All alone

 Beeches and Lodge Fields, Ironbridge, Wednesday 30th June 2021

I'm so lonely.

Where is everyone?

I used to have four very big friends!

But ... they are gone.

Now, I am all alone.

On my own.

No friends.

I miss them.

Here I am.

That's me - standing tall over the surrounding countryside. 

A bit faded in the mist, but here I am.

All alone.

And my big friends, now departed?

Here we were, a little while back, as we proudly guarded the valley which we occupied.

Photograph: Stephen Mitchell

Tempus fugit!

Our visit to these two grasslands on the upper slopes of the Ironbridge Gorge started over half a mile away.

Why?

That was where we parked for the day, in the grounds of the Abraham Darby Sports and Leisure Centre.

Kit was sent on ahead in one car which was able to park at the entrance to Beeches Field whilst the rest of us meandered our way to the site.

Beeches Field consists of a couple of areas of flower rich grassland together with a pool and some woodland. Most of it cab be seen in this aerial photograph.

Photograph: Bob Kemp

We started at the entrance by the houses at the top of the photograph and made our way to and beyond the bottom.

An initial attraction was the pool.

This is a home for great crested newts. We did find some nymphs. Fortunately a member of the group is licensed to handle these amphibians.

Also found in the pool was a hawker dragonfly nymph.

Photograph: David Williams

In some mud at the edge of the pool were lots of flies waggling their white tipped wings in frantic attempts to attract a member of the opposite sex.

Poecilobothrus nobilitatus - Photograph: David Williams

A reptile tile close to the pool was checked and, believe it or not, there were slow worms under its cover.

Photograph: Peter Hodgkison

We spent a considerable part of the morning in the area containing the pool checking out the grassland and the marginal vegetation. Here are some of the other insects we found.

Meadow brown butterfly:

Photograph: Peter Hodgkison

Blue-tailed damselfly:

Photograph: David Williams

A male Swollen-thighed beetle seen, as they often are, on a yellow flower head:

Photograph: Peter Hodgkison

A Tortoise shieldbug:

Photograph: David Williams

A 7-spot ladybird larva feasting on an aphid:

Photograph: David Williams

And a pair of Ringlets doing what the Poecilobothrus nobilitatus on the mud were aspiring to:

Photograph: David Williams

Time to move on to the second area of grassland. In fact it was well past the time to move as lunchtime was fast approaching. 

Passing the line of trees that separate the two areas we noticed a Stinking iris in flower at the edge of the vegetation under the trees.

It was unlikely that we would find many additional species in that area as the vegetation was very similar to the first, However, you will never know unless you look.

Beeches Field, as far as I know, is named after the Beeches Hospital which was situated nearby. The building was later used as a nursing home. This was closed earlier this century and the building was due to be demolished and replaced by housing.

Housing has been built on the site, but the hospital building appears to have been spared and renovated.

Lunch was declared and taken surrounding a bench on the hillside between beeches and Lodge Fields.

Photograph: Peter Hodgkison

From lunch it was a short walk to Lodge Field.

Photograph: Bob Kemp

Lodge Field slopes far more than Beeches Field. There is no pool but there is a very wet area towards the bottom of the site (which is at the top of the photograph), and there is at least one area of very damp grassland.

One striking feature of the site is the number of orchids inhabiting its space. Here is one of the three thousand or so.

Photograph: Peter Hodgkison

As we had made our way to the site a longhorn beetle, Rutpela maculata, was observed. However it was not on site, so it was not recorded. However, thankfully, we did find one on site which we did record and photograph.

Photograph: David Williams

Nearby a couple of white-legged damselflies were seen.

female - Photograph: David Williams

male - Photograph: David Williams

The heat and humidity were intensifying and a bench became the centre of attention as we took turns to take a rest before making forays into the nearby vegetation to see what we could find.

A patch of nettle not far away from the bench was home to a host of peacock butterfly larvae.

Photograph: David Williams

And in the grass close to the larvae a Bloodvein moth was seeking shelter.

Tempus fugit.

It was nearing time to leave the sites but, before we did, a quick beat of some bushes revealed an oak bush cricket nymph. It was placed back on the tree from which it came, where it posed long enough for its photograph to be taken.

Photograph: David Williams

Time to go home. We plodded our way back to the top of Lodge Field, across Beeches Field then back along the lanes and road to the car park to be reunited with our cars.

An excellent and exhausting day in two very good meadows.

My thanks to the Ironbridge Meadows Group for inviting us to survey and to the photographers for providing their efforts to illustrate this report. 

But before we move on a couple of aerial shots of the Ironbridge Gorge.

Photograph: Bob Kemp

Photograph: Bob Kemp

I am still there.

And still all alone.

Round-up

No, not the weedkiller, but of other outings during the past week.

A trip to Rodborough Common, Stroud to look for Large blue butterflies and Orthoptera failed to find the butterflies but did come across plenty of orthoptera. A couple of the species seen were.

Rufous grasshopper, 3rd instar nymph:

Photograph: David Williams

Large green bush cricket:

Penultimate instar - Photograph: David Williams

Final instar - Photograph: David Williams

Great green bush crickets, so I am told, are far easier to find as nymphs. Once they mature they retreat to thickets of plants such as bramble and are very reluctant to show themselves.

Large blue may not have been found but Small blue butterflies were.

Photograph: David Williams

Together with a Dark green fritillary.

Photograph: David Williams

And, for a little icing on the cake, the rare beefly Villa cingulata was observed.

Photograph: David Williams

A few days later we made a trip to Raven Meols Hills. This is an extensive area of sand dunes and plantation to the west of the town of Formby.

It is owned by the National Trust who charge a huge amount to park, cashing in on the draw of the beach and red squirrels in the plantation. As neither of us were members we (grudgingly) paid up.

As we walked along we came across this tree giving a clear indication of which way the wind was blowing.

So have a guess ...

Which way was the wind blowing?

Left to right as we look at the photograph?

Wrong!

It was blowing from the right.

Clearly we had chosen to visit on a day when the prevailing wind was not in evidence.

We made our way into the dune system.

An early and then frequent find was the Dune chafer.

Once you got your eye in they seemed to be everywhere, flying, on the vegetation, on the sand, in the sand burrowing and, of course, mating.

Another chafer was found, this time only one, a Brown chafer.

And to cap this beetle-fest a Monoceros beetle. This has a bizarre looking protuberance emerging from its pronotum. I apologise for the quality of the photograph but it is the only one I managed to take that clearly shows the structure.

I think that is enough from me for now.

Thank you for reading to the end.