24 Sept 2020

Bits and Pieces - 4

 Thursday, 24 September 2020

So now we know.

It is not really a surprise that we are facing stricter regulation to our lives. It has however, wiped out any prospect of restarting the Joy of Wildlife group in its usual form until next Spring at the earliest.

Anyway, on more joyous subjects, I continue to be sent lots of wonderful photographs which I would like to share with you, as well as providing a bit of information on outings that have been managed during this prolonged period of reduced activity.

If anyone has anything they would like me to include please feel free to contact me.

Which is what Neil did with some photographs of rarer beetles that he has managed to root out over the past few months, although the first appears to have rooted him out!

Photograph: Neil Nash

A longhorn beetle Molorchus minor which has been given the common name Spruce shortwing beetle. How it can confuse this bit of exposed body for a spruce is beyond me. A delightful find. This is an insect that has not been seen very often in Shropshire. Neil's knee (I assume it was his) and the beetle were in the right place at the right time. The right place was Lee Brockhurst.

Neil's next excellent beetle find is a first for the county. This was Silpha tristis, a carrion beetle, at Whixall Moss.

Photograph: Neil Nash

And finally, at the Millenium Village in Telford Neil came across Leptura quadrifasciata.

Photograph: Neil Nash

This beetle has been given the common name Four-banded longhorn beetle, which looking at the pattern on its elytra is understandable. But the markings are not really bands. Perhaps it should be called the Eight-splash longhorn - sorry, I cannot think of a better description of the yellow markings.

The Millenium Village is one of the many sites the Joy of Wildlife group planned to visit this year. All being well we will try again next year.

News from Madeley.

Someone is turning their lawn into a meadow.

Photograph: Nigel Cane-Honeysett

The plan was to spread this area with green hay collected from a churchyard in Hopesay. Permissions were granted and arrangements made. BUT....

Someone got in first, cut the churchyard and removed all the hay!!

Plan B - the area in the photograph has now been seeded instead. I look forward to seeing the results.

Finally before moving on to happenings in September. If you are a regular reader you will remember this photograph of Palloptera muliebris:

Photograph: Jim Shaw

It seems that I am the gullible victim of a spoof!

On reading the blog that contained this photograph and the my reference to its common name - the Dame Edna fly - I was contacted by C Midwinter, the author of the article in the Shropshire Entomology Newsletter that introduced me to the name. This is what he had to say:

"Just to clarify the Dame Edna fly name. I and a friend had been joking about this when I worked at FSC after I produced a photo of them together. Having previously put a spoof article in an early Shropshire Entomology newsletter I decided to insert one into newsletter 6 (Oct 2012) under a pseudonym on the Dame Edna fly and the name seems to have stuck, to my delight!"

I will let you guess whose pseudonym is C Midwinter.

You can see the original article by following this link Shropshire Entomology Newsletter Issue No 6.
The article starts on page 15. 

On the first day of September I journeyed on a glorious summer's day to the Earl of Bathurst's Estate at Cirencester Park to meet with our orthopterist to look for Woodland grasshoppers.

Cirencester Park contains a huge area of woodland punctuated by wide rides. And, surprisingly, you look for the Woodland grasshopper in the grassland of the rides rather than the woods.

Careful searching plus the aid of a bat detector, which is used to bring the male grasshopper's call into the human audible range soon revealed the target species Omocestus rufipes.

Photograph: David Williams

Interested as I was in this insect I was also on the look out for hemiptera. Whilst observation and patient searching are not some of my better attributes, I do wield a mighty sweep net. And the sweep net yielded a Crucifer (or Brassica if you prefer) shieldbug, Eurydema oleracea.

Photograph: David Williams

To be fair, although I swept it up, I did not notice it in the net. Fortunately my more observant colleague came to the rescue.

He followed this up by spotting a Tortoise shieldbug, Eurygaster testudinaria, in the grass. 

Photograph: David Williams

Finally, I did manage to find and photograph something all on my own - the rather bizarre looking weevil, Apoderus coryli, otherwise known as the Hazel leaf-roller.


From Cirencester Park we made the short trip to Rodborough Common to look for Great green bush crickets, Tettigonia viridissima.

Despite my difficulty in locating the correct car park we eventually got onto the common to search for our quarry. The bush crickets are usually found in scrub within grasslands. We searched lots of bramble and other scrub patches until, eventually, one was heard (not by me) and was tracked down to a bramble patch.

