Echoes of last year

The early summer this year is looking depressingly similar to last year's: good weather in March and April, but cloud and/or rain from May through to September. Having seen butterflies throughout March and April, I haven't seen a single one since the first of May.

It's not all gloom and doom, however, since warm wet weather is ideal for fungal rusts. (The microscopic analysis required to identify them is also something to do on a rainy day.)

This is the fungal rust Melampsora hypericorum on Tutsan:

Melampsora hypericorum on Tutsan

And this is Uromyces acetosae on Common Sorrel:

Uromyces acetosae on Common Sorrel

Astonishingly, this very common fungus - which has been recorded from Cornwall to the Outer Hebrides - has no previous Irish records. Must be an oversight. No previous Irish records.


Very few parasitic fungi have a common name, but Botrytis fabae (in this case on Bush Vetch) is commonly known as 'Chocolate Spot' disease:

'Chocolate-spot' on Bush Vetch

I suppose any disease that affects crops will tend to have a common name. Again, no previous records from Ireland.


Although I still haven't seen a female Orange Tip butterfly this year, they are clearly around: I found this single egg on Cardamine pratensis - their sole foodplant in this area:

Orange Tip butterfly egg on Cardamine pratensis

Ferns must be amongst our most architectural (or at least geometric) plants. We all know they unfurl lengthways, but the pinnae also unfurl widthways:

Unfurling Scaly Male fern

We have four species of horsetail on the patch. This is Water Horsetail, which usually has no branches, but can also be found in a branched version, like this one:

I keep looking for the named hybrid between Water Horsetail and Field Horsetail which are both found adjacent to each other at this location, but all specimens seem to be one or the other.


Dungflies are very numerous at the moment, sitting on leaves or hiding in flower heads. They are ferocious predators, and if you watch them for any length of time they will pounce, catch and then devour other flies and wasps. This is the male (the female is green):

Male Scathophaga stercoraria Dungfly

Many of the schools around here have an ongoing 'Green Flag' initiative which encourages children to recycle and helps them to be aware of their local biodiversity. I was invited to open and examine a log pile which had been placed in a dark corner of the playground of one local school and I got a few photographs during the analysis.

We found plenty of woodlice:

Oniscus asellus - Shiny Woodlouse

Oniscus asellus - Shiny Woodlouse

And this excellent spider, which I haven't identified yet:

Unidentified spider from log pile

We also found:

Beetles
Slugs
Cup mushrooms
and a Millipede

The Woodlouse and two of the fungal rusts are new to my species list, so it continues to expand despite the weather.

Recolonisation

The area I went to today was Spruce plantation for 50 years, then it was clear-felled about 10 years ago.  The original heath environment has recovered somewhat, leading to a wide diversity of wildlife where there was nothing but a black, arid desert for 50 years.

The area is rich in lichens, mosses and heathers, and the remaining stumps and logs are home to more lichens, fungi and insects.

Bilberry is just flowering now, and this flower has drops of what I presume is nectar forming on the inside:

Bilberry flower

Racomitrium mosses have a very distinctive appearance: each leaf ends in a long, twisted hair that gives the plant an overall pale colouring.

Racomitrium lanuginosum

Peltigera lichens are very leafy in appearance, although their colouring ranges from black to palest grey. This huge (40 cm.) specimen of Rabbit's Paw lichen -Peltigera membranacea - is growing on a dead log. 

Here's a close-up of one or two of the individual 'leaves' (properly called 'thalli'):

Peltigera membranacea

Equisetums (popularly known as Horsetails) are some of our most ancient plants. This immediate area has three species in very close proximity, although I do know of a nearby area with Wood Horsetail which clings onto remnants of its original woodland habitat (which presumably preceded the Spruce plantation).

Marsh Horsetail tends to grow in the fringes of wet areas:

Marsh Horsetail

Whilst Water Horsetail definitely prefers its feet to be very wet:

Water Horsetail

Field Horsetail has separate, pale, fruiting growths, which precede the green non-reproductive shoots:

Field Horsetail

Horsetails reproduce via spores which have hair-like growths attached to them. These hairs are very sensitive to humidity and they expand and contract very rapidly, enabling the spores to move through the undergrowth as if they were walking. 

This next shot is rather interesting:

Bombus bohemicus

It's Bombus bohemicus, one of the parasitic Cuckoo Bumblebees. Bombus bohemicus is parasitic on the white-tailed Bombus lucorum complex and, yet again, timing is critical here. The queen of the host species finds a place for her nest and lays her first batch of worker eggs. The cuckoo bumblebee then invades the nest and kills the original queen before laying her own eggs. The host workers then proceed to feed the cuckoo bees for the rest of the season. I watched this cuckoo bumblebee feeding on nectar and then it proceeded to remove all traces of pollen from its legs (you can see the pollen on the grass in the picture.) Since one of the primary roles that bumblebees perform is pollination, it's clear that adult cuckoo bumblebees are of no benefit to either plants or their hosts.


Another legacy of the original woodland environment is the occasional specimen of Wood Sorrel:

Wood Sorrel

Micromoths are just beginning to make their appearance for the year. This is Grapholita jungiella:

The micromoth Grapholita jungiella

These micros are very active at the moment, and you usually have to be patient enough to follow their very erratic flight in order to see them at rest after they eventually land. 

Between the showers

The weather has settled into an all too familiar pattern, with rain showers every day. It does mean we have high humidity and clean air, so we have plenty of wildlife that can tolerate consistent showers, but it does mean you have to choose your photography sessions very carefully.

One water-loving species is Water Horsetail - Equisetum fluviatile. Field horsetail is present very close-by, so I'll look out for the hybrid, E x.litorale, which I see from time to time.

(The red stems belong to Meadowsweet which is very prolific in this area.)

The first of this year's Pea family to flower: Bush Vetch - Vicia sepium. This is host to a number of micromoths, and, as expected, the normal purple version is very much earlier than the pure white variant that I've been tracking over the past few years.

This spider caught my eye as it hung on a small piece of web. I must get my eye in for spiders: they're the biggest group that I haven't got to grips with yet. Maybe next year.