Opportunistic shots

The weather has continued to be cold or dull or wet, or all three at the same time, but I suppose it isn't only us this year.

Scaeva pyrastri is thought to be a migrant hoverfly - at least for the first generation - in Ireland, but I suspect that as we get warmer, then it might well join the growing list of insects that have become winter-resident, like the Red Admiral butterfly, for example. I was just saying the other day that when I was younger, books seemed to have facts in them, nowadays they seem to contain mere guidelines, because so much is changing so quickly.

I spotted this female Scaeva pyrastri hoverfly as she examined each flower stem and seedhead for aphids:

Female Scaeva pyrastri hoverfly ovipositing

Every so often she would stop and lay an egg in amongst any aphids she spotted.

I checked one batch of aphids after she had moved on, and sure enough, I could see the egg - apparently directly on top of an aphid - arrowed in this shot:

Scaeva pyrastri egg (arrowed)

Male hoverflies are known to hover for a variety of reasons, such as protecting territory or showing off their skills to attract a mate, but this female was hovering very accurately as she minutely examined the flower stems and seedheads from around 10mm away. The Small Heath butterfly is very particular about its habitat: it likes heathy areas with shorter grass, but I'm sure it has some other requirement that we don't know about, because many apparently suitable habitats are ignored by them. I had always thought that one particular area on my patch was suitable, but it was only after 8 years of searching that I found a single specimen there last year. A couple of sightings at the same location this year - including the one in the shot - suggests that a colony has now been established:

Small Heath butterfly

It's a lovely little butterfly, and a welcome addition to my local list.

Syritta pipiens is readily recognised by the inflated thighs on the rear legs:

The hoverfly Syritta pipiens, female

A few moths have been brave enough to beat the rain, although reports of populations are far lower than normal, sometimes as low as 10% of the expected numbers. The Hawkmoths are our most stunning moths, and I was fortunate that this Poplar Hawkmoth came to light:

Poplar Hawkmoth

These are as large as smaller bats, and on a 17" screen at 1024 x 768, that picture isn't much larger than life size. The Poplar Hawkmoth larva usually feeds on Poplar, but hereabouts it will be Willow. Notice that the wings of this species at rest are held in a very unusual configuration, with the rear wings ahead of the front wings.

The Common White Wave is a handsome little moth:

Common White Wave moth

This species is distinguished from the Common Wave by the almost-straight rear grey lines on the forewing.

This weevil caused me a bit of pain during the identification process. Most web references say that it is associated with Dog's Mercury, which doesn't grow around here. It keyed quite quickly to Barynotus moerens, but with all the web references stating that it was associated with a single plant, I retried the identification several times to see where I had gone wrong. 

The weevil Barynotus moerens

After much angst, I found that it is also associated with Ground Ivy, which we have in abundance around the patch. I think many websites (and some reference books) just copy what they read elsewhere without examining the facts.

New to my species list.

Still raining

The weather has continued to be very wet, with rain every day of May and an associated slowing-down of sightings. I have managed to sneak out in the less wet spells, however, and made the best of the bad light.

Lady's Mantle tends to sneak up and surprise you. One day it's invisible, and the next the flowers are out. The large folded leaves are ideal for insects such as micromoths to make their larval 'spinnings' for their shelter.

Lady's Mantle

The fronds of Male Fern have only just unfurled and the spore-bearing sori are already in place (although they will remain empty for quite some time, yet).)

Sori of Male Fern

The hedgerow has at least five species of Potentilla (and also the hybrid P. x mixta) in various places along its length. Silverweed is one of the easiest to identify, with its downy silver leaves:

Silverweed

The striking Marsh Cinquefoil is currently in bud, so I'll show pictures of that very soon, weather permitting.

The Orange Tip larva that I showed the other day is now about 4mm long. Note the damage to the seedpod, which the larva has caused by eating it. This is the only foodstuff that the larva will ever eat, moving from one pod to another as it finishes each one off.

Orange Tip larva showing pod damage

Bumblebee workers are busy in the gaps in the rain. They're still very small, so I suspect the rain has limited their pollen-gathering ability to quite an extent.