Photograph: David Williams

It seemed reasonably unconcerned by out presence and interest but disappeared as soon as I got my camera out.

Still I did have some bush cricket success when my more heavy handed approach to finding them beat a Speckled bush cricket, Leptophyes punctatissima, out of a small Scot's pine.


The following day a few of us met up at Prees Heath for some socially distanced entomology. It was not a nice day and persistent drizzle curtailed our activities at lunchtime. When he got home, our arachnologist found that a spider so wanted to be identified by him that it had hitched a lift on his rucksack - Aranaeus quadratus.

Photograph: Nigel Cane-Honeysett

A couple of days later I was sent a couple of photographs of bugs that had been spotted during a visit to a graveyard in Wordsley. 

The first is a Birch catkin bug, Kleidocerys resedae. This bug is very common on birch trees but crops up almost anywhere (including heather where it is easy to confuse with the similar heather-based bug Kleidocerys ericae).

Photograph: Bob Kemp

The second bug, actually two bugs, that preferred gravestones to their usual habitat, are Forest bugs, Pentatoma rufipes, that are too busy creating the next generation to worry about their surroundings.

Photograph: Bob Kemp

In the second week of September following agreement from Caring for God's Acre and permission from Bridgnorth Council a small group visited Bridgnorth Cemetery. 


The September weather was wonderful. Too good really as it encouraged a lot of sitting around enjoying the sun and socially distanced company. Rest assured we also did plenty of searching.

Fungi were a feature of the site with many fruiting bodies visible. Some of the ones we managed to identify were:

A mushroom that lives up to its name - Death cap, Amanita phalloides;

Photograph: Bob Kemp

Amanita excelsa  var, spissa;

Photograph: Bob Kemp

Finally, what turned out to be only the third county record of Limacella guttata.

Photograph: Bob Kemp

Despite all the fungi, for me the star of the day was a Box bug, Gonocerus acuteangulatus.

Photograph: David Williams

Remarkably the Box bug was beaten out of a small section of box hedging. For once an insect that lives up to its name.

This bug is a very recent arrival in the county. It was first recorded last year and this latest find represents its third recorded sighting.

A bush covered in ivy attracted the attention of one of the group. He spent ages looking at and taking photographs of the ivy. What was the great interest?

Ivy bees, Colletes hederae.

Photograph: David Williams

The Ivy bee is another recent colonist within the county but it has spread rapidly and if you have flowering ivy you stand a reasonable chance of seeing it feeding on the plant. Unfortunately whenever I see a bee feeding at ivy it turns out to be a honey bee - but I will keep looking.

Another hymenopteran that was quite common in the cemetery was the field digger wasp Mellinus arvensis.

Photograph: David Williams

And, to round off this visit to the cemetery, we found a Juniper shieldbug, Cyphostethus tristriatus.


On the following Friday, 11 September, I visited Port Sunlight River Park on the banks of the River Mersey for a Tanyptera Trust Recording Day.


The River Park is the result of the "restoration" of a landfill site. The site has been capped and "returned to nature". Part of that return is to syphon off the gas produced by the site and use it to supply energy to nearby housing. The landfill site is also unusual in that it is a dome and stands a good height above the surrounding countryside and the river, affording good views from the top. The site is mainly grassland with some woodland and scrub as well as a large pool.

The visit started with an inspection of a wild patch by the visitor centre. This provided an immediate surprise when several distinctive nymphs of the Southern green shieldbug, Nezara viridula, were found.


As suggested by its common name this insect is found mainly in the south of England, especially around the Greater London area, but there are a scattering of records heading north and west. You never know it may turn up in Shropshire.

One insect that I did not have to look for was an Angle shades moth, Phlogophora meticulosa, which took a fancy to the tube of my vacuum sampler.


And as I was returning to the car to wrap up for the day I passed a Rosemary bush, gave it a tap, and out fell a Rosemary beetle, Chrysolina americana.


Whilst I was on the banks of the Mersey our Lichenologist was in Sutton Park where he found this parasitic fungus on a Lepraria lichen.

Photograph: Bob Kemp

I finish with another example of what earwigs get up to when you are not looking. This one had decided to take up residence in a photo frame, being exposed when the frame was opened.

Photograph: Nigel Cane-Honeysett

Just in case you cannot see it in the above photograph, here is a close up.

Photograph: Nigel Cane-Honeysett

I think that is enough for now. I have more to tell you about and I will issue the next report as soon as I have thought of a more original title.

