Insect life on the spoil heap

Here above is the bulbous female Green Dock Beetle (Gastrophysa viridula) and at nearly half the size below is the male of that species. When the female is full of eggs like this she is referred to as being "gravid". These beetles seemed at home on the underside of the dock leaves. The damage they inflict can be seen next to male in the picture below. It was following the trail of damage that lead me to an encounter with this species. So remember, if in doubt, follow the damage.The beetle below is a Flower Beetle (Oedemera lurida). Sitting on the petal of an Oxeye Daisy alongside a 22 spot ladybird. These beetles are pollen eaters and so hang around on flowers slowly munching their way through the yellow stuff and in turn pollinating the flowers.

Finally for today let me show you this. Thousands of Black Ant (Lasius niger) princesses getting ready for the 'day of the flying ants'. On one of the next sunny days chemical messages will be sent between ant colonies that will make these ants fly into the air to meet the flying males. Males and females fly separately in each colony to ensure genetic diversity within the species. After mating each female will then come back down to the ground and look for a place to start her own colony as queen. So in total this is a summary of the animal life found on the heap to date.

Butterflies
Common Blue - Polyommatus icarus
Speckled Wood - Pararge aegeria
Large White - Pieris brassicae

Insects
14 Spot Ladybird - Propylea 14 punctata
7 spot Ladybird - Coccinella 7-punctata
Black Ant - Lasius niger
Brown Lacewing - Hemerobius humulinus
Carabid Beetle - Harpalus rufipes
Common Carder Bee - Bombus agrorum
Common Field Grasshopper - Chorthippus brunneus
Common Froghopper - Philaenus spumarius
Common Wasp - Vespula vulgaris
Flesh Fly - Sarcophaga carnaria
Flower Beetle - Oedemera lurida
Green Dock Beetle - Gastrophysa viridula
Ground Beetle - Feronia nigrita
Harlequin Ladybird - Harmonia axyridis
Marmalade Hoverfly - Episyrphus balteatus
Meadow Grasshopper - Chorthippus parellelus
Red Ant - Myrmica rubra
Red Tailed Bumblebee - Bombus lapidarius
White Tailed Bumblebee - Bombus lucorum

Spiders
House Spider - Tegenaria duellica
Money Spider - Neriene peltata

Chilopoda & Diplopoda
Striped Millipede - Ommatoiulus sabulosus
Common Centipede - Lithobius forficatus

Butterflies at the School

Just a quick one today to talk about the butterfly life at the spoil heap. So far we have seen these species.

Common Blue - Polyommatus icarus
Speckled Wood - Pararge aegeria
Large White - Pieris brassicae

The Common Blue butterlfies were using the site for breeding as can be seen in this fantastic (even if I do say so myself) picture.

The male is the blue one on the right and the female is the brown one on the left.

Here is a close up of the male. You may think that this is pretty, but you wait until you see it with its wings open!

The female however looks quite different with her wings open. She is more of a brown colour.

New plant species recorded at school spoil heap

One month on and we have a few more plant species to report at the school.

Here is the plant species list for the school site, with the new additions in red.

Black Medick - Medicago lupulina
Broad Leaved Dock - Rumex Obtusifolius
Broad leaved Willowherb - Epilobium Montanum
Common Field-speedwell - Veronica persica
Common Poppy - Papaver Rhoeas
Hairy Tare - Vicia Hirsuta
Hedge Woundwort - Stachys Sylvatica
Herb Bennet - Geum Urbanum
Meadow Vetch - Lathyrus Pratensis
Oxeye Daisy - Leucanthemum vulgare
Red Campion - Silene Dioica
Red Clover - Trifolium Pratense
Redshank - Persicaria Maculosa
Ribbed Melilot - Melilotus officinalis
Ribwort Plantain - Plantago Lanceolata
Scarlet Pimpernel - Anagallis Arvensis
Small flowered Crane's Bill - Geranium Pusillum
Stinging Nettle - Urtica Dioica
Tufted Vetch - Vicia Cracca
Weld - Reseda Luteola
White Campion - Silene Latifolian Alba
White Clover - Trifolium Repens
White Melilot - Melilotus albus

Lets take a closer look at some of the additions.

