Gap in the clouds

An unexpected gap in the clouds prompted me to visit our highest local point in search of orchids.

Northern Marsh Orchid is the first of our local Dactylorhiza orchids to open:

Northern Marsh Orchid

All of the Dactylorhiza orchids freely hybridise with each other in a fertile manner, so I always like to assign a percentage of the three local 'species' which appear in any specimen. The first specimen, above, is very close to the 'clean' specification, (short spike, dark flowers, clean edge to lip of flower) so it is mostly Northern Marsh orchid.

The next specimen is paler and has a slight tooth to the front edge of the lip, so I'll give it 90% Marsh and 10% Common:

Northern Marsh Orchid with signs of Common Spotted Orchid

This third specimen is clearly a hybrid with Common Spotted Orchid (tall spike, still paler flowers, visibly sharp tooth):

Northern Marsh Orchid x Common Spotted Orchid

I'm pretty sure that third one has some Heath Spotted Orchid in it too.

Interestingly enough, the hybrids tend to follow the flowering dates of their major partner: Northern Marsh Orchid is always around 3 weeks earlier than Common Spotted or Heath Spotted, with hybrids somewhere in between, so it's not only physical characteristics that are shared. My 'clean' Spotted orchids are only starting to make spikes now.

I was astonished to also find a Common Twayblade orchid in this location:

Common Twayblade

I strongly associate Common Twayblade with limestone, so the road in this area must have been fortified or built with limestone chips, since this location is in a strongly acidic heath area. We need to be alert to just how much our actions can affect populations of plants (and hence insects).

Staying with the theme of habitat alteration, this part of the heath has become overrun with False Salmonberry:

False Salmonberry

False Salmonberry is an american rubus species that was introduced in Northern Ireland to support game birds for shooting. I first saw it locally about 5 or 6 years ago as isolated specimens, but now it has covered acres of heath, eliminating native species as it spreads. It is clear that this is yet another highly mobile and invasive plant.

Bumblebees that are brighter than usual tend to be males, especially if they have yellow hair where black would be expected.

Male Bombus lucorum

The tuft of yellow hair on its 'nose' is a clear indicator, but the overall colouring (in association with the absence of pollen bags from the hind legs) leaves little doubt. The flower is Common Catsear.

The hoverfly Sericomyia silentis is an excellent wasp mimic:

Sericomyia silentis hoverfly

It's quite a common hoverfly, but I rarely see it in large numbers.

Post hurricane post

The weather continues to be hateful, but I'm guessing that everyone has been in much the same position.

I went up to the boggy area which has many specimens of the late nectar source, Devilsbit Scabious, and found this specimen of the hoverfly Sericomyia silentis. For those of you who know the size of the flowerhead, it will be apparent just how large this hoverfly is.

Sericomyia silentis on Devilsbit Scabious

Devilsbit is a plant that loves damp, acidic soil, in complete contrast with its close relative, Field Scabious, which needs alkaline soil. Interestingly enough, I sometimes find an occasional specimen of Devilsbit Scabious which has the same colouring as the lime lover:

Pink form of Devilsbit Scabious

It's still 100% Devilsbit, though.

Staying with Devilsbit, I found a few rather interesting specimens that were making an extra flowerhead from an existing one:

Devilsbit Scabious with 'extra' flowerheads

Notice the second 'offshot' appearing to the lower left of the central flower. This phenomenon wasn't restricted to one area of the bog: I found multiple specimens spread over perhaps 200 m.

Some specimens of Angelica have survived the storms: these are mostly ones in very sheltered locations. Specimens out in the open have all snapped at ground level. This flowerhead had a number of Ichneumonids still nectaring on it. There are 3 in this shot:

Actually, I just spotted a fourth, right at the bottom of the shot.

This area has quite a few Scots Pines, and I found a few specimens of Suillus flavidus and its bigger brother Slippery Jack, which are always found in association with Pine. I also found the usual swarm of Hebeloma mesophaeum all the way along the edge of the access road:

Hebeloma mesophaeum 

The mosses are Pleurozium schreberi (red veins) and Rhytidiadelphus squarrosus (green 'stars' at 4, 6 and 8 o'clock).

I recently showed a specimen of the leafhopper Cixius nervosus, but I thought this one showed off those wonderful wing veins at their best.

Leafhopper Cixius nervosus

Leaf hoppers - like so many other true bugs - are quite difficult to separate, but the main identification features are visible in this shot.

1) There are 3 'keels' on the thorax.
2) The black dots on the wing edges are larger than those on the inside veins of the wing
3) There is a rather distinct black bar across the front third of the wings.
4) The area between the eyes and the thorax is brownish-yellow.

Let's hope next week's fungal foray isn't rained off.

Mixed bag

These are the last photographs from my usual stretch of hedgerow for several months. The day after I took these, the hedge was cut down to the ground to a distance of a metre from the road on each side for 200 metres. So there won't be anything worth posting from there until next spring. I don't know why the hedgecutter chose this totally inappropriate (and illegal!) time to do the cutting ("it's only weeds and bugs"), but we have to live with these decisions. Unfortunately, the wildlife can't.

Last year I showed a photograph of the capsid bug Lygus rugulipennis. This is its nymph from exactly the same area:

Nymph of  the capsid bug Lygus rugulipennis

If you follow the link back to the original picture, notice how different the adult is from the nymph. This is typical in bugs, and makes identification of nymphs that bit more difficult, since it's normally the adults that are shown.

