Spring has sprung.

February thought it was March - we had a very cold snap when temperatures hovered around freezing here in North Cornwall.  Then there was a very cold easterly wind when eventually backed southerly and became warm, but just as strong, eye-wateringly strong.

My pond was frozen for almost a week but Water Boatman and Diving beetles survived the ice and could be seen foraging in the warm weather.

Then, Spring arrived.  In the last few days of February temperatures rose to double figures.

Wild and garden daffodils began to flower.  A large queen Buff-tailed Bumblebee disappeared into one of their trumpets.  Honey bees massed on my neighbours flowering Heather.

The first invertebrates had awakened from their winter sleep.

Gorse Shieldbug

After a couple of months of checking on local Gorse bushes, we saw our first Gorse Shieldbug on the 25th and every day since.  7-spot Ladybirds are about too whilst overhead, a Buzzard mewled and a Great-spotted Woodpecker drummed in a nearby copse.

7-spot Ladybird

Along the hedgerows, it seemed that every tall twig held, alternately, a Robin or a Dunnock each spaced about 100 metres apart and proclaiming his territory.

And on the 25th the first butterfly roused from hibernation; a Peacock and a Small Tortoiseshell on the 28th.

Spring has most definitely sprung.

Blogs I follow

https://downgatebatman.blogspot.com/

https://maryatkinsonwildonline.blogspot.com/

Signs of Spring?

Well officially, it has been the wettest January in 10 years.  I can confirm that from experience!  On the North Cornish coast, we rarely get snow and are too high above sea level to suffer from flooding.  But there certainly has been lots of rain.  Our streams are surging and high and the ditches are overflowing onto the roads.

When it is wet, we experience very low cloud which means we have to walk through a miasma of damp, drizzly all enveloping rain drops.

Despite all this, nature is beginning her regeneration.

New lambs

Mammals, such as deer and squirrels are becoming more obvious, out looking for mates and visible through the leafless branches.  We have new lambs gambolling in the fields. Birds too are becoming apparent with Nuthatch, Pheasant, Goldcrest appearing and a territorial Robin singing every 100 yards or so.

Invertebrates are beginning to appear too.  During late January I have recorded a Ruby Tiger Moth caterpillar trying to get run over on the road; it was safely returned to the verge.  

Garden Tiger Moth caterpillar

One sunny day there was a Queen German Wasp investigating Ivy and I have rescued two other species from the cold wet weather.  

Queen German Wasp

Queen German Wasp

I found a Common Earwig on our coal bunker and a 7-spot Ladybird on the house wall.  Both are now ensconced on my pop-up butterfly cage which is now serving as a hibernaculum for them and an overwintering chrysalis that I hope will prove to be a Red Admiral when it emerges.

Common Earwig and 7-spot Ladybird

Flowers are also pushing out of the verges, with buds and flowers showing.  Honeysuckle is in bud and in the last days of January a number of plants were in flower; Dandelion, Lesser Celandine, Barren Strawberry, Primrose, Snowdrop, Dog’s Mercury, Alexanders and Daffodils almost ready to pop.

Snowdrops

Honeysuckle buds

Dog's Merucry

Alexanders

There are certainly signs of Spring in North Cornwall

Blogs I follow

https://downgatebatman.blogspot.com/

https://maryatkinsonwildonline.blogspot.com/

The Dark Days of December?

 

As the end of the year fast approaches, the days become increasingly shorter.  There is less time, and less light, so I don’t expect to be able to see much of nature, especially flowers or invertebrates.

I began this blog on the 21st of December; the Winter Solstice which is the shortest day and longest night of the year. Literally, one bright phenomenon to look out for was the so-called Star of Bethlehem, the Great  Conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn.  In the days leading up to this “once in 400 years” event, early evening cloud prevented it being visible.  We have an excellent dark sky view to our south and west from home but couldn’t beat the clouds.  That is, until the 22nd when the vision was apparent

The rain during these few days meant that even the view from our windows to the feeders was blurred and indistinct.

Saturn and Jupiter

Our daily walks were punctuated with rain, but even when it cleared, there was no much expectation of seeing anything of note.

The farmers had been using this quiet time to trim their hedges and verges, further reducing opportunities as vegetation and any insect population was trimmed back to woody branches.

Neatly trimmed hedgerows

The omni-present Red Campion was seen every day as well as its companion Herb Robert.  We were unprepared for an out of season Field Buttercup but not too surprised to see an early Primrose and a single Lesser Celandine right at the beginning of the month.  The vanilla/marzipan smell of the groups of Winter Heliotrope are a welcome Christmas flower.

Field Buttercup

Primrose

Winter Heliotrope

An advantage of trimmed hedges and verges, is that the hedge bottom is visible and in the gaps, can be seen the fields normally hidden by Cornish Hedges.

