Better Luck at Cambois

 First of all though I've been forgetting to take photos of what has been a very frequent visitor to the garden - the early bumblebee.  I've always thought I'd do it 'sooner or later' but finally did a week ago. 

Early Bumblebee

Numbers have definitely been up this year.  I'm not sure what plant it's on, possibly marjoram, but it's attracted a few others as well, including honey bee.

Another landmark this year has been the appearance of the first butterfly on the potted buddleia in the front garden - as ever a small tortoiseshell.

Small Tortoiseshell

It nearly didn't happen though as the first flowers were already dying off in the hot, dry conditions by the time it arrived.

Meanwhile my main trip was a revisit to Cambois Beach last Tuesday, hoping to have better luck than a couple of weeks ago.  Conditions were distinctly unpromising though, as there was no sun and temperatures were down to 18C in a Northerly breeze.

Of course there were nevertheless a good number of meadow brown, notably some females settling flirtily on the paths:

Female Meadow Brown

Following the undergrowth close to the railway track, I did get lucky when a grayling flew in and landed directly in front of me.  It was even more lucky that I accidently snapped it with wings open as it flew off.

Grayling

Grayling in flight

One further sighting some moments later may or may not have been the same one.

Otherwise there were repeat sightings of a few small skippers and burnet moths, plus some other moths that my tentative identification skills suggest were common but nevertheless nice to see:

Yellow Shell

Shaded Broad Bar

Silver Y

Yesterday I made a quick visit to Chopwell East Field to see how the nature reserve is progressing.  Frankly it was a bit of a shock to see how little vegetation had survived the conditions, and notably there was very little sign of bird's foot trefoil or field vetch making progress.

So it was a similar pattern of some meadow brown, burnet moths and occasional small skipper.  Several of the bees seen were very faded, in one case unrecognisably so.  However one did catch my eye as I think this may be a white-tailed bumblebee.

White-tailed Bumblebee?

Also in good condition was the red-tailed bumblebee, offering a slightly better view of itself than is sometime the case.

Red-tailed Bumblebee

Some Hits and Some Misses - Part 1

Not for the first time, I've fallen rather behind with my nature record keeping. It's difficult keeping up with lots happening and the various distractions of the  World Cup, Wimbledon and the Tour de France.

Where to start?

Well I did do a couple of Large Heath surveys at Muckle Moss near Hadrian's Wall but the first on a windy day produced none and the second in slightly better conditions last Thursday only one definite and one suspected sighting. On the first occasion there was at least a possible sighting of the Manchester Treble Bar moth and there was a plump specimen of the oak eggar moth.

Oak Eggar Moth

It seems the season for Large Heath in the Hadrian's Wall area is pretty much over.  On the way back from the second trip, I made a bit of a detour to Bywell to see if I could find the white-letter hairstreak, only to discover that the tree where I saw it before was completely dead - presumably a victim of Dutch Elm Disease.

There was a similar disappointment a couple of days earlier when I took a bike ride to the Big Waters Reserve to see if the farmland nearby where the clouded yellow turned up was still under set-aside. It wasn't. At least on a fairly brief stay I managed to see two small skipper, a few dragonflies, a red admiral and two small tortoiseshell.

At the weekend I travelled West to link up with V&A and baby.  On the Saturday afternoon we went to Broughtonknowe Wood near Biggar, an impressive and large area of grassland.  I was quickly pleased to note a number of ringlet around. In fact there must have been over a hundred of them, considerably outnumbering meadow brown and all others.  The whites all proved to be green-veined white, a change from the mainly large whites I've been seeing at home.

Ringlet

Green-veined White

There were a couple of small skipper and a large number of burnet moths but bees were largely overshadowed by drone flies. Apart from a couple of azure damselflies, dragonflies weren't settling.

Azure Damselfly	Blotch-winged Hoverfly
Orange-spined Drone Fly	Furry Dronefly

In the evening we took a walk along the old railway line near Leadhills.  The objective here was a pair of hen harriers with chicks that had been observed by V&A as recently as last Thursday.

As it happened they weren't to be seen and we speculated that they may have left the area - perhaps wisely as this is a known shooting area.

So the main birds we saw perched on posts were a very distant buzzard and a juvenile wheatear.

Buzzard

Wheatear

Oh, and I did catch a view of a grey heron enjoying a scratch.

Heron

Missed Targets

I've been dotting about a bit over the past few days, and so have a lot of the butterflies.