This is Black Medick (Medicago lupulina) so called because its small yellow flowers are replaced with a cluster of black sticky seeds.

This is Common Field-speedwell (Veronica persica). Its a gorgeous small blue flower found on the south facing slopes of the meadow.

This is Ribbed Melilot (Melilotus officinalis) another member of the pea family. I wonder how did all the pea seeds get into this soil. They must have been dropped by birds because I don't think I have ever seen peas floating in the wind!Similar to this is White Melilot (Melilotus albus) that is also found on the spoil heap. By far the biggest advance for us is that we have identified many insect species at the heap. So far we have recorded 50 species living on the mound. I'll tell you about those tomorrow.

Centipede

If you remember a month ago, I mentioned how we were trying to identify and photograph all the plants and animals that live on a spoil heap. Take a look at this beast! It is a Common Centipede (Lithobius forficatus). Now this little chap lives under rocks and fallen logs. We found him under a large plank of wood alongside several other centipedes, a few groundbeetles a large house spider and some woodlice. When disturbed, these animals will leg it as fast as they can to anywhere dark. In the daytime they hide from the sun and the unwanted attention of predators. At night time however, they become one of the fiercest predators in the garden. Taking on animals ten times their size with deadly poison fangs. Apparently this species delivers a bite like a bad bee sting. I'm glad I kept my fingers away. This fact alongside how ridiculously fast this creature is made me a bit scared to use the bigascope. But with trembling hands and beads of Chilopoda fearing sweat dripping off my nose, I managed to get these images.

Here is a bigascope close up of the little chap's fangs. I had to take this one through the bottom of the Petri dish that I had him in. So there was a degree of safety for me.

This one could have gone wrong at any time though. With the bigascope in the way, I couldn't see him and if I got too close and touched him I would have an angry centipede on my hands. Literally!

Take a look at this video. It shows how the centipede is a master of movement. The centipede is one of those super ancient life forms that appeared 420 million years ago in the late Silurian period. In fact it was the first land predator. They ruled the Earth for 100 million years before even the spider came along. Though it is the most primeval of species it is welcome in the garden because it eats slugs and other pests. Strangely they can cohabit with spiders much bigger than themselves without either species thinking of eating each other. Now that is team work.

Operation Sawfly

Check out these beauties! The bottom three are Marmalade Hoverflies (Episyrphus balteatus) and the top two are simply called Hoverflies (Eupeodes corollae). Together they are busy fertilising a poppy in my garden. My garden does seem to be a resting place for a lot of fly species. Check these out.

There is nothing glamorous about this Blue Bottle (Calliphora vomitoria). With a Latin name like that you can guess how it eats. That's right, it vomits stomach acid on its food and then sucks it all back up through a straw like mouth. Nice.On another leaf of my clematis was this Green Bottle (Lucilia caesar). Compared to the blue bottle this fly is seen less and hated less. The reason being that blue bottles are attracted to human cooking since they find food by scenting the air. The green bottle finds food in other ways and so will not enter your house.

Even more reviled is this the Flesh fly (Sarcophaga carnaria). This is the fly that specialises in laying its eggs on the dead and dieing. This is what maggots turn into.

One thing I find interesting about the web is this drive we are now seeing to get all human knowledge out there where it can be accessed by anybody. One project that I admire especially is the Wild About Britain project. This aims to photograph every species of plant and animal found in the UK. I, ladies and gentlemen am about to contribute photos unknown to science.

The Internet contains pictures of Rose Sawfly "slugs" and Rose Sawfly flies but there is no images of a Rose Sawfly undergoing the metamorphosis. i.e. a Rose Sawfly cocoon. Nobody knows what one looks like. Well folks, I have found three Rose Sawfly slugs on my Rose and have taken two into captivity for observation. As we speak they are happily munching rose leaves in a jar on my desk.This was one of the Rose Sawfly (Arge ochropus) slugs on the 20th of July and the following picture was taken today (23rd July) and you can see that it is now almost twice as big.

