Still sunny

In this extended period of sunshine, most wildlife has advanced, regardless of the fact that we're still in March. I could see five Small Tortoiseshell butterflies at the same time in my garden yesterday, and that's more than I usually see in a year. Small Tortoiseshells hibernate as adults, so I think the mild winter has allowed a higher proportion of them to survive.

Some plants are flowering at roughly the usual time: I found Germander Speedwell:

Germander Speedwell

Wood Sorrel:

Wood Sorrel

And Common Dog Violet:

Viola riviniana - Common Dog Violet

But this flowering specimen of Herb Bennet is by far the earliest I have ever seen:

Herb Bennet

Field Horsetail is a bit unusual, in that it has early fruiting growths before the sterile green parts are seen:

Field Horsetail - fruiting growth

Again, these are a couple of weeks earlier than I would expect.

If have a microscope, I urge you to put one of those fertile cones on a slide and wait a couple of days for the spores to drop. The spores are fascinating: they have four curled 'legs' which expand and contract with humidity. As they curl and uncurl, they catch onto plant parts and debris, pulling themselves along in order to aid dispersal. This is a plant with 'walking' spores.

Even the uncurling fronds of Hartstongue Fern appear to be earlier than usual:

Hartstongue fern frond uncurling

As soon as the relevant plants are flowering, then their dependant insects appear as well. This is a new moth for me - Mottled Grey:

Mottled Grey moth

The Mottled Grey overwinters as a pupa and feeds on a number of Bedstraws, but the foodplant in my locality will almost certainly be Cleavers.

The Common Quaker feeds on Willow catkins, so March is the normal time to see them:

Common Quaker moth

I spotted a horde of Gerris lacustris Pond Skaters skimming over the surface of the stream beside the path:

Gerris lacustris Pond Skaters

These detect any unfortunate insects that have fallen into the water by sensing the vibrations in the water surface: they move instantly to the precise location in a feeding frenzy that lasts just a short while.

I think I have a new favourite picture. This is portrait of a female Platychierus albimanus hoverfly:

Female Platychierus albimanus hoverfly

I particularly like the way she is highlighted by the petals of the Celandine.

I wasn't too happy with the distance shot of the Small Tortoiseshell butterfly in my previous post, so I'm showing this closeup from yesterday:

Small Tortoiseshell butterfly

Keep learning

Over the years, as experience builds up, you make a series of 'rules' which help you reach an identification. Until yesterday, one of my rules was "If you see a bee which is less than 20mm long, then it isn't one of the social bees". Applying this rule, I leaned towards one of the Andrena solitary bees for this specimen: 

But it didn't match any of the images that I could find in the usual places. When I asked for help, back came "It's a Honeybee". Blinded by assumption (and not helped by the fact that this was roughly 60% - 70% as big as I would normally see), I had excluded the obvious. Factor in the fact that Honeybees have become very rare in our area, and the mistake is easy to make.

Assume nothing.

Moving swiftly on......

This Eristalis tenax hoverfly has the very dark colouring that we expect to see in early specimens. The summer generation of many of our hoverflies is much brighter due to the higher temperatures. This female will have mated at the end of last year and has managed to successfully shelter in some nook or cranny through the -17 degrees that we endured in December:

Female Eristalis tenax

The Willow catkins opened last Thursday (17th) and insects have been busy nectaring and gathering pollen ever since. This queen Bombus lucorum bumblebee found the pollen quickly enough:

Queen Bombus lucorum

She is now gathering enough pollen to feed the first few workers from her nest, and she will spend the rest of the year laying more eggs to sustain the nest and produce drones and queens for next year's generation. A few of the new queens actually become workers for a while at the end of the season, gathering pollen alongside the last of the workers.

With the early willow pollen season being so short, no time is wasted before the willow-dependent moths appear. This is the first Common Quaker - Orthosia cerasi - of the year:

Common Quaker - Orthosia cerasi

The Common Quaker is readily identified by the large, rounded, 'kidney mark' which has a pale, thin, outline which matches the colour of the thick band near the trailing edge of the wing. 

Full swing

We've had a few days of sun now, and it's already getting difficult to keep up with the number of species I'm seeing.

Some water-walking insects are revealed by the shadows they project onto the base of the ditch. These 4-leaf-clover-type shadows are made by the water cricket Velia caprai. The insects themselves are present, but are hard to see as they scoot across the surface of the water.

A bit of refocussing (well, a lot really) and the insects themselves are revealed:

This Common Carder Bumblebee - Bombus pascuorum - was nectaring on the Celandine. I'm presuming she's also a queen, although they're a lot smaller than the other local bumblebee queens.

An excellent juxtaposition of two beautiful beetles: 7-spot ladybird and the leaf beetle Chrysolina staphylea:

Plenty more moths are coming to light, although this one didn't quite meet the friend it expected:

This is the Early Grey - Xylocampa areola:

And two colour forms of yet another willow feeder, the Common Quaker - Orthosia cerasi:

Legacy Anemone

Wood Anemone is usually found in older deciduous woodland, and that's typically where I find it. High in the Spruce plantation, however, a single tiny clump continues to grow - almost certainly an indication of the original habitat that was removed to plant the conifers. This little act of defiance always makes me smile.



Yet another new moth to light: Common Quaker - Orthosia cerasi. Male.