Which bug drinks through its anus and doesn't urinate?

I don't usually like distractions of any kind whilst writing these updates; that includes music, but this morning (24th March) feeling a little strung-out and tense from....well, let's just call them 'noises off'? I'll say no more than it involves neighbours children screaming unchallenged for what seems like hours and at a level that can be heard inside my house as clear as day, I scanned the CD rack (yes, I'm afraid I haven't fully joined the digital revolution yet, in fact, I'm still in mourning for my old vinyl discs) and looked for something that would serve as an antidote to all that.....kerfuffle. 

I found the perfect thing-Clifford T.Ward is to be recommended as one of the best singer/songwriters to emerge during the 1970s and multiple sclerosis claimed his life way too early.

And so I was sitting here contemplating how to begin this writing, when his song 'A Day To Myself' came on and although the beautiful, poignant lyrics are Clifford reflecting on all the lives lost at war over the years, this line seemed to fit so well with this time of year...'When April was about to smile on England'. 

Yes April in all its glory, is almost upon us and you feel that our stop-start spring is about to burst into life at any moment. Let's get cracking on updating you on what's been happening then...

The blue-tits that I have been hoping will use the nest box that I fitted a camera inside, have been showing more interest. They seem to be into a routine of checking it out every morning between about 8 and 8.30am.

 I also got this brief view on the video camera...

 To encourage them to nest build and ensure there is enough nesting material to hand, I have hung a net filled with moss close by...fingers crossed...

And here's one of them in the cherry tree...

I haven't seen too many native ladybirds this year yet but did find plenty of the tiny 16-spot still overwintering in quite large aggregations...

16-spot Ladybirds (Tytthaspis 16-punctata)

And a few snapped with my phone...

This is the first butterfly that I have seen at close enough range to photograph this year-it's a small tortoiseshell recently out of hibernation.

There is lots of goat willow in flower right now and that seems to be attracting the attention of the golden dung flies...

Scathophaga stercoraria

Scathophaga stercoraria-A Golden or Yellow Dung-fly

An update wouldn't be complete without a spider photo and so I should probably include this wolf spider?

The nursery web spiders are back too...

Now!This is a really strange one...I found these little bugs recently in the kitchen but, I have no idea what they could be-any guesses at an identity would be really appreciated...

I do know what these next creatures are though and it isn't a couple of little sweeties-well, actually they are kinda sweet but you know what I mean...

Yes they do look a little like sweets (candy for our overseas friends) or even pills maybe? You would hope so because that's the origin of their common name of Pill Millipedes. Here's what they look like when not curled into a tight ball...

Pill Millipede (Glomeris marginata) 

Most pill millipedes are black but they also come in brown, red and yellow.

Pill Millipede (Glomeris marginata) 

Not to be confused with pill woodlice which only have seven pairs of legs, rather than the 18 (around) that these millipedes have. Fascinating creatures, for instance, did you know that they don't urinate? They can tolerate ammonia gas, which they can pass directly through their exoskeleton. Strange? Maybe to us it seems strange but not as strange as the fact that they can drink through their rear ends! Yes it's true, they have special tube structures called uropods that are used to 'wick' up water.

Weird enough for you? Have you heard of coprophagy? It is yet another trick these millipedes get up to and involves eating their own poop!  Apparently they loose a little copper each time they poo and can replace it by eating their own poop.

My first Bee-fly of the year...

Also my first moth of the season-found on a fence-post...

And so, as you can tell from this update, things are moving in the right direction at last with a lot more finds now. All we need is some decent spring weather and all will be well.

Until the next time..

Skullduggery...or skulduggery if you prefer-pick the bones out of that!

 I don't ever really expect to find much in the way of invertebrates when I visit coniferous woodland, with its densely populated and planted trees, it hasn't proved to be a good hunting ground for me regarding insects and bugs.

That's how it was again on a recent hike around Hemsted Forest, a local wood owned and managed by the Forestry Commission. 

But as I was making my way back, I saw this skull, or at least a part of it, poking out of the ground. I think it is the skull of a red fox. It's a real shame that it is incomplete but what I did find cleaned up quite nicely and is quite an intriguing little artifact...if you like that kinda thing! Below is a photograph of all the bones I found after they'd been thoroughly cleaned.

 I did have a nice find elsewhere though, it was one of those where I didn't realise quite what I had found at the time-I knew it was something different but had to get the photos on to the laptop to have a good look and try to find an identity for it. 

That proved to be quite a challenge for me. I hunted through all of what I considered to be reasonable suspects and drew a complete blank. Little did I know at the time, this would take three days to resolve and even then, there was a twist in the tail (of my story, not the insect!) I suppose I should stop prattling on and post a picture of this mythical beast, so that you can decide for yourself as to whether I was being incompetent? Okay....

The shape of the head and length and markings on the antennae were giving me some clues but it was those, what would you call them, mandibles? Look at how long they are and all the beetle larvae (that's what I considered amongst others this might be) I have seen have mandibles/jaws that curve inwards to grip their prey, these seem to be turning out to me. What purpose could they serve? Anyhow, it transpired that it wasn't a beetle larva after all, although I'm not sure if that's significant regards the mandibles.

