After a bit of a break from putting out the moth trap due to recent windy and wet weather, it went out at the weekend. This Common Rustic (Mesapamea secalis, #642) was the only new species, but the catch included a splendid pair of Buff Ermine moths (Spilosoma lutea). Another new moth is this leaf mine from the apple tree, which is from the tiny Apple Leaf Miner moth ( Lyonetia clerkella, #643).
I recently became a “friend” of Kemerton Lakes Reserve, so took the opportunity to walk some of the member-only paths. One interesting thing I came across were leaf galls made by small mites. The red “pustules” on Field Maple are from a tiny mite called Aceria aceriscampestris, while those on the Alder are Eriophyes laevis.
There were a few past-their-best Pyramidal Orchids about, but this Broad-leaved Helleborine (Epipactis helleborineas) was in full bloom - a new orchid for me.
This fungus, looking like a cluster of dirty potatoes, growing on one of the paths was interesting, and so far I wasn’t able to put a name to it.
This fly is easily recognised by its wings which are smoky black from about half way, with (in the male) distinctive white tips. They are usually found close to water, where they feed by catching small freshwater crustaceans and mosquito larvae from the surface. They have a complex courtship dance involving the male waving his wings at the female (hence the “semaphore” name) and then hovering in front of her, before embarking on an aerial display flight.
Hypericum androsaemum or Tutsan s a member of the St John’s wort family. It’s a medicinal plant, used to heal wounds and burns, as an anti-septic and also as an anti-depressant, so has some colourful names like “Balm of the Warrior’s Wounds” and “Sweet Amber”. The name Tutsan sounds superficially Asian, but it is in fact a native plant found wild, mostly in the west of UK, with the name coming from the French “toute-sain”, literally all heal This example was found growing up between the cracks in the paving out the front of the house - which is definitely a Pathclear-free zone, and a as a result by late summer a riot of weeds. Tutsan is a common garden shrub as well, so probably this one arrived courtesy of a bird-dropped seed from a neighbouring garden.
For some reason I missed Honeysuckle (Lonicera periclymenum) off the list, but this is also a native hedgerow plant and I have a couple of clumps of it in the garden. They are there mostly for the scent and the insects, but this is another plant known for medicinal uses, including to treat respiratory and intestinal infections.
Last week there were some new beetles about. The brown coloured beetle is my first click beetle, Athous haemorrhoidalis. This is quite a common beetle of hedgerows and meadows, which like other click beetles can launch itself into the air with an audible click. The beetle lives on pollen, nectar and emerging foliage, bur during their 2 year larval stage the grubs if present in large numbers can damage crops and turf.
The shiny black rove beetle is of the genus Philonthus, potentially P. laminatus; there’s quite a few species to choose from, and they are very similar. This one is very uniform glossy black, including the legs. The small ladybird is a 10-spotted one, Adalia decempunctata. There are many colour variations to this species, which can even (despite its name) have up to 15 spots. These are a gardener’s friend, preying on aphids.
I do sometimes get them overhead, but this is the first time I saw a Kestrel (Falco subbuteo, #589) actually perched in the trees around the garden. This is an adult male. maybe looking for some easy prey such as a young bird to take back to its own chicks. Or maybe he’s just enjoying a change of scenery - we do often have kestrels in the fields around the village. This kestrel is not the only interesting falcon lately, as a Hobby, being mobbed by the local House Martins, flew over during the weekend. Whether a hobby, sparrowhawk or indeed this kestrel, which had attracted the attention of some starlings, it’s the alarm calls of smaller birds that first alert you they are around.
#589 Kestrel (Falco subbuteo)
Last week there was more diversity in the light trap, and actually not so many moths. There were three ground beetles, two of which were of the type pictured, which I believe (based on the shape of the pronuptum) is Ophonus rufibarbis - this genus of beetle is apparently quite often attracted to light. I’m not sure if was the beetles (which are predators) or some ants that also got into the trap, but all that was left of this mayfly was its rather beautiful wings. From the pattern on the wings, these are all that’s left of a Green Drake Mayfly (Ephemera danica), though I would like to catch another sometime so I can see the whole creature.