One thing I haven't done justice to is the number of times an early bumblebee has turned up in the garden.  They really have been quite frequent but I've tended to see them in the passing while doing other things.

Harebells

After returning from Avignon I took a run to Wylam to check the calaminarian grassland area for harebells as there is apparently a bee that can be seen on them.  Unfortunately there are two bees that are colloquially knows as 'harebell bee' and I couldn't remember which one it was supposed to be!

In any case there weren't too many harebells and they weren't fully out yet, so no bees. 

What there was a lot of was ringlets, the first I have seen this year. But they were absolutely refusing to settle anywhere and so I couldn't get a picture. Doubtless there will be more.  

There wasn't any sign of the blood bees/suspected red-girdled mining bees from the last time I was there, just a few mini miners investigating the remaining holes on one part of the path.

Then there was a trip to Nottingham to see the test match, so not about nature. However as I was getting ready to go there was a lone harlequin ladybird in the house and the place we stayed in offered an orange underwing moth in the kitchen.

Harlequin Ladybird

Orange Underwing

Having noted that grayling butterfly sightings have started on Teesside, I decided to take an early trip to Cambois yesterday, having missed seeing them there last year.

The weather conditions were not at all favourable - a strong wind and cloudy outlook - and there were no initial signs of any butterflies, just a couple of red-tailed bumblebees. What caught my attention more was the array of wild flowers in bloom, really quite a display.  A couple I particularly noted were common restharrow (lots of) and lady's bedstraw.

Common Restharrow

Lady's Bedstraw

The grayling didn't turn up but skirting around perimeter areas I did come across 17 meadow brown, three small skipper (one very challenged by the wind) and across the road near the school, six six-spot burnet moths, one species I certainly was not expecting.

So no great triumphs but a pleasant day out.

A Good Year For Butterflies...

As far as I'm concerned, it's definitely a good year for butterflies.

I've had my eye on the developing nature reserve at Chopwell East Field.  Over the winter I noticed it was being grazed by highland cattle and wondered what the results would be this summer.  I eventually revisited last Tuesday to find another abundant supply of butterflies.

In the more Southern area the initial accent was actually on moths as around seven five-spot (I think) burnet moths were found nectaring on knapweed, with a similar number of shaded broad bars showing up as well.

Five-spot Burnet

Shaded Broadbar

Again the dominant species in terms of numbers were meadow brown (some already very worn) and small skipper but also seen were large white, green-veined white, comma. small copper, and small tortoiseshell.

Comma	Green-veined White
Meadow Brown (worn)	Small Copper
Small Skipper	Small Tortoiseshell

I took a little detour into a promising field the other path and noted similar activity.  But on the way back I stopped to photo what I suspected to be a white-tailed bumblebee when it was chased off by another small butterfly that turned out to be a white letter hairstreak.

White-tailed Bumblebee

White Letter Hairstreak

This was a considerable surprise as I have never heard of a white letter hairstreak being reported there and I do not believe there are any elm trees.  It is however clear that there have been more of them about this year.

To trump it all  I achieved a longstanding ambition the day after when i managed to get a couple of distant snaps of purple hairstreaks in the oaks by one of the viaducts at Hamsterley Mill.  Unfortunately they weren't in great condition.

Purple Hairstreak

Meanwhile the first butterfly has been sighted on the buddleia in the front garden.  It was a red admiral.

Hunting For Butterflies

A lot has been going on!..

About ten days ago I took a last trip to Pathhead Nature Reserve for a late attempt to find the dingy skipper.

It was unsuccessful although I did see large numbers of meadow brown, good numbers of small skipper plus a fair few small heath and a couple of (I think) six-spot burnet moths, most of which were to be duplicated in subsequent trips elsewhere.  A notable absentee was common blue and perhaps the strangest sighting was a common carder bee that was so heavily bleached by the sun that it was almost indistinguishable.

Small Heath

Common Carder (bleached)

In the preceding fortnight there had been several sightings of patchwork leafcutter bees and always on the same flower which I'm not able to name but it was an obvious favourite.

Patchwork Leafcutter Bee

This turned out to be the start of a good for finding butterflies...

Bordeaux Day 3

With day time temperatures scheduled to hit a maximum of 36C I was a bit cautious about my plan of heading towards the sea at Lacanau and reckoned to do about half of the approximately 120km round trip.  In the event, thanks to an early start and a good day in the saddle I managed about three-quarters of it, turning back a good way past St Helene.

