Bees And Not-to-bes (cont.)

One or two more mysteries emerged when I decided to take an early trip to Dipton Woods, Corbridge to see if green hairstreaks were appearing in view of the bright weather.

Not like me to get overly interested in flowers but I lingered a bit over the wood sorrels near the start of the track and, even less likely, wanted to know what the fungus was I saw on a tree in the same area.

Wood Sorrel

Hoof Fungus

So apparently it was a hoof fungus, appropriately named.

Green hairstreaks were about though not in the large numbers I have sometimes seen there.  In total I saw eight.  I thought it might be because it was early in the year but a chap I bumped into a bloke reckoned the couple he saw had been on the wing a long time.  The ones I saw turned out to be a mixture.

Worn Green Hairstreak

Fresh Green Hairstreak

Incidentally, aforementioned bloke also told me he had seen a tree pipit.  I didn't.

It was also encouraging to see a further eight speckled wood, showing they are in my view doing better than last year.

Speckled Wood

Also spotted but very hard to photograph were what I took to be a number of bilberry mining bees.  I was fairly convinced of this but they were always hanging of the bottom of bilberry flowers and the state of my knees doesn't encourage crawling around in the dust to get the right camera angle.

However there was also the appearance (twice) of another mystery tricolour nomad bee that I did manage to capture, the underside being particularly interesting for the contrasting brownish colour.

Nomad

Nomad (underside)

Experts may tell us that these tricolour nomads are impossible to distinguish visually, but given the likely presence of bilberry mining bee, there must be a shouting chance that this is Panzer's nomad bee, which is thought to be its main predator.

Dazed and Confused

Eventually the weather had to perk up, resulting in an increase in activity both in the garden and elsewhere.

One of the first signs of this about ten days ago was finding a large number of nomad bees swarming around my forget-me-nots.  I've never seen so many together and hardly any were actually settling, so a bit of a scunner.

I was fairly comfortable identifying Gooden's nomad bee and in subsequent days reckoned I'd identified male and female Panzer's nomad bees, one of which also turned up (I think) at Bolam Lake on Friday.

Gooden's Nomad Bee

Panzer's Nomad bee

The presumed female I caught in a bug box at home had entirely red and black bands on the underside, which tallied with a photo on the internet.

Then much more recently, this item turned up and also fell victim to brief imprisonment the bug box.

Nomad Bee

For reasons that are hard to define too closely, I'm not convinced that this is a panzer's.  Perhaps it's a bit too large, particularly in the thorax area.  So I started to wonder about flavous nomad as the nearest alternative but a bit of research show's that Marsham's and Kirkby's nomad bees are possible locally.  So I'm now unsure about nomad bees with any red markings...

Also, as there are so many nomad bees, where are the mining bees they predate?

Also confusing has been the continuing lack of butterflies settling in the garden. The couple that have were both green-veined whites but I had to take a bike trip along the Tyne before I could get a snap of an orange tip - a rather bedraggled female.

Green-veined White

Orange Tip

Now orange tips are everywhere including five in the garden yesterday, but still not settling or only briefly.

One clear certainty is that the red mason bee is back in big numbers and the wee bug hotel (more like a bug B&B really) is doing a roaring trade.

Red Mason Bees

I was also fairly confident of identifying a Hawthorn Mining |Bee at Bolam Lake...

Hawthorn Mining Bee

... unless it's Gwynne's Mining Bee, or something completely different?

For a few days now, I've puzzled over this small bee that landed on a californian poppy:

Chocolate Mining Bee

After careful consideration, I think chocolate mining bee.  I saw one last year I believe.

And again on bees, I definitely saw a garden bumblebee the other day.

Garden Bumblebee

Okay the tail looks a bit weird but I got a really good look at the double stripe around the waist.  You can just about make it out.

Lastly on a quick tour of a few lakes in Northumberland, it really looked like our small group was not going to see anything beyond standards like tufted duck, canada goose, common tern and great crested grebe.

Great Crested Grebe

Common Tern

Then, just as I was turning to go back to the car, someone someone spotted on osprey flying close overhead with a large fish between its claws.

Dazed and confused indeed!