I’m liking this funny looking small bug with its enlarged antennae and bright green legs, which was running to hide on the underside of the dogwood leaf as I tried to get a photo. It goes by the name Heterotoma planicornis, and lives on smaller insects and plant buds, often apparently on stinging nettles. It’s not rare, but it is small and a bit shy, and a new species for the garden..
Heterotoma planicornis (#639)
There are many Scarlet Tiger moths (Callimorpha dominula) around at the moment, flying around in the late afternoon and evening, or resting up during the day. They are so numerous here, that it’s surprising to see that their distribution in UK is rather restricted to the south and west of the country. The caterpillars like Comfrey, but I also find them on the Green Alkanet in the garden.
There were 8 or so Scarlet Tigers around the moth trap the other morning, plus a few other species like this Clouded Silver (Lomographa temerata) and a bunch of “micro” moths, including an Ermine (Yponomeuta sp. several species are too similar to ID in the field), Grey Tortrix (Cnephasia sp. ditto), Bramble Shoot Moth (Notocelia uddmanniana) and Codling Moth (Cydia pomonella). Codling Moth is a nuisance in orchards, as its larvae tunnel into the core of the apple, leaving a “maggoty apple” with a dirty brown tunnel through the fruit.
I’m a bit frustrated with this one, as last week some alien looking pink/orange blobs looking like melted plastic appeared on a stump of dead wood. They didn’t look right for Coral Spot Fungus, at >1 cm across too big for sure, but thinking I had time I didn’t get a decent photo or check it out properly, and a couple of days later when I had time the orange was gone replaced by these brown spheres. After due research, it turns out that my fungus was in fact a slime mould, Wolf’s Milk (Lycogala terrestre), which is found on dead timber mostly from June through to November. It is sometimes called Toothpaste Slime, because when you puncture the orange blob fruiting body and squeeze a little toothpaste-like orange slime comes out; something I also missed the the opportunity to try…
#626 Wolf's Milk Slime Mould (Lycogala terrestre)
Caught a few new moths earlier in the week. The Buff Tip (Phalera bucephala) is not new, but I like them a lot, so I thought I’d include this photo of one trying hard to be a birch twig in the morning sun. The Common Footman (Eilema lurideola) with its yellow edges was new, as was my third type of wainscot moth, the Smoky Wainscot (Mythimna impura). Finally, all the Riband Waves (Idaea aversata) I have seen or caught so until now have been mostly pale, so it was nice to catch this one that actually had a dark “riband” across the wings.
I’m really delighted to record my first Hedgehog in the garden. Maybe it’s a relatively young one as it does not seem that big, and it was a surprise to see it out and about in the mid afternoon. It has found a nice place to rest up during the day in a huge pile of leaves behind a dense clump of bamboo, so I’m hoping it will stick around. There should be plenty enough for it to eat around the garden, but we will put some water out for it and maybe some food if we can find a way to stop our cat from eating it first.
Other mammals putting on a show yesterday evening were our resident bats; they are pipistrelles, but I’ll need to buy or borrow a bat detector to be sure exactly which species..
#631 Hedgehog (Erinaceus europaeus)
Several of these small green Mirid bugs turned up on newly emerging globe thistle flowers. They are common bugs all over UK, but these are the first of this species I found in the garden. This species prefers low vegetation such as nettles and thistles, and is identified by its black & green colour and, if you look closely enough, black stripes on the hind femur. The other insect is also a bug, but in this case a nymph of Green Shield Bug (Palomena prasina), which I found in my mini wild-flower meadow.
I guess it’s one of the good things about a garden nature list that when you find some disastrous garden pest instead of throwing your hands up in horror like most gardeners, you just think it’s cool to add a new species to the list. Case in point is this Gooseberry Sawfly larva, found while I was cutting back the gooseberry bush (where anyhow gooseberry mildew had destroyed most of the crop). These larvae are quite pretty really, but in a bad infestation they will literally strip all the leaves off a gooseberry bush, and then move on to do the red currents. These sawflies have up to 3 generations in one year, so I might be less relaxed about it by the end of the summer.