Fungi were found in the hedge bottoms but despite the wet damp weather, were not abundant.  Brackets and encrusting fungi could be see as well as a few Candlesnuff fungi (Xylaria hypoxylon) the rare, but spreading Perenniporia ochroleuca as well as Tawny Funnel - Lepista flaccida and my favourite, Cobalt Crust.

https://northcornwallnaturalist.blogspot.com/2020/11/blue-sky-experience.html

Tawny Funnel Cap

Perenniporia ochroleuca

Cobalt Crust

Invertebrates were very few, although any sunshine brought out masses of midges near the stream at Crosswater.  A late German Wasp was seen on Ivy, no doubt seeking a hibernacula.  One Green Shieldbug was also found on an Ivy leaf for three days in a row, before it either succumbed to predation or fell lower down the hedgerow.  We also had a couple of sightings of active 7-spot Ladybirds.

German Wasp

7-spot Ladybird

Green Shieldbug

The views through the hedgerow was welcome allowing us to see a Red Fox crossing a field and a Roe Deer busily eating amongst the Purple Moor Grass until it sensed us.  Two areas on our walk have quite a number of trees and here, on three or four occasions we were rewarded with sightings of Grey Squirrel.  We often see the hoofprints of deer on the paths that cut the hedges and cross the roads, but carrying the correct lens at the right time to get a photograph of a deer itself is more challenging.

Red Fox

Roe Deer

Deer slot

Another advantage was to be able to find abandoned bird nests.  We identified these as Tits, Blackbird and at least four Wrens’ nests.

A Wren's nest

Apart from the permanent presence of Gulls and Corvids, we were rewarded by the sighing of a small flock of Long-tailed Tits, a couple of Great Spotted Woodpeckers chasing each other and, at regular intervals along the walk, a singing Robin.

Back home, there are more invertebrates with Winter Moths regularly seeking out our lighted windows and a rain speckled 7-spot Ladybird rescued from the house wall and brought into the garage.

Winter Moth

The last sighting of the year on the 31st was of a Rabbit.  It's good to know that they are surviving Myxomatosis and VHD.

Blogs I follow

https://downgatebatman.blogspot.com/

https://maryatkinsonwildonline.blogspot.com/

Blue-sky experience

 At this time of year there is very little invertebrate activity to be found on our daily walks.  Even flies are becoming uncommon, although, the slighest warmth brings our midges to dance in the sun.

I can't stop looking for anything in the hedgerows.  So, yesterday we kept catching sight of the occassional troop of Common Funnel Mushrooms deep in the hedgerow leaf litter.   There were even a few examples of the encrutsing Stereum species wrapped around small twigs.

As it was a Sunday, and lockdown, we took advantage of the almost zero traffic and dallied on blind corners that we would usually pass swiftly, and safely, by.

On the dying branch of a small Ash tree in the hedgerow there was a hollow rotted out in which could be seen the unmistakeable stipes of Candle-snuff fungus.  A further rotting piece of the branch caught my eye with what looked like a dark bird dropping probably from eating blackberries.  The branch broke off when touched so I examined it further.  Turning it over I was delighted to see that it wasn't an exreted blackberry, but part of a dark blue Cobalt Crust (Terana caeruleum).   

Cobalt Crust - Terana caeruleum

This is an unusual fungi in North Cornwall and only the second example I have found.  Its colour is magnificent ranging from a deep cobalt blue shading into a sky-blue with an almost white edge.

A closer view

A fantastic find.

Blogs I follow

https://downgatebatman.blogspot.com/

https://maryatkinsonwildonline.blogspot.com/

Grisly nature

Folklore had these parasitoid worms forming from the dropped hairs of horses when they were frequently found in horse troughs.

The Gordian knot is an illustration of a problem without a solution. An ox-cart which delivered a peasant named Gordias into Phrygia who became its king, was tied up with a knot so intricate that is was not possible to undo it, but whoever did would rule the whole of Asia  Alexander the Great tried and failed so sliced it in half with a stroke of his sword hence the Gordian knot/

A phylum of parasitoid invertebrates comprising the marine Nectonema and freshwater Gordioida. There are 350 different known species throughout the world.

Adults can reach a length of between  50 and 100mm and in extreme cases 2m but only up to 1mm in diameter.

They have an external dark brown cuticle, which is almost all muscle which gives them a hard and wiry feel. This muscle arrangement results in them  twisting into intricate knots - hence the genus name Gordius resembling the classical Gordian Knot. 

Nematomorpha showing the eponymous knotting behaviou

They lack any excretory, respiratory or circulatory system.  The eyeless head may have a darker band below the paler tip.

The tail end of females is rounded but males of most genera genital papillae showing as a cleft tail.  Males of Gordius genus have a crescent-shaped fold above the two lobes.

Male nematomorpha with bifuricated anterior.

They exist in their external adult form purely to reproduce.

The life cycle is complex and almost wholly parasitic.

Long strings of gelatinous eggs are laid in freshwater.