When will it cocoon? Who knows, but we shall follow this very closely!

What have I seen at Watermead so far?

Just a quick list to chronicle the species I have seen at Watermead to date

Birds

Bullfinch - Pyrrhula pyrrhula

Canada Goose - Branta canadensis

Common Gull - Larus canus

Coot - Fulicia atra

Cormorant - Phalacrocorax carbo

Crow - Corvus corone

Dunlin - Calidris alpina

Goldcrest - Regulus regulus

Goldfinch - Carduelis carduelis

Goosander - Mergus merganser

Great Crested Grebe - Podiceps cristatus

Grey Heron - Ardea cinerea

Kingfisher - Alcedo atthis

Lapwing - Vanellus vanullus

Mallard - Anas platyrhynchos

Moorhen - Gallinula chloropus

Mute Swan - Cygnus olor

Pochard - Aythya ferina

Shelduck - Tadorna tadorna

Shoveler - Anas clypeata

Starling - Sturnus vulgaris

Tree Sparrow - Passer montanus

Tufted duck - Aythya fuligula

Water Rail - Rallus aquaticus

Wigeon - Anas penelope

Wren - Troglodytes troglodytes

Butterflies and moths

Speckled wood - Pararge aegeria

Small White - Artogeia rapae

Large White - Pieris brassicae

Gatekeeper - Pyronia tithonus

Cinnabar moth - Tyria jacobaeae

Small Skipper - Thymelicus flavus

Ringlet - Aphantopus hyperantus

Peacock - Inachis io

Red Admiral - Vanessa atalanta

Comma - Polygonum c-album

Dragonflies and Damselflies

Brown Hawker - Aeshna grandis

Common Blue Damselfly - Enallagma cyathigerum

Blue-tailed Damselfly - Ischnura elegans

Banded Demoiselle Damselfly - Calopteryx splendens

Insects

Soldier Beetle - Rhagonycha fulva

Green Bottle - Lucilia caesar

Speckled Bush-Cricket - Leptophyes punctatissima

Other Vertibrates

Grass Snake - Natrix natrix

Grey Squirrel - Sciurus carolinensis

Rabbit - Oryctolagus cuniculus

Fox - Vulpes vulpes

Things I saw in Malaysia

So with my feet still beyond walking on, let me show you some things that I saw last year in Malaysia. The picture above is nothing more than jungle. Malaysia has lots of jungle.

I have no idea what this is. It has a Lewis Carol like weirdness to it. This was taken at a wildlife reserve near the outskirts of the city.

This is a picture of a caterpillar being carted off into the jungle by some massive red ants. I'm glad I didn't stay too long.

Here at the side of the roads is a herd of buffalo. I didn't get too close!

This is one of the millions of massive butterflies irresistibly attracted to the daft over luminescence of the Patronas Towers. This poor chap, like all those other poor creatures lured out of the jungle was doomed.

Aslan? I'm glad this chap was in the reserve, behind a small moat of water. I wouldn't really want to meat him.

Flutterbies

OK, fair enough, this wasn't at Bradgate Park but its a nice photo I took out in Malaysia.. The tiger is an animal on the brink of extinction. As an animal it requires humans to leave it alone, to leave its food alone, to leave its habitat alone. It is specialised to an environment without humans. This specialism will unfortunately result in its extinction. The only animals that will survive the great human extinction will be those that can take advantage of our pathetic attempts to manage the land. Those creatures that can carry on in spite of our best efforts to kill the world will inherit "our" earth.

We like parks. We preserve parks because they have a use to us. The animals that survive at Bradgate Park will survive our time. Having looked at the mammals, the larger flying species and those species that inhabit the "grasszone" I will turn the attention of this blog to the flutterby population.This is a Small Heath butterfly (Coenonympha pamphilus). Though not particularly rare this has a butterfly conservation priority of high. Yet it has made its home in the short grasses of Bradgate Park. I took this picture whilst trying to find an adder. I suppose though this species is not as iconic, it is rarer.