#624 Gooseberry Sawfly - Nematus ribesii
No rain last night, so the moth trap was out and catching a fair number of moths, the Heart & Dart being the most numerous, with a couple each of Vine’s Rustic and Uncertain moths. With these there were three new species: a Bright-line Brown-eye (Lacanobia oleracea), a twig-like Flame moth ( Axylia putris) and a Barred Straw (Gandaritis pyraliata). The Barred Straw is an unusual looking moth as it rests with its fore-wings completely covering its hind-wings, and in this case fluttered off before (unfortunately) I could get a better photo.
This weekend there were a few new bugs about. This rather fine leaf mine on a Nasturtium leaf is from the larva of a fly, probably Pea Leaf-miner, Chromatomyia horticola (#616), though there is another species with an identical mine. Chromatomyia horticola mines leaves of different plants, which include Sow Thistle and Garden Peas, both of which I find in the garden with similar narrow white mines.
The smart-looking black & grey fly appears to be Anthomyia procellaris (#617), due to the placement of the block spots. It is not an uncommon fly, often found sunbathing - in this case on my potato plants. Its larval life-cycle is not really known.
The moth trap was fairly quiet on Sunday morning, with this rather burgundy-tinted Middle-barred Minor (Oligia fasciuncula, #615) the only new species caught. On Saturday night I noted several insects flying around the light turned which I thought were stripey micro moths, but it turns out hey were my fist species of caddisfly, the aptly named Long-horned Caddisfly (Mystacides longicornis, #618). Caddisflies are usually associated with water, where their larvae live in a case made from bits of sand and gravel. My garden is quite far from any stream, so either these insects roam further than you might expect, or maybe they are from one of my small garden ponds.
It’s Cockchafer season, and one of these big beetles dropped in over the weekend. It’s always good to see them. though this one seemed a bit injured.
The round and shiny black beetle is my first clown beetle, Hister unicolor (#614). This family of beetles are scavengers, with a preference for dead animals, animal dung and other rotting things. Hister unicolor is a little less specific than some and can be found in woodland and gardens attracted by compost and rotting vegetation. This individual, as is commonly the case apparently, had several brown mites clinging onto it.
It’s been all about moths lately, but there are other insects about. One great thing about moths is the wealth of information about them online. The same is not true for wasps and I can’t even get close to identifying these two that I photographed last month, despite getting some quite okay pictures. They are probably some type of parasitic wasp that lays eggs in other insects, but there’s just too many species - a huge diversity of around 6,500 species, just in the UK - so I’ve thrown in the towel on ever working out what they might be. These wasps typically synchronise their appearance with that of their hosts, usually with more appearing later in the summer. I’m hoping this will include some of the more spectacular big & brightly coloured ones which I might be able to identify.
After a couple of fruitful trapping evenings I had a bit of a backlog of photos and a few identification challenges I was still working on. I’m impressed how many moths I’ve caught, and the variety of species - I had no idea there were so many around. I particularly love the birch twig imitating Bull Tip and the pattern on the Grey Dagger, neither of which I’ve ever seen before. As the weather has turned a little wet and it looks like it will be windier too I’ll give it a rest until the weekend and see if there’s anything else around I should take notice of.
Moth trapping is getting quite addictive, and I’m very happy to reach 600 species in style with this gorgeous Small Elephant Hawk-moth, found in the trap this morning. I’m still working on identifying some other of last night’s moths - but this ID was pretty straightforward. Nice!
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#600 Small Elephant Hawk-moth - Deilephila porcellus
Passionate about nature, based in Gloucestershire UK; this site is about creating a wildlife friendly family garden and exploring the diversity of animal & plant species that share it with us.
As a nature lover and wildlife gardener I started wondering about the biodiversity in my backyard and just how many species from plants to insects to birds to mammals might live in or visit it.
Much of the wildlife in my small, village garden has been present right under my nose for years without my really appreciating it, so on the way I am learning a lot about different species and how to make a wildlife-friendly environment for them; also getting engaged more in conservation activities around Gloucestershire, Worcestershire and the Cotswolds.
My garden species tally started from zero on June 1st 2018, the target was 1000 species, which I eventually hit in June 2024. But there’s still plenty to see and learn about.
I'm very interested in your comments & advice: whether it's about the blog, some help with identification or just how to make my own little Eden better for wildlife. So please leave a comment or drop me a line if you feel like it!
Graham Tompsett
microedenproject@gmail.com
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