'Osmylus fulvicephalus'...or more commonly, a giant lacewing. That's what this turned out to be. I think I would be right in stating that the larvae are rarely seen, but I did mention that this story has a twist and that is the fact that I have actually found this species before, but had totally forgotten until, something rang a bell having settled on its identity this time.
A search of the internet revealed this image from a few years back...

It's a picture of one of the photographs on my old flickr photostream; I no longer have an account with flickr in protest at their enforced changes.

Since finding this amazing creature I have been fascinated by those jaws and how they evolved as they have and I discovered a key...

Under the 'Key to larvae' section, I discovered the following passage of text:

The most useful characters are the fusiform shape (wide in the middle, tapering at both ends) of the body and the large 'jaws' which are either large mandibles with teeth for biting, or modified mandibles and maxillae (for manipulating food) which fit together to form two forwardly-directed 'spears' or jaws, used for sucking the contents of the prey.

And so it seems that those enormous jaws are little more than straws...

Something else that I have seen and photographed before, although not that often, is a tiny harvestman called 'Megabunus diadema' it is only about 3-4mm and hides away most of the time, the reason I suspect that the Spider & Harvestman Recording Scheme has only a handful of records for this species in Kent and less than 1,000 across the British Isles...

This one is a female, as it's only females that have those pronounced spikes above the eyes. I spotted this one a few days ago and I think it's probably only the third I have ever seen.

I have featured a few millipedes in past blog updates but I don't think I have ever covered the pill-millipede? Until now that is...

The pill millipede (Glomeris marginata) is quite similar to the pill woodlouse, in that they both curl up into a tight pea-like ball when threatened. This one however has 2 pairs of legs per segment, rather than the one of the woodlouse. I have been photographing lots of woodlice for a future blog update and so will try and include a photograph for comparison then.

I think that as this update has been quite wordy, I'll add one final picture and description and call it a day-I do tend to get carried away with some of these updates when little and often would probably be a better motto.

And so for now, here's the stretch limo of the spider world; a Tetragnathide, or 'Long-jawed Orb Weaver' that I found over wintering under a leaf...

Until the next time...

'Something nice'...twice!

Just when I was starting to think that it was all over for this year and my aching feet that have already been stuffed into wellies for too long, and the inevitable cake of mud that returns with me from my daily walks is telling me that escape from winter isn't an option,the same thing that happens most years, surprised me yet again.

Why does it surprise me? Because my memory would rival a goldfish for longevity. And what is it that occurred? Merely the appearance of what I like to refer to as 'something nice'...

Click on any photo for a larger view

Pogonocherus hispidus-A Longhorn Beetle

Of course, 'something nice' is what I'm always hoping to find but when something nice turns up at this end of the season, it gives me that kind of 'perhaps it's not all over just yet' feeling and encourages me to search with renewed vigour,at least until either I realise it was just a 'one off' or maybe the weather intervenes.

I have come across this beautiful little beetle before but usually in the springtime. I understand that some of this species overwinter as adults though and I do recall once spotting one in February.

It isn't easy to get an idea of size from these photos but body length is only around 5-7mm.

The patterns on the insect are said to be an attempt at mimicking bird droppings as a means of camouflage.

These beetles also rejoice in the name of 'Lesser Thorn-tipped Longhorn Beetles' If you take a look at the closer shot below, you will see the two thorn-like projections at the end of the abdomen that give it this name.

This beetle turns up fairly frequently across England and Wales. The much rarer P.fasciculatus is a notable B. species and can be distinguished by the lack of thorn-like projections.

There is yet another very similar beetle with a similar name too-this one is 'Pogonocherus hispidulus' and although it can easily be mistaken for the same beetle, it has much more white on the abdomen and also a white patch on the antennae.

Here's one that I photographed a while ago, for comparison...

And so to quote a line from a song that I can't remember the title of (see what I mean about my memory)..."This is where the story ends"-well, actually, no.

Because, no sooner had one 'something nice' come along, than I was gifted with a second...

This large female Ichneumon wasp was sitting on some fence netting and she was unusually cooperative.

The term 'Ichneumon Wasp' is used rather loosely to refer to wasps in the family Ichneumonidae. There is actually a genus called ichneumon but it is not easy to distinguish from related genera.

Identification of these wasps can be a real challenge with approaching 3,000 U.K. species and little information available.

I did find a check-list of British species at the Biological Records Centre when trying to identify this one but it runs to 162 pages and is just a list of names with no pictures to help.

Dr Gavin Broad of The Natural History Museum said this : 

"There are some ichneumons that can be readily identified from photos, such as Amblyteles armatorius, or Ichneumon suspiciosus. Ophion obscuratus is a wasp often photographed and easily recognised (its main confusion species is very rare and can almost always be readily discounted). Some of the larger Tryphoninae can be fairly easily identified and many of the larger Ichneumoninae can be recognised on colour pattern, if one is familiar with the species [that's quite a big 'if'!].

"It is also worth noting that Chinery's photographic guide has a page of ichneumonids entirely incorrectly named."

Here's a different species of parasitic wasp that I photographed a couple of years ago (might even be 3 years ago...memory!)

A colourful image to end on-here's a juvenile pill millipede that I discovered under a dis-guarded piece of red plastic...

Until then next time then...