01 Saturday May 2021
I think you’ll agree this female Orange-tip butterfly has nailed this camouflage scenario.
She kept completely and utterly still, even when I got within a couple of inches of her for some macro photos. Amazing effort!
26 Monday Apr 2021
Posted in insects
Tags
Something flitted close past my ear, pulling my hair, making a low thwack sound. I rubbed my neck, threaded my fingers through loose strands of hair, thinking an insect had landed on me … nothing. I pulled off and checked my cap … still nothing. Thirty minutes or so later, as I had finished my meander around the park, I took off my backpack to put my camera away and found this hitchhiker, a Caddisfly.
Even as I unzipped my bag to get my macro camera, it remained motionless. I got down within inches of its face and took several photos, yet still it didn’t move. Eventually, wanting to get it off my backpack, I had to poke it gently with my finger and even then it just climbed on to my finger and moved slowly around my hand. I don’t think it was injured at all, just remarkably laid back about human contact. Finally, I managed to persuade it to climb on to a nearby bush where it could snooze in the sun in peace.
24 Saturday Apr 2021
Tags
British butterflies, Cosmeston Lakes Country Park, Dingy Skipper, early emergence of Dingy skipper, skipper butterflies, spring butterflies
Well, this was a surprise! My first Dingy skipper of 2021 flitted up from the ground as I walked a path at Cosmeston Lakes Country Park yesterday, settled briefly nearby, then floated off and promptly disappeared. Luckily, I managed to fire off a couple of quick shots, and I think these show how easily this little butterfly can ‘disappear’ in the landscape – it’s incredibly well camouflaged.
In my five and a half years in Britain, this is the earliest I’ve seen a Dingy skipper by at least a week, and my average first sighting has been a little later still, around the tenth of May. I presume our recent warm dry weather has led to these butterflies emerging earlier than usual, though the lack of rain could be an issue for them as the ground is very dry and the usual flush of spring wildflower growth delayed.
23 Friday Apr 2021
Tags
blackthorn, Blackthorn blossom, British insects, British trees, insects on Blackthorn blossom, Spring colour
Flies and hoverflies, bumbles, bees and butterflies – all love feasting on Blackthorn blossom as much as I love watching them enjoying its bounty. And the blossom itself is so blindingly white it’s like a springtime snowfall when the petals fall to the ground.
22 Thursday Apr 2021
Tags
British insects, British shieldbugs, Dolycoris baccarum, gorse, Gorse shieldbug, Hairy shieldbug, Piezodorus lituratus, shieldbugs on gorse
I had expected to find Gorse shieldbugs on these glowing gorse bushes (the clue’s in the name) but, in fact, the most numerous were the Hairy shieldbugs (of which there must have been at least 20).
The Gorse shieldbug (Piezodorus lituratus) (above left) looks very like a Common green shieldbug but its red antennae are a distinctive identification feature. The Hairy shieldbug (Dolycoris baccarum) (above right, and below) is a much more colourful character, a stylish combination of purple-brown and green, and it also has distinctive antennae, this time three white bands on a black base.
21 Wednesday Apr 2021
There’s something quite startling about a tiny blue creature flying through your field of vision – it’s certainly eyecatching. I saw my first Holly blue of the year during Sunday’s meander but that one didn’t linger for a photograph. Yesterday, in a location where I didn’t see any last year, they were like buses – I saw four in total, including these two that floated in together.
17 Saturday Apr 2021
Posted in insects
I must admit that, at first sight, this object, which was lying on a dirt path in a paddock in my local country park, had me completely baffled. I even poked it with the toe of my shoe, thinking it might be poo. But, once I looked closer, I could see the outline of wings and realised it was an empty cocoon. But of what?
Once I got home, I checked through the pupa images on Peter Eeles’s excellent UK Butterflies website but nothing seemed to fit. So, I posted photos of my find on Twitter and asked the man himself for help. Peter very quickly identified the cocoon as that of an Elephant hawk-moth (Deilephila elpenor), a beautiful creature that I’ve not yet seen (click on the moth’s name to see a picture on the UK Moths website). At least now I know they can be found nearby.
14 Wednesday Apr 2021
Tags
British butterflies, Green-veined white, Lavernock Nature Reserve, Orange-tip butterfly, Orange-tip male, spring butterflies
With the help of a little warm sunshine, Lavernock Nature Reserve came up trumps for me yesterday, as I found my first Orange-tip and Green-veined white butterflies for 2021, two of each. So beautiful, so lucky!
13 Tuesday Apr 2021
Tags
British insects, Common Green Shieldbug, Exapion ulicis, Gorse weevil, Green shieldbug, Palomena prasina
Slowly, slowly, more insects are emerging. When I was getting a Gorse photo for last Sunday’s yellow wildflower challenge, this teeny tiny Gorse weevil (Exapion ulicis) paid a visit. I’m not sure if it was getting salt from my hand as it seemed quite reluctant to leave.
And yesterday I was scanning a Buddleja for leaf mines when I had the feeling I was being watched. This Common green shieldbug (Palomena prasina) was very well camouflaged sitting perfectly still on its leaf.
10 Saturday Apr 2021
Butterfly species seven and eight for the year for me are the gorgeous Peacock (I saw five on one of the few days we actually had some warm sunshine) and that lover of the woodland edge, the Speckled wood (two now seen – more will surely follow, when the sun returns).
earthstar 
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