From these develop planktonic larvae which have a boring apparatus with which to enter its first host, aquatic invertebrates typically diptera or trichoptera larvae.  Once inside this host, they encyst in the gut of the invertebrate.

In turn, these invertebrates are predated upon by freshwater or terrestrial invertebrates, typically Coleoptera or Orthoptera with Carabidae being a common host.

Once inside this host, the larvae develop into the adult worm-like form.  They grow to fill the internal cavity of the host but also influence it to seek out and enter water where the host drowns.  Once this is achieved, the adult Nematomorpha will abandon the host and seek a mate to reproduce in freshwater where the next season’s eggs are laid and the adults die.

 The National Biodiversity Network shows 251 records, the majority of which were recorded in Wales and a few in Scotland.  The South West has no records at present.  However over the last three years specimens have been increasingly recorded in Cornwall and on Lundy. 

Although reportedly adults emerge from their host in late summer or early autumn, on Lundy adults are typically found in shallow temporary puddles on the island road in November and December.  In Cornwall, they have been recorded during Riverfly surveys in small streams in April, August, September and November.

I always search shallow puddles of the picture that eludes me, that of an adult emerging from its host.

Blogs I follow

https://downgatebatman.blogspot.com/

https://maryatkinsonwildonline.blogspot.com/

What’s eating Shieldbugs?

On our local patch we can expect to record four different species of Shield or Squash bug on most days when it is not pouring with rain.  These four are:-

Dock Bugs (Coreus marginatus) are usually seen in tens of individuals with all five instar and adult stages throughout the year.

Dock Bug and Green Shieldbug instars

Green Shieldbugs (Palomena prasina) similarly found in tens and all stages of their life cycle.

Green Shieldbug and Dock Bug adults

Sloe Shieldbugs (Dolycoris baccarum) are less common.  We are lucky to see one or two of these at a time and usually only in the adult stage.

Sloe Shieldbug

Gorse Shieldbugs (Piezodorus lituratus) are again only usually seen in ones or twos and generally the adult stage and only on one particular Gorse bush.  That is, we used to see them on most days until the end of July.  My records show then in all months from January through to the 28th of July - then nothing.

Gorse Shieldbu

In a different part of the parish, on Gorse bushes on top of the Atlantic cliffs I am usually rewarded with a sighting or two every week when I walk my Butterfly Transect.  But, nothing on their usual Gorse shrub on our daily walks until the 26th of September when there was one.

So where had they been I asked myself?

On Lundy I have come across the occasional Gorse Shieldbug carapace caught up in a spider’s web.  And, there are certainly Garden Orb spiders and Labyrinth spiders in amongst the Shieldbugs’ favourite bush.  Perhaps the spiders had been culling them.

However, during September one and sometimes two Common Lizards had taken up residence in that particular Gorse Bush.  On warm sunny days they could be found basking in the sun as we carefully walked by.

Common Lizards

I am aware that lizards predate slugs, but have they developed a taste for Gorse Shieldbugs causing them to move out or to move deeper into the shelter of the Gorse.

So, a good selection of Shieldbugs to be found on my local exercise walk. There was a unique sighting of the predatory Spiked Shieldbug (Picromerus bidens) devouring a caterpillar in 2013, which first piqued my interest.

Spiked Shieldbug and caterpillar

Stop press, just yesterday 8th October two Hazel Shieldbugs (Acanthosoma haemorrhoidale), new for the site!

Hawthorn Shieldbug

Blogs I follow

https://downgatebatman.blogspot.com/

https://maryatkinsonwildonline.blogspot.com/

Red Letter Day

A red letter day is one of those days highlighted in red on the calendar, from the medieval practice of colouring saints days in red.

Today, despite the very strong north easterly wind, I embarked on my weekly butterfly transect.  I expected a few stray species not a bumper crop.

Beginning at the Bush Inn at Crosstown, I quickly notched up 5 Small Whites.

Small White

And so it continued through each of the ten sections with butterflies on each of them.

All week I have been noting many Large and Small Whites as well as Red Admirals so was expecting to see some of them.

Red Admiral

I was totally unprepared for the sheer numbers.  I recorded 40 Small and 14 Large whites but what made a real RED letter day was the 51 Red Admirals seen on 9 of the 10 sections.

Small Coppers and Small Tortoiseshells as well as the almost mandatory Speckled Wood and two rather late tattered Silver-washed Fritillaries made up the rest of the list. It was the second largest total of butterflies I have recorded this year.

Small Copper

For a September transect, I counted an unusually large total of 143 butterflies of 7 species.

To top it all off, deep in the woods on Bracken was an unusual sightiing for this area, a Hawthorn Shieldbug.

Hawthorn Shieldbug

Truly a butterfly transect to note on the calendar in red.

Blogs I follow

https://downgatebatman.blogspot.com/

https://maryatkinsonwildonline.blogspot.com/