Migrant Hawker, Aeshna mixta

I haven’t just seen a Migrant Hawker. Well, I have sort of..

I just identified a Migrant Hawker on somebodies blog and I thought that I better do a Migrant Hawker post in case he comes round to check me out. (hi Stephen) Fodrambler does not lie 🙂 🙂 🙂

The easiest identifying feature is the “Golf Tee” mark on the second segment of the abdomen. and that is diagnostic.

It has a brown costa (the leading edge of the wing) and almost non existent antehumeral stripes.

This next picture is not a Migrant Hawker this is a Southern Hawker. I am just using it to explain “antehumeral stripes” The Southern Hawker has very bold antehumerals (the two yellow stripes just behind it’s head.

Back to the migrant Hawker and here is a quick tour.

So that is my quick guide to identifying a Migrant Hawker.

Top.

Middle…

and this is the end of it.

Except for a couple of my very own drawings explaining Dragonfly anatomy for reference purposes only.

 

Shine for me

I thought that we should have some pictures of the larvae of the Peacock Butterfly and given how easy it would be for me to obtain these images….it would be a crime not to do it.

So I invited a baby Peacock outside for a photo shoot.

My beautiful little animals are going a bit nuts at the moment, they keep trying to escape. They are quite big and I am not sure if they have got another moult in them or if they are ready to pupate. I have caterpillar proofed my cupboard with many more sheets of paper and I am keeping them well fed but they seem determined to wander 🙂

The Pellucid Hover Fly

A couple of days ago I posted a picture of a Pellucid Hover Fly (above) without properly identifying it. So just to set the record straight and while I am having my coffee and making my plans, this is a Pellucid Hover Fly.

This one is a female, it is the same with all Hover Flies, the female’s eyes are spaced apart and the male’s eyes meet in the middle.

The Pellucid is one of the UK’s largest flies and quite easy to identify. It has a large white band through the middle of the abdomen and dark spots on it’s wings, also a very pretty face.

The colouration is supposed to mimic a bee or wasp, that may serve to deter attacks from birds but there is another reason behind it.

The female is an intrepid beast. She enters the nest of wasps (Common and German) and lays her eggs in their nests. The larvae feed on the debris at the bottom of the nest. Despite the fact that she doesn’t look much like a wasp she is allowed to do this without being attacked even though Wasp’s nests are otherwise pretty well guarded places. This may be a symbiotic relationship as the larvae clean the nest and remove (eat) dead Wasps and their larvae and they also eat other insects that they find in the nest.

When they are ready to pupate the larvae leave the nest and pupate underground and adult flies emerge sometime around June.

Most Hover Flies look a bit like Bees or Wasps and that must help to prevent attack but they don’t sting. The big difference between a Hover Fly and the Bees and Wasps is that Hover Flies only have two wings. They belong to the order Diptera (The True Flies) and Diptera literally means “two wings”.

All insects have four wings but in the Diptera the hind wings are tiny and are not used for flying.

so that is the beautiful female Pellucid Hover Fly, Volucella pellucens.

Here is the male of the species.

Now while you were reading that I have had a chat with Fizz and we have decided to give the Butterflies a rest for today and go up to the woods in search of a particular fungus that I feel quite confident of finding and of course we shall play ball in the fields on the way. So we shall see you later.

Have a nice Tuesday.

Cirsium vulgare

Like fireworks.

TOWIE WOWIE

I took Fizz for a walk. I couldn’t take her with me this morning, it would have been too dangerous. There were busy roads to cross and although we were only hunting for a Small Skipper there was always the chance that we could run  into a Large one.

So, getting pics of the Small Skipper this morning was amazing but an Essex Skipper on the same day, what are  the chances of that happening?

C’mon Poochy we’ve got games to play.

While she was sucking her ball and resting in the shade I took a little stroll up the track to see what I might find.

The thing is you don’t just have to find these Butterflies, you have to get close enough to photograph them and from the right angle. It is not always as easy as I make it look.

(in fact a bit of luck sometimes comes into it as well)

This Butterfly was a lot easier to approach than the last one. I don’t think that this was her first hit on the old Hog Weed juice, if you know what I mean. Probably about her eighth. Practically nothing was going to drag her away from the bar. Nice to see a happy Butterfly 🙂

So here is our Essex. Black tips to the underside of the antennae, that is 100% Essex.

Small is Beautiful

I went out early this morning to try and catch the Butterflies napping.

I am after the Skippers. I want the photographs  that show the difference between a Small Skipper and an Essex Skipper.

A little Skipper.

