Sunday week ago, as I was meandering my way around the outskirts of my town, I found an area of shrubs that was warmed by the bright sun and also sheltered from the seemingly relentless cool easterly wind. Not surprisingly, it was alive with insects enjoying the warmth, and this little creature was one of those.

At first, I thought it was a Dock bug but, on closer examination, I realised it looked similar but with some significant differences: its body was slimmer than a Dock bug’s; its legs were smooth and pale; and, most tellingly, its ‘shoulders’ were angular and pointy. This was my first ever Box bug (Gonocerus acuteangulatus – note the epithet ‘acute angle’ that references those ‘pointy shoulders’), a rare find in Wales, where fewer than ten have so far been recorded.

I wondered about the reason for this bug’s rarity and found the answer on the British Bugs website:

Historically very rare and known only from Box Hill in Surrey, where it was found on Box trees, this bug has expanded its range dramatically during the last decade and now occurs as far north as Yorkshire and as far west as Devon. This range expansion has been aided by a shift onto numerous other foodplants, and it is now most frequently found on hawthorn and buckthorn.