Bumblebee worker landing on Raspberry flower

Ichneumonids have started to appear in large numbers, which is no great surprise: their target moth and butterfly larvae are fattening up nicely, now.

Ichneumonid on Cow Parsley

Ichneumonid (left) and the hoverfly Syritta pipiens

The second shot also includes a rear view of a male Syritta pipiens hoverfly.

The next shot took me a couple of hours to tie down to species. It's a Lesser Dungfly which keys out to Cordilura rufimana. The Cordilura family is quite large, with some 22 species on the BI list. Most are dung-feeders as larvae, but C. rufimana appears to feed on the rootstock of various plants.

The Lesser Dungfly Cordilura rufimana

Surprisingly similar, but totally unrelated, is the Stilt Fly Neria cibaria. These have a strange habit of lowering their mouth to the upper surface of leaves and then rocking backwards and forwards on those long legs, shaving the upper surface of the leaf, presumably for food.

Neria cibaria - a Stilt Fly

A couple of sawflies next:

The first is on Broad Buckler fern:

Sawfly on Broad Buckler fern

And this is one of the Tenthredo sp.:

Tenthredo sp. Sawfly 

The Hoverfly Cheilosia albitarsis is an associate of Creeping Buttercup. The extremely similar (and only very recently segregated) Cheilosia ranunculi is thought to associate with Bulbous Buttercup.

The hoverfly Cheilosia albitarsis

Two shots of very small (6mm) soldier beetles from the Rhagonycha family: 

First, Rhagonycha limbata: 

Rhagonycha limbata

And secondly, Rhagonycha lignosa, which is associated with Hawthorn flowers during the early part of its season, and can be separated from the species above by the all-dark thorax:

Rhagonycha lignosa

Rhagonycha lignosa is a new species for my list.

A couple of weeks ago, I showed one of the pollen-stealing cuckoo bees. This one looks to be another member of the same family: Nomada flava.

The kleptoparasitic cuckoo bee Nomada flava

Rhagonycha section of this page has been updated to correct the identification of Rhagonycha lignosa.

Hoverflies and legs

Volucella bombylans is another bumblebee mimic. This is the white-tailed variety: Volucella bombylans var. plumata, which is reckoned to be a good mimic of Bombus hortorum and B. jonellus. Pity I don't have either of those on my patch.

The larvae of V. bombylans feed on detritus in the nests of wasps and bumblebees, which leads me to wonder just how important the mimicry is, since I have plenty of these hoverflies, but neither of the similar bumblebees.

This grasshopper gives me a nice lead-in to another two hoverflies. It's the Common Green Grasshopper - Omocestus viridulus:

The first of the hoverflies is Xylota segnis, which runs very quickly over leaves looking for pollen grains. The first time I saw it, it took me quite a while to realise that this fast-running, grasshopper-legged creature was, indeed, a hoverfly:

The second set of legs belongs to the hoverfly Syritta pipiens, which has inflated rear thighs that resemble pollen baskets. As a bee mimic, that would be fine, but there is no bee of a comparable size (about 8 mm. long) that collects pollen in baskets; most of the smaller bees gather pollen in abdominal or thoracic hair.

Sun!

The hottest place in Ireland, today, and it showed: hoverflies and bees of all kinds were on every flowerhead.

This is another of the mining bees from my garden: the beautiful Andrena cineraria.


That shot required knowledge of the behaviour of the bee: they land and very quickly bury their heads in the florets, so all you get is an abdomen shot. But they tend to do a slow 360 degree turn before they fly off. So if you watch where they land and wait for them to complete their rotation you can get the shot as they prepare to take off.

A few butterflies are now making an appearance. So far I've seen Green-veined White, Peacock, Orange Tip and Large White. This Small Tortoiseshell is clearly showing signs of age..they overwinter as adults and have been flying around for a couple of months, now:

The hoverfly Rhingia campestris rears its young on cow dung, but it has lately been seen in urban areas, so perhaps it has migrated to domestic dung.


One of our smallest hoverflies, Syritta pipiens. The inflated thighs appear to be mimicking a minute bee which is now extinct.



And this one's for Aynia....7-spot Ladybird.