Shock! County bug recorder finds a bug

Wednesday 15th June 2022, Pennerley Meadows

This was the bug.

A Gorse shieldbug amongst the seedheads of a Gorse bush.

Nothing special you may think. Photographs of this species have appeared periodically in these reports.

Why the reaction?

Over the years, especially since I became the shieldbug recorder, I have gained a reputation for not being able to find Gorse shieldbugs when everyone else around me is finding them by the bucketful. As a result whenever I do find one the event is treated like England winning the Ashes or not finishing last in the Eurovision Song Contest.

Right, now that I have got that out of the way, I can concentrate on the day’s main activities.

We were invited by the owner of Pennerley House to take at look at his meadows. This was followed by a visit to two of the SSSI meadows in Pennerley maintained by Natural England.

Arriving at Pennerley House we were met by about a dozen members of the Marches Meadows Group who had come to watch us in action and learn a little bit about the invertebrates that inhabit the meadows and their marginal vegetation.

There are two meadows at Pennerley House. The first has been established for the longest time.

The second, separated from the first by a stream, was created more recently.

In view of the cumulative size of the group, we split up into small groups and set about exploring the meadows, attempting to do as little damage to the meadows as possible. Thankfully paths had been cut around the edges of the two meadows making access easier.

With a mixture of our main techniques we attempted to demonstrate both the art of collecting invertebrates and the science of identifying them. Vacuum sampling from the meadows, beating the trees that bordered them and sweeping the longer vegetation that lay between the paths and the stream.

Just about everything that my group found was tiny! This was very frustrating as it was difficult to keep everyone’s interest high when just pointing to a series of small objects moving about a tray that could not really be seen in any detail without a magnifying lens.

Fortunately others were more successful in their searches and found some larger insects. They brought these over to show. We were also able to observe Chimney sweeper moths darting hither and thither over the meadow.

The sharing of information was not all one way as a couple of the meadow group pointed out a Greater butterfly orchid to me. (I would not have spotted it without their help.)

As morning turned into afternoon we left the meadows and made our way along a green lane to the SSSI meadows that we had been given permission to visit.

Arriving at the site we assembled at the gate. Then something caught our eyes from the other side of the lane. A large object was peering over a gate at us.

I believe this was a Rhea.

Having said “hello” to it I retreated rapidly when it turned towards me and looked as though it might give me a mighty peck.

We filed through the gate into the first of the SSSI meadows and settled down for lunch. Looking at the view we tried to work out what the hills were in the near and far distance.

We were not very successful!

By now the sun had all but disappeared behind cloud. It stayed that way for the rest of the day, reversing the usual pattern of weather we have experienced on our outings this year.

Lunch over we started to survey the first meadow. 

Obviously a group of people walking here there and everywhere in a meadow is going to cause a great deal of damage. To minimise this we kept to the edge and restricted our physical searches to the marginal vegetation and hedges.

Having been shown Greater butterfly orchids in the first meadow I started to notice them in this meadow.

They seemed to be quite common here, as were other orchids which went unidentified by me.

Moving into the second meadow I paused to appreciate the site and take in the view.

Wonderful.

What a shame such places are a rarity in our countryside today and those that still exist seem to be forever under threat of "improvement". We are very thankful to the individuals and organisations who do maintain the meadows they own.

We made our way back to the cars and then home.

Before you ask, I have not forgotten that these reports, to make them more interesting, are generally stuffed with photographs of what we found.

 
My camera set up is not good enough to take photographs of anything smaller than a shieldbug (hence the Gorse shieldbug at the start) so I am dependent on others providing images for me to use.

Unfortunately for this outing all the usual photographers were unavailable.

However, one of the group has come to my rescue. He has supplied the following photographs of insects that he took during the day. I am very grateful to him!

A hoverfly, Volucella bombylans;

Photograph: Jim Cresswell

A pair of weevils busy generating the next generation. I am informed they are probably either Phyllobius roboretanus or virideaeris;

Photograph: Jim Cresswell

A grassland micro-moth, Crambus lathoniellus;

Photograph: Jim Cresswell

And another hoverfly, Volucella pellucens.

Photograph: Jim Cresswell

As we made our way back along the lane to the start we passed this Nettle rust which my camera just about coped with.

My thanks to the owner of Pennerley House for giving us permission to do what we enjoy doing and arrange our access to the SSSI meadows with Natural England. My appreciation to the photographer for providing his excellent images.