Burning up at the bioblitz...

It's Wednesday August 23rd and looking like a lovely, late summer day. Today there is a 'Bioblitz' in a local village:coordinated by the Medway Valley Countryside Project, who's stated aims are:

• Create, Sustain and Enhance Kent’s Landscape & its wildlife
• Develop, Manage and Support community-based environmental initiatives
• Develop, and Promote life long outdoor learning
• Encourage and Enhance greater access in the outdoors and the corresponding health benefits.

I thought a visit would be apposite...

It was a great way of engaging the children (of whom there were many) and the guided walks seemed popular. I decided against them though, and instead had a short walk of my own to see what I could find. Half a dozen of my finds are shown below. Nothing out of the ordinary, but there were quite a few more that I didn't photograph, and it all added to their overall tally.

I have had several early morning walks with the camera recently. Mostly for the purpose of getting some long-exposure tripod shots: I think it would be fair to say that the results have been, variable and on Monday August 28th all I managed was the following shot of a crop field, and that was taken with my phone...

Just two days later, the same destination of Frittenden, saw the highest temperatures in the whole of the UK for that day: 29.3 deg or 84+ if you prefer Fahrenheit. Here is one of the photographs from an early morning session that I can share...

A Grass Moth

And a tiny Green Shieldbug nymph too...

The Comma butterfly is a real success story, in that it seems to have been able to reverse its decline and is now wide-spread once again. Named of course for the white comma shape on the underside of its hindwings. The jagged edges of the forewings are the reason behind the other common name of 'Angelwings'. 

A Comma Butterfly - Polygonia c-album

Having found the adult butterfly, I was pleased when I spotted a caterpillar; however, once again, as with the puss moth larva I found a while ago, all was not well. On close inspection, I could see an unwanted visitor...

It was this tiny parasitic wasp, which I managed to remove. Yes, I was interfering with nature in some small way, but I wanted to see if I would be in time to save the caterpillar and allow it to form a chrysalis. As you can see in the next photo, it did go on to suspend itself from a nettle soon after. The inset picture is a closeup of the wasp...

It wasn't too much later that it had indeed become a chrysalis, and so if my hunch is right, I may yet get to see the adult butterfly emerging.

All of which brings me back to my last update about the puss moth parasitic larvae. Having seen most become pupae, one remained fairly active and amazingly, seemed to survive without a food source for another 15 days. After which it gradually became increasingly yellow in colour...

It's still around but not looking good now!

I can also now confirm the identity of the 'dancing chrysalis' featured in my last update. It eclosed last week to reveal a fabulous herald moth...

I haven't featured spiders for a while, and as you all love them so much and September (spider month) is just around the corner, I thought I would add a couple of pics of a teeny, juvenile, fence-post jumper. A first for me; not seen anything other than adults until now...

I guess I shouldn't really leave you with images of spiders...nightmares and all that! Here then is something much prettier, they are (empty) lacewing eggs and these are another 'first' for me. Despite searching each year, I have never been lucky until now..

Dance yourself dizzy...

In an effort to start this blog update in a slightly different way, I thought perhaps a dancing chrysalis might fit the bill? You might like to ensure that your sound is on for this...

Please remember that these videos are often too large to show in the e.mail version of the blog:

         

Not exactly quiescent is it. All I know about this is based on the larva that I found in the garden, which looks like this...

I kept the (unknown) larva until pupation and I guess I must have disturbed the chrysalis to instigate such a violent reaction.

Staying with the theme of moth larvae for a second; I recently discovered an early instar of an Elephant-hawk moth (Deilephila elpenor) which gave me a chance to observe how they grow (fast is the answer!) and hadn't realised that they start out green. I thought I had found a green version, which you don't see too often...

Luckily though, I found one of those too...

This is what the brown one looks like now, still a lot of growing to do...

Yes, time for some news about the puss moth parasites featured in my last update. I wasn't at all hopeful about my chances of encouraging the parasite larvae to pupate: I had read that it is tricky to provide the right conditions, as it's assumed that they do so inside of the puss moth cocoons. The best idea I could come up with was to sandwich them between 2 pieces of bark and then put them in the dark. 

I left them for a few days, and when I checked, to my amazement, they were still moving and had begun to change in appearance...

Sure enough, a few days later when I re-checked them, they had begun to pupate. I now have 3 cocoons. I am expecting that they will now remain this way until next year and then...hopefully, I will get to see the wasps emerge, if I am real lucky.

Baby news now: Nadya Suleman, better known as "Octomom," became world famous when she gave birth to eight babies in January 2009 but could you imagine trying to look after this lot? I'm not sure of exact numbers, but it's in excess of 20 that this mother has to care for.

This is 'Elasmucha grisea' the Parent Bug. Or as I have seen them described, the Motherly Bug. A description that seems more apt in a way, because dad has naff-all to do with caring for his offspring, in fact he dies soon after mating, which seems a bit harsh; whilst mum sits tight, on-guard, from egg laying until the nymphs venture out to feed.

Here's an unrelated 2nd instar nymph that I found at a different location. This one seems to have damaged an eye: I wonder if that will resolve at the next moult?

This update seems to have turned out to be devoted to the first stages of life, with eggs, tiny nymphs and chrysalis' a'plenty, so let's end with another discovery of ova. Whilst looking for butterfly eggs in the garden, I spotted this amazingly small egg on the Nepta plant. It really was too small to accurately measure but I guess was around 0.5mm.

I think it may be a bug egg of some kind? (sits back and waits for somebody with superior knowledge to confirm/deny) But if it is; which species? I know there are at least a couple of Rhopalid bug species present. There are several bugs that I can rule out, but that's about as far as I have got, and although I have kept this in a little pot (container that is, not hashish!) I still wonder if I will be able to find it again being so small (the egg, not me).

A pretty, pretty picture to end on. One of the few Painted Ladies I have seen locally this year. Well, I did see an overweight girly, covered in tattoos with a phone stuck to her ear one evening.