The difference is tiny. The very tip of the underside of the antennae is black in an Essex and orange/brown in a Small Skipper. You can only see it if you look at the animal face on.

It is not easy getting close to them, never mind getting in their little faces.

I have been advised to hum to them to hold their attention. I was told a low almost inaudible hum but the only tune that I could remember when the time came was Wagners “Flight of the Valkyries” inappropriate perhaps and  it requires some gusto to do it properly but it was the only thing that sprang to mind as I crept up behind yet another of the little blighters.

Gotcha!

Orange tip on the underside of the antennae. That is a Small Skipper 100% Small. Excuse me while I savour my triumph.

Now all that we have left to do is to catch an Essex, well, one is not much use without the other.

Fizz, fetch me my butterfly net.

Fruits of the Forest

This is just a little something to keep you going.

Thank you little flower.

Now I have to take Fizz up to the Badger sett and tell them the good news about Owen. I expect that they would rather hear that he had accidentally shot himself instead of them but they will have to settle for the news I have.

“Sett”le, geddit? 🙂 I’m so funny 🙂 🙂 I have been very lucky today, there are many more pictures to come.

Unidentified Wildflower

This is the flower that I went out to photograph today.  I told you that it was beautiful, didn’t I? At this moment in time I don’t know what it is, although I recognise the family and finding it shouldn’t be too much of a problem.

However I do believe in getting other people to do my work for me and I have a lot to do this evening. So if anybody recognises it please do tell me what it is.

Large Skipper

Continuing with my Butterfly theme this one is also on the wing now until the end of July.

You can tell a Large Skipper from a Small or Essex Skipper by the blotchy pattern on their wings (normally referred to as chequered) the other two species have uniform orange wings. Also the antennae of the large Skipper are pointed and hooked and the others are not.

The male large Skipper, pictured below, has a prominent “sex brand”, The black, diagonal line about half way down it’s fore wing, these are actually scent scales that make it smell like a man butterfly. Also the underside of the antennae tip is orange.

These features are absent on the female.

Male.

Female.

This pose, with the wings held at different angles is very typical of the Skippers and it works for me, I think that it looks nice.

That’s a large Skipper Butterfly

Purple Hairstreak

I thought that we could have some Butterflies today because I have just been out photographing one. This isn’t it. This is a Purple Hairstreak (female). I am just in a Butterfly mood.

I have only got two pictures, well I have got more but they are exactly the same as these, she was one of those annoying animals that only had one pose and then she flew away. She did close her wings for me..

These are fairly common butterflies but you don’t often see them. They live up in the tops of Oak trees. The eggs are laid on Oak buds and the larva burrows into the bud and eats it. The adult butterflies feed on Aphid honeydew that they find up in the canopy, they don’t often come down to our level. Flight time is now until the beginning of September so keep your eyes open if you live near woodland with Oaks in it.

She is a very beautiful butterfly to see.

Animal Magic

“Just like that”

It’s your destiny

The Swallows have fledged, or at least they are fledging. They are still in the nest today but they have been out and they can fly.

It has taken me a few days watching and all that you get are a couple of short video’s but for me, my understanding and the pleasure that I got from watching them makes a few days just a drop in the ocean. It was time well spent.

Anyway you should be glad that you don’t have to watch the whole twenty hours of video, that I now have to sort and delete from my machine to free up space.

Here are the best bits.

Yesterday morning there were five birds on the nest, there were five birds on the nest and then there were four birds on the nest. I had missed the very first flight and only realised when number five returned to the nest.

This first video starts with the mother calling for them to leave the nest, there is a little comic interlude of the way that they follow flies, their little heads bobbing in unison and in the last bit the second bird to approach the nest is the returning chick. Does he bring food back or do the others just think that he has?

This next video shows them leaving the nest and returning. They spent most of the day fluttering around inside the little alley way that has become their home and by the end of the day they were all settled back on the nest but this is fledging. Today I think that they have ventured outside and seen the blue sky but they still return to the nest.

These birds have made me think a lot about nature as a whole thing and about life and death in the wild. The caterpillars that I am trying to raise are falling to the parasitoid flies that these Swallows depend on for food and survival. The parents have done a really good job of raising them given the wet weather we have been having. I have often looked out in the pouring rain and wondered how they are managing to raise a brood and now this, flight.

I am so in in love and in awe of them and so damned jealous.

I am jealous because they get to eat those delicious crunchy flies, or perhaps because they can raise offspring in a matter of weeks and not the 26 years it usually takes us. Maybe I am jealous of something else altogether…..