Sunday, 25 May 2025
It has been very windy today with no butterflies and very few other insects on the wing, but I did manage to find a Common Red-legged Robberfly (Dioctria rufipes). […]
Saturday, 24 May 2025
Insects added today are the Marbled White Spot (Protodeltote pygarga) moth, a hoverfly, the Sun Fly (Helophilus pendulus), the Patchwork Leafcutter Bee (Megachile centuncularis), the Common Tachinid fly (Tachina fera) and the sawfly Broad-striped Rhogogaster (Rhogogaster scalaris). A good morning for slugs too. However, if I thought insect ID was difficult then slug ID I can forget about. […]
Tuesday, 20 May 2025
The Cuckoo was calling in the same area again today, but still no luck locating him. There were another 4 insects to add to the Downs list today – Common Tenthredopsis (Tenthredopsis nassata), a crane fly (Limonia phragmitidis), Hairy Shieldbug (Dolycoris baccarum) and the Tortoise Bug (Eurygaster testudinaria). Latest appearances among the […]
Saturday, 17 May 2025
Brimstone (Gonepteryx rhamni), Small Blue (Cupido minimus) and Speckled Wood (Pararge aegeria) butterflies are still around in good numbers. The Common Dogwood (Cornus sanguinea) continues to support a wide variety of insects, with all of these seen within a few metres of each other – Cinquefoil Strider (Macrophya annulata), Flecked Strider (Macrophya blanda), Red-thighed Macrophya […]
Thursday, 8 May 2025
It was a good day for insects today. Forest Bug (Pentatoma rufipes), Lucerne Bug (Adelphocoris lineolatus), Common Dance Fly (Empis tessellata) and Plain-winged Spring Beegrabber [Myopa testacea] were seen before adding Buzzing Spider (Anyphaena accentuata?). As there are 3 very similar species in this spider genus, which can only be separated under a microscope, I […]
Tuesday, 29 April 2025
Latest addition to the butterfly list is Dingy Skipper (Erynnis tages), while I saw my first ever Common Heath (Ematurga atomaria) and Muslin moths (Diaphora mendica). A shield bug seen on hawthorn blossom turned out not to be a Hawthorn Shield Bug but rather a Common Green Shield Bug (Palomena prasina). Yesterday I saw only […]
Tuesday, 8 April 2025
Despite that first flurry of butterflies two weeks ago there are still no great numbers of butterflies about, but large numbers of Sarcophaga sp. flesh flies have now appeared. Latest flower to appear is Cowslip (Primula veris) widely regarded as one of the heralds of spring. Indeed the ‘veris’ in its scientific name means ‘of […]