This is a Speckled Wood butterfly (Pararge aegeria) that I saw at Watermead recently. It was the first time I had knowingly seen one of these, so I was quite happy. It is strange that as soon as you have identified one, you then spot them everywhere.

This cheeky chappy is a Small Skipper (Thymelicus sylvestris) that I also saw down on the meadows of Watermead Country Park. Unlike a lot of butterflies he didn't seem put off by the presence of the camera. Often, butterflies take off when you get too close, but this chap didn't mind one bit.

The final butterfly of the day is this Ringlet butterfly (Aphantopus hyperantus) that I saw down on the Grand Union Canal. I didn't know what it was at first and had to use Wild About Britain to get it identified. Having now seen and identified theses butterflies I now almost see them everywhere.

The crawling things of Bradgate Park

So, having survived the Trailwalker challenge (just about) I can tell you a little more about what I saw at Bradgate park the other day. Before I do though, let me share this realisation with you. When walking, I enjoy the stopping more than I do walking.

The creature above is a Dor Beetle (Geotrupes stercorarius). As with most beetle encounters they tend to occur utterly by accident. As I was walking along he just crossed my path.

Dor beetles are one of the UK's largest dung beetles and are quite at home in the deer dung of Bradgate Park. Normally, these bugs are much less into their haut cuisine and settle for a good old cow pat to make their home. Ever wonder where cow pats go? Well these creatures slowly eat them. Just think, if we didn't have these creatures our fields would be stacked high in cow poo. What a wonderfully helpful little guy. I like how this beetle seems to swim across the grass rather than cut a path through it. His broad body is quite like a boat, maybe useful for swimming through fresh dung. MMmmm nice thought. Thanks to Charlieb from Wild About Britain for the ID of this one.

This creature, a Carabid (Pterostichus Nigrita), on the other hand is long and thin and can cut through the grass. Its legs are short and powerful to enable it to cling onto each stem as it passes. It was much faster than the Dor Beetle and thus harder to film! Thanks to Jaguarondi for the ID

If you don't live in the grass there is no limit to how fast you can go. The Green Tiger beetle(Cicindella campestris) in the video below is so fast that I couldn't keep up with it. This one video is all I have, because when it had gone, it had gone! Thanks to glsammy from Wild About Britain for the ID.

Some species have to live in the grass and be fast. Creatures that eat the grass and can escape predators are perfectly adapted and can live unchallenged. The female Common Green Grasshopper (Omocestus viridulus) below is perfectly designed for survival in this habitat. So much so that grasshoppers dominate at Bradgate Park. You can't go anywhere without hearing them or seeing them jump from infront of you as you walk. Thanks to GuyF from Wild ABout Britain for the ID.

Flying creatures of Bradgate Park

Amongst the bracken of yesterdays walk, which was around Bradgate Country Park, you could hear birds calling. This constant twittering would be shattered every now and then by the racket caused by a wood pigeon taking off or a crow coming noisily to investigate who knows what, but soon after the calling would begin again. It was most noticeable when I was up to my eyeballs in bracken. Looking around I could see several species of birds acting cooperatively as they kept their eyes on me and calling warning calls to the other birds. The bird above is a Yellowhammer (Emberiza citrinella).

Joining the avian warning system was this Skylark (Alauda arvensis) above and a Male Reed Bunting (Emberiza schoeniclus). For several minutes I watched as they sang their warning, before moving to a different perch. Several times they would fly overhead to get a closer look at me and assess the danger.

Each of the several ponds had a dragonfly. One pond had two, but they fought with each other the whole time I was there. Obviously they are very territorial. I noticed that the upland environment seemed to favour one particular species. Basically all the ponds were colonised by the same species which is quite different to down in the Soar valley where different species live side by side. The one above is a Broad Bodied Chaser (Libellula depressa). As different to the Hawkers this dragonfly has a brightly coloured thick abdomen. Hence the name.

Away from the ponds I found this beautiful Common Darter (Sympetrum striolatum). This dragonfly is quite happy living without ponds and is commonly found in hedgerows etc. Being smaller than the Chaser it makes sense to find somewhere else to live rather than fight a creature twice your size for a space on a lily pad.

