Timing

Timing is very critical for our wildlife. Leaf miners need leaves which contain enough fresh green matter to keep them fed until they mature, so they can only exist in summer. Flowers need flying pollinators to transfer pollen from one plant to the next. Birds need caterpillars to feed their young. Sawflies need fresh leaves for their larvae to feed on. Frogs need warm water for their tadpoles to develop. Parasites need their target species to be present before they can be parasitised. All species need their pre-requisites to be in place in order to feed/pupate/hibernate/survive.

Some of these timings are pretty relaxed. For example a bird can find larvae of suitable species for all of the breeding season, which might be all of 6 months long. But other timings are much more critical. If you consider that many mushrooms exist for only a few days, then any dependant larvae must grow from egg to maturity in that same short timeframe. Taking that further, any parasite that needs the larva to be present must also be around during those few short days: their opportunity to parasitise might be as short as 2 or 3 days in a year. Synchronisation is crucial.

When I was considering all of this, I noticed a specimen of Lawyers Wig - Coprinus comatus - on my lawn. I know that these tend to last perhaps 48 hours at a maximum, so I thought I would try to capture the life and death of this specimen over time.

I set up a platform for the camera and took shots every 2 hours. Sadly, the days are very short now, so I didn't get as many shots as I wanted. I should also point out that lying in very wet grass for even short periods is not a pleasant experience.

This is the shot at 11am:

By 2 pm. things had moved on a little:

And by 4 pm the light was fading and I got this shot:

Next morning only the stipe (stem) was left.

The Coprinus family of fungi reproduce by liquidising the spore-bearing gills, dropping the spores very locally (and very quickly). This is a double-edged sword: the spores don't get distributed very far, but there is also very little time for a hungry larva to consume any of the spores.

Timing is again of interest in this shot of the December Moth:

December Moth

I took this shot on 16th November, which is two weeks before December. It is well documented that this moth now appears from late October until January, but it must have originally been named December Moth for a good reason: it appeared in December. Phenology (the study of timings of appearances of species) shows that species are appearing at times which vary from the recordings when the species were named 2 or 3 hundred years ago. This applies mostly to plants and insects, but bird migrations are also changing. This variation in species timings is one of the reasons that global warming was detected: it might not tell us why we're warming up, but it certainly confirms that it's happening.

Oddments

We had lying snow for around 10 days and I saw no moths during that time: earlier species would have died off, and new specimens would be staying underground until the snow went away. Sure enough, the same day the snow thawed, I found two specimens of the December moth:

Male December Moth

These feed on broad-leaf trees as larvae, and adults can be found from October to January; their eggs staying dormant until the trees have leaves in April or May.

Note the very feathered antennae. These perform a very similar function to the gills on the underside of mushrooms. Feathered antennae are more sensitive, making it easier to find the female, thereby increasing the chances of reproduction. Mushroom gills increase the surface area for spore production, making more spores available and again increasing the chances of reproduction.

As I was taking the shots of the male above, I spotted a minute (3mm) Springtail on the wall just below it:

It looks to be the same species as the one I showed on a mushroom earlier in the year.

A trip to the frozen high area yielded very little. I did see the empty seedpods of Yellow Rattle:

Empty seedpods of Yellow Rattle

And this frozen puddle on the path had an entertaining spiral pattern:

Ice spiral on frozen puddle

I just realised that the images for today are all virtually monochrome.

December moth and May butterfly

The first December Moth - Poecilocampa populi - for 2009. I suppose phenology has changed a bit since these were first named.



This is another first: the first of my garden Large White butterfly larvae that has survived to pupate. Of the 8 larvae that I have observed, 7 were parasitised. Now that's population control.

Four more have arrived, and we'll see what the final tally is.