 Mustang, Hurricane and a Messerschmitt Me-109.

AT-6D Harvard

Lancaster and Spitfire

Lancaster

Spitfire

Messerschmitt Me-109

Spitfire and P-51 Mustang

The show goes on tomorrow as well, and as far as I know the awesome Vulcan Bomber is coming over - just about shook the roof off of our house last time.