Eggs for breakfast...

I feel that I need to start this update with an apology. In my last update I stated that the Red-legged Shieldbug I found was the first mid instar for this year. In fact, I had found and featured one just a couple of updates previously. Ooops! Memory may be worse than anticipated.

I can now advance this story though, because recently I found three final instar nymphs...

It's amazing how your mind works isn't it. Well, it's amazing how mine works at all! But somehow my mind went from three little nymphs, to three little maids, which led me to Hinge & Bracket. You won't remember them of course: Dr Evadne Hinge and Dame Hilda Bracket were elderly, intellectual female musicians who played and sang songs to comic effect back in the day. Anyhow, I interviewed them once for a radio show and they were actually 2 guys. Problem for me was that they were in character, but not in costume; quite confusing.

I digress! Back to the business in hand. There seem to have been an inordinate amount of aphids this year. The garden has been full of greenfly, Whitefly, Blackfly, pick a colour fly: but they haven't had it all their own way...

Emerging ladybird larvae

The Blackfly were decimating my cherry tree and so when I spotted this group of emerging ladybird larvae, I released them onto the tree. They love aphids and within a few days were having their fill.

Eventually these youngsters will grow into something like this...

Although not with a face full of pollen hopefully!

Ladybird larvae are voracious feeders and it's not just aphids they will eat. I know they prey on most soft-bodied insects; but what I witnessed in this next photo was another first for me...

Yes, this ladybird larva is actually having eggs for breakfast...ladybird eggs!

I think this one is the dreaded Harlequin larva, which will indeed eat other larvae and eggs.

Of course insects preying on each other is part of nature's cycle and happens all the time. A couple more examples...

A tiny Cucumber spider makes a meal out of a fly, and a wasp has caterpillar for lunch. Actually, the wasp could be parasitising the caterpillar I suppose.

It's not just dog-eat-dog in the natural world though: there is lo♥e too. I know this might look like a double-ended, two-headed moth, but actually this is boisterous convivial fun - they are busy making whoopee.

When it's like these of course...

I've written about it here many times now. Bugs moult to allow themselves to grow, and these pictures (above) are of the discarded 'skins' of hoppers. Even though I have seen probably hundreds of these over the years. it still amazes me how a bug extracts itself and leaves the 'exuvia' so complete. These always look like the ghosts of  bugs to me.

What about these two bugs: do you think they look similar? Both found on grass. Maybe they are the same species, but the one on the left is a juvenile? 

Well I can tell you that the species is Leptopterna dolbrata and they are both adult. 

The one on the left is actually a female though. Notice how the males are always macropterus (fully winged) whilst females are brachypterous, or partly-winged. That's pronounced as brak-ip-ter-us by the way. 

Whereas this, is a pronounced limp!

And so I guess I will end this update with what was not only the highlight of my week, but possibly THE best find I have ever made? A morning spent at the beautiful coastal resort of Tankerton in Kent was not only good for the soul, but also provided an unexpected delight...

Some of the beautiful beach huts at Tankerton

I was walking one of the paths above these huts when something flew (and I use the word flew, loosely) past me at head height. It was dark, huge and ungainly. I could be heard saying out-loud..."What the f..." erm, I mean.... "Crikey, I wonder what on earth this might be?" I tracked it to a private garden where it, well to say landed is being kind: it kinda crashed into some low growing foliage where it bumbled around for a few seconds before taking to the tree tops, never to be seen again.

What was it? My first EVER sighting of a wild Stag Beetle, that's all!

A male too. Only males have the large 'antlers' which they use for fighting other males. But yes, in all of my years on this earth, this is the very first time I have seen one of these rare British beetles up close in the wild. I may have seen them as a kid I suppose, but even with my memory, I surely would remember such a striking encounter?

I would have loved to spend more time in its company, and possibly get clearer photos but it wasn't to be and the episode was still enough for me to keep mumbling for the rest of the day..."I just saw a stag beetle!"

Cast your fate to the wind...

Usually these updates are fairly easy to write. I sit in front of the computer for a short while, just meditating on what might follow: then I unlock a little door inside my brain, and the words tumble out onto the page already formed, and another session is underway.

Today was my 'Brexit' day though; no matter how I tried, I could not get it done. The only words that did emerge, did so with such force that they tumbled right over that Brexit cliff-edge, like demented lemmings. Having now confined my false start to the rubbish skip of eternity, I am going to start with a picture instead...

Pentatoma rufipes - A Red-legged Shieldbug

I think this is a mid instar of the bug that we always called a forest bug, until it joined the ranks of those who have seen their names updated. I see these quite a lot, but this is the first mid instar for 2019

Now! What has eight legs, two 'hands', striped legs and a spotty body?

This does...

Yes, this tiny spider has gone for the full Monty regards camouflage. All those stripes and spots will help to break up the body shape. Floronia bucculenta or maybe Drapetisca socialis: those were my guesses for an ID. Turns out (of course) to be neither. No, this is the Shadow hammock-spider - Labulla thoracica. Would you like me to explain the derivation of the common name this spider has? I bet you would! Truth is, I have no idea and my research has thus far drawn a blank. Here it is...

Dead fly or live moth? Erm... dead fly or live moth.? Live moth I think...

This beautiful moth was another first for my little garden. It's a Common Swift Moth: although, not so common in my garden obviously.

No! Not yet: Patience is a virtue, possess it if you can. Always in a woman, seldom in a man. 

The wasp beetle is a small, narrow-bodied longhorn beetle: it is black with yellow bands on the body, and relatively short antennae.

How to identify: The wasp beetle is a small, narrow-bodied longhorn beetle: it is black with yellow bands on the body, and relatively short antennae! 

This beetle besides being a wasp mimic, is also as I said, a longhorn beetle. Which ties in nicely with my next image, which is a longhorn bee...

Okay, so it's actually a 'Longhorned Bee' (Eucera longicornis) but a very interesting find. According to the Bumblebee Conservation Trust: 'this species has declined significantly across Britain and is now absent from many of the southern counties it used to be found in. As a result, it is considered a UK priority species. They are now mostly found in a small number of locations on the south coasts of England and Wales with some inland populations near Shropshire'.

'JJ': And of course Kent can now be added to that list!

There are lots and lots, I do mean lots, of hoverfly larvae around right now. This one seemed to be pretending to be a catkin, or flower/seed-head or summat...

Here's another hoverfly find: this one is green. Not sure of an identity though, there are so many similar ones, poss: Melansotoma species?

I'm sure there was something else I was going to share before I close this update? Now what was it...oh yes! I remember now...

Gruesome but fascinating? No question in my mind. This Dance fly, or Empid fly; possibly Empis tessellata, has fallen victim to a Pathogenic Fungus (Entomophthora muscae). A pathogen, in the broadest sense is anything that can cause a disease, an infectious agent. 

Here's the fascinating part though: 

The fungus enters the brain of the fly and causes it to land. It then forces it to climb to the top of a bush where it dies soon after. Then the fungal spores erupt from its legs and body and are spread by the wind. Because it is at a high point, the spores can spread a maximum distance, causing havoc for other flies. 

Well, as it said on the wall of the public toilets in Maidstone the other day...

'WE AIM TO PLEASE
You aim too please'

Farvel for nu chums!