Ant-associated Excitement

Wednesday 8th April 2026, Severn Valley Country Park

Glorious weather marked our day at Severn Valley Country Park. This, plus it being the Easter holiday period, made the park very popular with families looking for a day out. So much so that the car park reached capacity (fortunately not until we had assembled) and people resorted to parking along the entrance road.

As usual, the actual car park and its environs detained us for some time. A number of Sallows were in flower, attracting various flies and bees. Ladybirds were also present in numbers, including a heartening quantity of 2-spot Ladybirds. This pair were in the business of creating the next generation. Note that one of them is the red-on-black ‘quadrimaculata’ form.

We eventually moved on to the immediately adjacent pond area.

photo: Keith Fowler

A number of Epistrophe elegans hoverflies kept their eyes on us from a safe distance above our heads…

…while at ground level a couple of surprisingly tame Bank Voles completely ignored us as they went about their business.

The vacuumers got to work, extracting several beetles from the surroundings.

Celery Leaf Beetle. Photo: Nigel Cane-Honeysett

14-spot Ladybird. Photo: Nigel Cane-Honeysett

24-spot Ladybird. Photo: Nigel Cane-Honeysett

Tachyporus obtusus. Photo: Nigel Cane-Honeysett

Oulema obscura. Photo: Nigel Cane-Honeysett

Microplontus campestris. Photo: Nigel Cane-Honeysett

Meanwhile, a Water Ladybird was found at the edge of the pond, not with a suction sampler but with a sweep net.

The cricket season has begun: two tiny first instar Dark Bush-cricket nymphs appeared. One was spotted and captured in the bushes but the second decided to do a  spot of sun-bathing on the tube of one of the vacuums! These are the earliest Dark Bush-crickets ever recorded in Shropshire, beating the previous best of 20th April in 2015 and 2025. Is this significant? Almost certainly not!

We decided to move into the meadows on the opposite side of the access road. But not before a couple of late finds were made: a Hazel Leaf-roller, who hadn’t read the instructions and was perched in a Hawthorn.

And a Nursery Web Spider who had snaffled a juvenile wolf spider for lunch.

photo: Nigel Cane-Honeysett

Into the meadows we went.

photo: Liz Roberts

One notable feature of the day was the number of male Orange-tip Butterflies on the wing. Sadly they were unphotographable, never resting for a moment from their relentless patrolling. The same could be said of the Brimstones which were also zooming around. But a Comma was more accommodating.

The meadows soon delivered one of  the finds of the day: a Turtle Shieldbug. A species with only a handful of Shropshire records, all from the south-east quarter of the county. To prove it  wasn’t a fluke, a second one turned up a few minutes later.

It was a good day for shieldbugs and allies. Others which were photographed included a Forest Bug nymph

A Box Bug (another species which only moved into Shropshire in the recent past)

And the Rhopalid bug Rhopalus subrufus.

The Turtle Bug was good. But the find of the day must surely have been a small, unusual-looking rove beetle.

This is Nigel’s report of the find: “Yesterday’s rove beetle is the ant associate Lomechusa emarginata. There are only two post 2000 Shropshire records on NBN and a few from the mid 20th century, so it’s a good find. It’s not at all common anywhere with just 83 UK records on NBN. These are amazing beetles. The beetle and its larva both solicit food from the host ants by tricking them into regurgitating liquid intended for the ant’s own larvae. Basically, Lomechusa appear to have broken the communication code between ant and ant larva. There’s more! Lomechusa have different summer and winter hosts. Spending the summer with Formica ants and the winter with Myrmica ants. Extraordinary. This is what makes our Wednesdays so much fun.”
 
A few other finds from this area included a  couple of arachnids. Firstly a spider, Episinus angulatus

photo: Nigel Cane-Honeysett

And then quite possibly a Wednesday first: a positively  identified mite, Leptus trimaculatus.

photo: Nigel Cane-Honeysett

Two Cream-spot Ladybirds were persuaded from a Field Maple.

As was, rather more surprisingly, a Common Groundhopper. Quite what this flightless, ground-dwelling insect was doing up a tree only it knows!

We moved on, heading deeper into the trees. Continuing the theme of wildlife not reading the field guides, a flatbug appeared randomly during the sweep of an aerial net.

Probably not uncommon but rarely recorded due to their hiding-under-bark lifestyle, this one was presumably having a rare trip out into the sunshine and got unlucky. It is Aradus depressus.
We arrived at our next intended target: a woodland stream.

photo: Keith Fowler

In truth this did not yield the quantity of finds for which we were hoping, but a nearby damp area did produce a second groundhopper species in some quantity: Slender Groundhopper.

Another weevils species also appeared around this time - Leiosoma deflexum.

photo: Nigel Cane-Honeysett

The open canopy of the woodland was also putting on a fine show of Spring flowers.

Lesser Celandine & Bluebells

Wood Anemone

With finds in slightly short supply, someone had a bright idea: give up and retreat to the visitor centre for ice creams! There was a conspicuous lack of resistance to this idea, so we examined what remained in the trays and then began retracing our steps uphill. Keen readers will recall the opening paragraph of this report, the consequences of which began to have ominous portents as we neared the visitor centre. Words such as “sold-out” floated through the air towards us as we passed families emerging from the building. And lo, it came to pass that there was no ice cream, except for dog ice cream (which is ice cream for dogs(!?), not dog flavoured ice cream, in case you were worried). The hoards of day trippers had eaten it all and the relief delivery had not yet arrived. Calamity! We were forced to make do with tea, coffee, crisps and cake (which was, admittedly, delicious).

photo: Keith Fowler

In due course,  refreshed, we prepared to leave. But what is this we see? People with choc ices! Yes, the emergency ice cream lorry had arrived, 15 minutes too late for us. Though, truth be told, I did spy a couple of our number with a crafty Cornetto as we walked back to our vehicles…

 
Many thanks to our hosts for allowing us to do what we do, and for providing delicious and refreshing refreshments!  
  
 
 
Photographs © the author except as noted