It was quite a long way to the National Park I wanted to suss out and the main thing I noticed meanwhile was the abundance of some yellow flowers on the outskirts of Bordeaux.

Common Evening Primrose?

Suggestions by AI favour Common Evening Primrose, though this sighting was actually timed at 8.31 a.m. Hmmm?

Meanwhile also a sign advertised the presence of a rare mammal, the 'genet commune' in the Parc des Jalles  Apparently it's totally nocturnal so i didn't look for it.

Anyway there was an early success on reaching the Park when I came across one of the target species - a pearly heath, not a great discovery but it's as near to the UK as I've ever seen one. 

Pearly Heath

Other heaths seen were decidedly common.

After that things frankly got a bit frustrating.  I stopped at a promising looking spot a few miles South of Salaunes, where there was clearly a lot of action.  A number of brown butterflies were fluttering around and arguing with some speckled wood but they refused to settle properly.  I wondered distantly about gatekeeper but could not prove my hunch.  After a while an impressive marbled white spent a long time working the path edges but without landing at all.

So the only ones things I captured on camera were small skippers and, a bit later on, some burnet moths.

Small Skipper

? spot Burnet Moth

I think all the several skippers I saw on the day were small.

From this point on it got even more frustrating.  I notice that the photos I tried to take tended to be poorly focused just as the butterflies' behaviour got extremely skittish and now wonder if these factors were the result of the increasing heat which duly exceeded the 35C mark as promised.

Having just passed Salaunes (where there was thankfully a water pump) I noticed a number of blues zooming around but couldn't manage to get anything like a decent view.  They definitely weren't commons, having a brighter shade of upper wing and dark spots on the underwing.  I wondered about nazarine blue but I think they were smaller than that.

So I rode on thinking to stop at St Helene, seeing continued brimstone, the odd clouded yellow and occasional annoying marbled white until I could smell the sea air and eventually realised I'd overshot the turnaround point.

It was worth it though as my last stop was for another group of fast-flying blues.  After much patience, 

I finally did see one settle for several minutes.  So I managed to identify it as I sat sprawled in the roadside grass with the thing virtually between my feet!  

In the end it was nothing special or new - a short-tailed blue and my only disappointment now was that I didn't get a better shot of it.

Short-tailed Blue

So mystery solved - always assuming that they were the same as the ones at Salaunes! We will never know.

Call me a Liar would you?

It's often interesting how nature can make a fool out of you.

I'd hardly finished writing the last post complaining about the lack of butterflies in the garden when they gradually started turning up, first of all a few whites and then one by one the common members of the maligned Nymphalidae family.

Meanwhile I managed a couple of expeditions to catch up on other species.  First was a bike ride to the dunes at Cambois in search of grayling where I did manage to catch up with one rather battered individual almost as soon as I arrived.

Grayling

That however was it - any number of meadow brown, small skipper, burnet moths and after a bit of foraging, a couple of small whites and small tortoiseshells.  I rather thought I'd done better on my last visit, but on checking this was hardly the case.

Right at the end of July, I tried the Hamsterley viaducts for purple hairstreaks and over a two hour period saw eight - a rather sparse result and as ever they were flattering around the oaks and impossible to photograph.

A mission to Bywell Bridge the day after proved abortive as there was no sign of the white-letter hairstreak and to my surprise the elms were already beginning to turn brown.

Then on the 31st - a really hot day - the first small tortoiseshell appeared in the back garden and, perhaps even more exciting, a brimstone moth slept over in the large bedroom.

Brimstone Moth

A couple of days ago was when the Nymphalidae began to appear, as well as both large and small whites.

Small White	Large White
Small Tortoiseshell	Red Admiral
Peacock	Comma

I'm starting to see an awful lot of peacocks when the sun shines, perhaps not unconnected to the fact that a woman down the road in Rowlands Gill has been breeding them. 

Two I haven't seen to date are humming bird hawk moth and holly blue.  I'd like to think things have changed for the better but the weather remains patchy and unreliable.

An extra frisson of excitement was nearly provided what seemed to be an obscure ladybird on my car door handle.  In fact it was a variation of the invasive harlequin ladybird, which apparently can take a variety of different patterns and colours.  It was completely different to the one I once found in the summer house.

Harlequin Ladybird

So that's what I also thought it was this morning when a black ladybird with two red spots turned up while I was trimming the laurel hedge.  Unless of course it was a kidney-spot ladybird...  That was one photo I should have taken but didn't!