Birds but no bees...

I have to start this blog update by sharing part of an article I read in the Guardian newspaper recently. It had been written by Patrick Barkham, a natural history writer.

He writes:

Focusing on one small area of nature helps us make connections and interpret interesting behaviour because we soon acquire a bit of expertise. Some people just love birds of prey, others obsess over orchids or a limited group of insects.

At first, my identification skills were rusty (I mistook moths for butterflies and spent ages trying to identify a common "cabbage" white) and my mission was a bit embarrassing. Soon, however, the pleasures of lingering in sunny meadows in scrappy corners of London and more conventionally beautiful nature reserves surpassed any lingering discomfort about explaining to passersby what I was doing. I met some lovely fellow obsessives but most of my joy was a more solitary communion with the countryside.

And he concludes:

We need to feel we belong to human society, and sometimes nature watching can make us feel we are eccentrics on the margins of conventional life. But we also at some fundamental level need to feel we belong to the natural world. Being in nature, allowing the near or distant wild to seep into us, is wonderfully liberating. We see ourselves as we truly are, a small living thing, part of much grander and older forces all around us. It's an appreciation for something that in other eras people might have called God. I don't call it that (although I've no grudge against people who do) but I worship this greater society of living things of which we are but one small part. It makes me feel much better about myself and much fonder of the world around me.

I hope this moves you in the same way it does me...

Right then! On with the update...

Click any photo for a larger view on black

What could be more apt to accompany that writing than this field of poppies I saw close to the Hothfield Nature Reserve in Kent recently? 

Whilst scouting around the reserve itself, I found these brilliant sundew plants...

This is Broad-leaved Sundew, a carnivorous plant that inhabits the acidic bog of Hothfield. Once an insect gets stuck, the plant will curl itself around it and devour!

This is one of the few places to find Keeled-skimmer Dragonflies in Kent too. It seems to be more common across the west of the U.K.  I struggled to get close photos on the day as there was a survey of the orchids taking place and I didn't want to disturb that, or get in the way...

A male Keeled-skimmer Dragonfly

This is doing my usual thing of jumping around subject-wise/mixing it up, but I just wanted to share this little toadlet I photographed because, I don't ever recall having photo'd one before. That doesn't mean I haven't though, I could well have done and forgotten...

I have been making a concerted effort to try and get into taking some bird shots of late, and although for the most part I have only been taking garden birds, I thought I'd share them with you here. A departure from my usual macro photography of insects, but the next update will be all invertebrates (you have been warned.)

A young Starling

A Jackdaw

A Sparrow dust bath

A Blackbird sunbathing

A juvenile Sparrow

A baby Robin

And just because the robin is my favourite, another to complete the set...

Back on the invert trail-you don't often see these next creatures looking quite as clean and tidy, normally they are sporting all kinds of excrement on their backs...

Green Tortoise Beetle larvae

There are a couple of things that I can almost guarantee I will come across every time I go out walking locally; it's not as if I have to go hunting either, they are present in large numbers...

A Dock bug

These dock bugs (Coreus marginatus) if I have remembered the Latin name correctly,are all over the dock and bramble and most seem to be engaged in a personal mission to create yet more dock bugs. I always look for the nymphs as they are amazing little creatures...

And then there are the sawfly larvae; several species to see and causing havoc by completely defoliating some of the shrubs

A Sawfly larva

A different species...

And a closer look...

A couple of things to end with then, I couldn't resist including this goat that belonged to the farm where we recently stayed for a few days...

And then my dismal attempt at capturing a bird in flight. It's a lot harder than I thought; this photo has been heavily cropped and as you can see, it is already on its way out of shot...

Until the next time when I shall be back with an update all about weevils; unless I change my mind beforehand that is...

A jewel of a cuckoo wasp...

Another day, another blog update and although I like to think that all of my finds are special, every so often something amazing appears and then it's down to me to try and do it justice with my photographic skills.

Imagine then how pleased and excited I was to see this beautiful little wasp...

It's a ruby-tailed wasp. Ruby-tailed wasps belong to the order Hymenoptera, that includes sawflies, bees and wasps. Here in the U.K. we have a number of species that are difficult to tell apart with any degree of certainty.

They are all are beautifully coloured, red, blue, green and bronze metallic colours. Their abdomens are usually a ruby red colour which gives the wasps their name ‘ruby-tail’. These wasps are solitary meaning they do not live in large social nests.

Being barely 10mm in length, they can be difficult to spot. You can often see them running over walls and tree trunks. This one I assume may have been sleeping when I spotted it on oak fencing, as it had its antennae tucked underneath. I have seen them before but struggled to get pictures as they are usually very fast.

As a parasite they require another species for part of their life cycle, mainly mason bees and other solitary bees.

The wasp reverses into the hosts nest hole and lays its eggs next to the host eggs. The wasp eggs hatch into larvae, which eat the newborn host species. The unsuspecting adult host returns to seal its nest hole, never knowing what is inside! This is why this wasp is also known as a cuckoo wasp. The larva complete their development inside the nest and the adults emerge the following spring.

Pebble prominent moth caterpillar

A close-up of that face

And a cropped version

This larva of the moth Notodonta ziczac (great name) is quite common and one I see most years feeding on willow (Salix) with its tail end held up in a characteristic pose that has the effect of making it look like the head end.

It can get to a reasonable size, I made a point of attempting to measure this one and at full stretch it was close to 40mm.

24-Spot ladybird larva

If you thought 'ziczac' was a great name then check this one out-the 24-spot ladybird has this splendid moniker:Subcoccinella vigintiquattuorpunctata, now that might be a very intelligent and descriptive name but I doubt I could even pronounce it-as for remembering how to spell it...or even just remembering it!

The ladybird itself is our only vegetarian species, not only that, it is our only hairy, vegetarian species.

Eurygaster testudinaria

These large shieldbugs are often known as Tortoise Bugs. Again, I find these most years and increasingly they are appearing locally. What interested me about this couple is that I have not photographed them in cop before and allied to that, what struck me was that it's the larger female here that has the really striking markings and colour.

And....that then got me wondering if all the previous finds of colourful individuals amounted to them all being females? I know the colour and intensity can vary quite a lot but I am going to be as observant as possible with future finds to put my theory to the test.

Kybos cf. betullae 

I have been seeing a large number of hopper nymphs of late; it's that time of year again. Some are very tricky to try and identify though, as is the case with the one pictured above. It is one of those that requires dissection to be sure but it was found on willow which is a help, although not sufficient to be completely sure of a full ID.

Here's another, maybe this is the same species? They were both on birch...

This little one seems to have picked up a rather gruesome parasite...

 More hopper nymphs...

This one is Javesella species, very small, about 3-4mm and probably an adult rather than a nymph...

Whilst sorting through some old photographs for another project recently, I came across the following picture of a grasshopper that I'd forgotten all about and so,I'll share it here as my final picture for this update...

Until the next time then...

(My latest contribution to Magnet magazine is HERE)