Udea lutealis is one of the larger micromoths, and is to be seen on practically every verge and hedgerow at the moment. The faint pattern diminishes as the moth gets older, and mature specimens (i.e. a few days old) appear to be a uniform cream in colour:

The micromoth Udea lutealis

I spotted this larva of the Sawfly Arge gracilicornis on Bramble. I had hoped to follow its progress for a few days, but that is no longer possible:

Larva of the Sawfly Arge gracilicornis

I should also mention at this point that I will be unable to continue my 5 year study of the sawfly Nematus pavidus this year, since the Willows were also threshed to ground level and won't have leaves until next year. I hope I can find some more specimens elsewhere.

The fungal rust Puccinia graminis infects many different grasses. This infection is on a stem of False Oat grass:

Fungal rust Puccinia graminis on False Oat grass

I haven't seen very many specimens of the wasp-mimicking hoverfly Sericomyia silentis this year. This one was on Male Fern on the other side of a deep ditch:

Hoverfly Sericomyia silentis

Earwigs are universally despised and, I think, a bit unfairly. They are quite unusual in that they tend to stay in family groups, whereas most other insects abandon their eggs/larvae. This is a male (the pincers are curved) Forficula auricularia:

The earwig Forficula auricularia

This one was photographed in my garden: I found it when checking a pot full of Fuchsia cuttings. Notice how small the wing covers (the squarish area next to the middle leg) are. Earwigs can actually fly, but I rather suspect that they are reluctant to do so because the wings have to be folded around 40 times to get them into such a tiny space.

New identification.

Catching up

Sawfly larvae are particularly difficult to identify: the literature is incomplete and rather out of date, although there is a great deal of ongoing work to tie up larvae with host plants and with the adult versions. Happily, I managed to identify this one on Alder - it's Nematinus fuscipennis:

It's almost the end of the season for many insects, and many will perish as the temperatures begin to drop. This Sericomyia silentis hoverfly was quite inert on Devilsbit Scabious:

Another handsome moth came to light. It's the Red-Green Carpet - one of our late-season specialists:
When I identify new species of mushroom I like to confirm identifications using as many features as I can. These are the surprisingly long and thin spores of the Spathularia (at x 400) that I showed earlier in the week:

Busy time

The burst of good weather has produced lots of new photographs (which bring associated research), and I have been working on a new project doing wildlife surveys with schools in the area, so things are a little busy.

The leafmining fly Agromyza minuscula mines Meadow Rue as well as the Aquilegia in my garden. I have no Meadow Rue near my patch - it tends to be coastal near here - so the flies have travelled quite some distance to find this alternative food source.

Foxgloves tend to creep up on you. One day, they're a rosette of leaves, the next they're in full bloom the whole length of the spike:

Last week, I showed a male Bombus lucorum; this one has found a new queen:

I'm amazed at the size difference. The males will now die off, and the new queens will go back to their nests and act as workers until next year when they go off to make their own new nest. The queen is certainly Bombus Lucorum s-s, which confirms my belief that I have both B. lucorum s-s and Bombus cryptarum on my patch.

Meadow Vetchling has added a lot of yellow to the verges, now. The various Cinquefoils are next, followed by various St. John's Worts and the Birds-foot Trefoil.

I often think the people who gave names to various species in the 1700's and 1800's had a sense of humour (or they needed some light relief from their intense work). This is the wasp-mimicking hoverfly Sericomyia silentis, which has to be the noisiest hoverfly around. It's certainly louder than the bumblebee:

There are plenty of moths around at the moment (sorry, Weaver). This is a male Golden Swift:

I did quite a bit of research on this image because I have often seen these bright orange phoretic mites, and always on Limoniidae Crane Flies:

Limoniidae are often aquatic as larvae, but some feed on fungi. These phoretic mites are also known to feed on fungal spores, so it looks like these mites (which belong to the spider family) are simply using the Limoniidae as transport between fungi.

Finally, some more moths that came to light:

Clouded-bordered Brindle - Apamea crenata - which feeds on grasses as a larva:
Common Marbled Carpet - Chloroclysta truncata - which feeds on woody plants:
And Dark Arches - Apamea monoglypha - another grass feeder:
New to me.

I also updated my species index.

A collection from gaps in the rain

Another Dolichovespula sylvestris, but this time I think it's a male. Angelica is great for insects.


This Ichneumonid with huge antennae was wandering over leaves, sweeping the antennae from side to side. Long antennae usually indicate the male, but I'm sure this one was searching for larvae on the underside of the leaf.



Two shots of one of my favourite hoverflies, Scaeva pyrastri:


And a good wasp mimic, Sericomyia silentis.


Most leafminers make either a gallery mine (long and thin) or a blotch mine (erm, blotchy). Agromyza sulfuriceps does both. The mine starts as a gallery, then the gallery twists are all made adjacent to each other. Finally it breaks the walls and makes the blotch. A blotch mine has a distinct advantage in that the upper surface of the leaf can be pushed upwards. This allows the larva to grow bigger due to the increased space. So maybe this is a once-little fly that's getting bigger.


I have to leave the identification of this one a bit abstract: the species complex hasn't been fully worked out, yet. So it's Chromatomyia sp. On Common Ragwort.


As I was walking back to the car I heard a Buzzard high above me. No telephoto on a macro lens.