Mammal life at Bradgate Park

A short training walk today around Bradgate Park this afternoon yielded some interesting species. This is the route I walked.

http://www.mapmyhike.com/route/gb/groby/765124767920228524

The first thing I saw was the smaller species of deer that inhabit the country park, the Fallow Deer (Dama Dama). Now either they are extremely tame, or my camouflage gear is very good because at one point I could have touched one that was grazing near me. The Fallow Deer at Bradgate seem to hang around in small (~10) herds and graze together. I felt honored to get so close to them. It was fantastic!

There is another species of deer in the park that are best avoided. These are the Red Deer (Cervus elaphus). I dislike how people describe the stags as aggressive. At most they are territorial and grumpy. The best thing to do is just stay out of their way.

During my day I did come across two alien mammals. The first is visible in the picture at the top. See it? Yes that's it the Rabbit (Oryctolagus cuniculus ). The other was a Grey Squirrel (Sciurus carolinensis ) that I found in the woods. It wasn't a tame one, so I had to use all my cunning to film him. Yes, that's right, I hid behind a tree.

OK so it wasn't a Red Squirrel, but they are long gone. There is no point blaming the squirrel for the fact that we introduced it. Its no good crying over the loss of the red squirrel, crying won't make it better. We might as well rejoice in the squirrel that we now have.

A walk to Gaddesby

As it happened I couldn't sleep last night, or get up early this morning to go on that long walk. I decided to go on another walk that was circular and that I could start half way through the day on. From Rearsby to Gaddesby and back, both in Leicestershire. Check the route.

http://www.mapmyhike.com/route/gb/rearsby/911124758528222385

I wanted to stretch my legs and have a wander down some paths that I have never been down before. The walk started out moving along the edges of arable fields filled with cabbages and broad beans. The second half moved down into the valley of Gaddesby Brook. Down here the land is less fertile and it is used to graze cattle, sheep and horses.

I did see some wildlife on the way. This Common Wasp (Vespula vulgaris) caught my eye as it slowly chewed at this style. Wasps like this chew soft wood and transport the pulp to their nest, which itself is made from a paper like substance. What this wasp is doing is sourcing the raw materials for its nest.


I also saw a few of these pretty Gatekeeper (Pyronia tithonus) butterflies. This really is butterfly season. I do like butterflies that are a more gentle looking, and less striking. If you were wondering why butterflies have eye spots then think about what kind of animals have a pair of eyes that look forward at you.

Home via the countryside

One of the main reasons that I decided to write a blog was to chart some of the "expeditions" that I go on. Large or small, epic or a stroll. The main point is that I go somewhere that I never have been before with my eyes wide open. So far my writings have covered ground that I know very well. Tomorrow as part of my training for the Oxfam Trail Walker event at the weekend I need to get some miles under my belt. As part of my training I have been walking home from the school where I work a couple of times a week since Christmas. This route normally takes me through endless residential streets and the odd ring road. Here and there I do find the odd oasis of nature but mostly it is all the same.

So tomorrow I will walk this route
http://www.mapmyhike.com/route/gb/oadby/544124749529455977

It is a route from the school to my house avoiding as many roads as I can and cutting across country. Who knows what I mights see! Judging from today's weather conditions I may have to take my rain coat!

Watermead Country Park

There wasn't a great deal going on at Watermead. Oh except this...

Caterpillars get ready

Down at Watermead changes are happening. Alongside the new bridge that has been put in life is going through its own changes. In the meadows caterpillars are munching their way to adulthood. The caterpillar and moth above are both Cinnabar Moth (Tyria jacobaeae). Both can be seen down at Watermead.

This pair of photos shows the caterpillar and butterfly of the Red Admiral (Vanessa atalanta) taken down at Watermead. It is a little early in the season to sea the butterflies so the adult picture is one from a couple of years ago. The caterpillar was heading away from its stinging nettle food supply to pupate somewhere safe. With this going on you can't doubt that summer is well and truly here!