Insects couldn't really celebrate National Insect Week last week due to incessant rain or cloudy, cold weather. They came out today, a sunny, warm day and this gallery shows they did celebrate in the end. I spent some time trying to get a focused shot of a beautiful velvety male
Eristalis intricarium, the first I have seen in the garden.
He hovered at about 1 m of height over a patch of Red Valerian, swiftly chasing away any insect that invaded his airspace. The top shot is the best I got, by pre-focusing on a plant and then approaching the hovering fly. Not perfect but I was quite pleased with it.
A Silver Y moth, part of a local influx today.
A Merodon Equestris hoverfly covered in pollen.
The shiniest bluest bluebottle I have ever seen!
A soldier beetle on Feverfew in my local wildlife garden
Colletes bees on Oxeye Daisy
Bombus hortorum feeding on Linaria purpurea
A male Tree bumblebee Bombus hypnorum shows its colours
Bombus pascuorum feeding in Birds Foot Trefoil
One species that does not seem to be celebrating is the Wool Carder Bee, Anthidium manicatum. They didn't have a good year last year. Could they still be late? I do hope so.
4 comments:
UK Wool Carders have just begun to appear on Flickr, with pics from Shropshire and London in the last two days.
I normally don't ever see them in S. Yorks until the end of July.
I'm not yet seeing any Silver-Y but I still can remember the huge influx we had in 2006.
They were everywhere that year.
This year tho' I am seeing lots of the tiny Eudonia truncicolella moth.
Very very few Shieldbugs! :(
Over the Humber in Grimsby, last year was a good year for Anthidium in the garden, with one particular male lasting almost two months, plus plenty of females about. This year the first one appeared on 16 June, but there was a two week gap before I saw one again. There was a female yesterday carding hairs from the Stachys, and there are a couple in the garden right now.
Hi Ray and Alan, great to hear they have started to appear. Here mid June seems to be the norm, so they are quite late. Today seemed an ideal day to emerge, sunny and hot, but none seen.
Few shieldbugs about here too, just a few Eyrsarcoris venustissimus.
Post a Comment