Keep well


8 Sept 2020

Bits and Pieces 3

Tuesday 8th September 2020

Strange, even though the Joy of Wildlife group is not operating, I seem to be finding it hard to set aside time to do these reports. 

Is it that the lack of outings has made me lose focus? Is it that living in the "COVID new normal" times I have found other things to do to occupy me? Perhaps the easing of restrictions has also eased my scheduling, as in lockdown I had a more regimented existence in order to pass the time.

Anyway I have now started this third instalment of wildlife miscellany that I and others have managed to experience recently.

In the second full week of August when were were treated to hot sunny weather for a brief spell three of us met up at Dry Sanford Pit Nature Reserve, part of the Cothill National Nature Reserve, near Abingdon.

Dry Sandford Pit, like many nature reserves, is a former quarry which over time has developed a wonderful mixture of habitats. In addition its exposed quarry faces provide much of geological interest.

Why did we go?

In the hope of finding Great green bush crickets.

Did we find them?

No!

But we did find several things of interest some of which we managed to photograph. Starting with a fairly common sight along woodland rides, a Speckled wood butterfly.


We came across a grassland clearing surrounded by woodland that was rich with scabious, and feeding on one flower head was the Large scabious mining bee, Andrena hattorfiona.

Photograph: David Williams

This is our largest mining bee in terms of body length.

Wandering on we came to a more open area of grassland. A sweep of this turned up a nymph whose identity had us foxed. Fortunately our "Queen of the Nymphs" Maria subsequently came to our rescue by identifying it as a Stictopleurus nymph.

Photograph: David Williams

There are two known species of Stictopleurus in Britain that are quite difficult to separate to species. To assist we have put together this composite photograph of the adults highlighting a couple of features that distinguish them.

Photograph: David Williams

(You should be able to see an enlarged image by clicking on the photograph.)

Unfortunately we have been unable to identify the nymph we found to species.

Moving on from the grassland we made our way through a deeper part of the quarry to an area of fen. Someone had kindly positioned a seat overlooking this area so we were able to sit and take in the view at leisure.


Refreshed by our rest we wandered on and on looking for the elusive bush cricket - to no avail.

Never mind, there will be another day.

A couple of days later we gathered at Brown Moss on another sunny, cloud free day.


The air temperature was a little cooler than the previous few days but it was very humid making it more oppressive. We tried hard but we had to admit defeat early in the afternoon as lethargy took over making us wonder if we could get back to the cars!

Here are a few pictures of beasts we saw on the day:

A Common darter

Photograph: John Martin

A water ladybird,


And a young newt;


Plus one of a photographer practising his art deep in the undergrowth!


The following day this lovely hoverfly Arctophila superbiens was snapped at Ripple Wood.

Photograph: John Martin

Yet another day later I ventured to North Lancashire on yet another splendid day.

The journey there was long but easy as traffic on the M6 was still much lighter than normal.

That said ,as I approached my exit there was a queue ahead. Fortunately the end of the queue was a few car lengths after the start of the slip road enabling me to leave the motorway without being held up. Those travelling to the next junction and beyond were not so lucky.

This was a Tanyptera Trust outing to record wildlife found on the exposed shingle at the riverside in a large meander of the River Lune.




Despite my best efforts (!) I found nothing of interest here but one of the other member of the party found this large spider which may be Arctosa cinerea, a spider that specialises in this type of habitat. It constructs a silk-lined burrow under the stones. Within this burrow it can withstand being submerged by the water of the river for long periods.


I apologise for the poor quality of the photograph but I did not want to risk loosing someone else's find whilst transferring it to a clearer container!

Towards the end of August a visit to Cherhill to look for Wartbiters (unsuccessfully) and then Rodborough generated a collection of photographs of orthoptera.

Here they are:

Two female meadow grasshoppers, one of which is the uncommon fully-winged form

Photograph: David Williams

Basking female meadow and stripe-winged grasshoppers together on a small piece of bare earth

Photograph: David Williams

A male dark bush cricket

Photograph: David Williams

A female rufous grasshopper, showing the clubbed/white-tipped antennae.

Photograph: David Williams

Bringing August to an end, a trip to Mason's Bank in the far south west of the county yielded this slime mould which is probably Tubifera ferruginosa.

Photograph: Bob Kemp

The end of August signifies the end of this instalment. All being well more will follow in a little while.

Stay safe.