A short 'Summery' !

 While it has been very much warm enough for me, the North Northumberland coast has not seen the roasting temperatures of the south and inland. On Saturday it did reach 28 degrees in the afternoon but has mainly been in the 21 - 25 degree range. We had a massive thunderstorm on Wednesday night that frightened Peggy half to death so we were up from 3am til 6am comforting her on the settee. The wind has been a touch irritating too, with SW 3 - 5 most of the time, but over all it has just been summery weather.

As I mentioned last time, one star this week was the garden arrival of Wool Carder Bees. These are rare in Northumberland with only a few records around Berwick and the Tyne Valley so these were not on my radar. In fact it was only from photos I took of a 'Leafcutter Bee' that made me cotton on to their presence.

To begin with a single male was photographed on Great Mullein chewing at the furry leaves. His yellow spotting on abdomen and legs was quite obvious in photos, a nice colourful little bee a bit like Hairy Footed Flower Bee.

After a few days I planted two new Stachys byzantina plants ( Lambs Ears, a Wool Carder favourite) . Before I had patted the soil down around them a male Wool Carder had taken them as his territory and was fighting off other bees. Since then both male and female bees have been present, females taking away 'cotton wool buds' of fluff away to nest holes out of the garden somewhere. 

They are a great addition to the garden fauna.

 

Wool Carder Bees in the garden.

 As if that nice surprise wasn't good enough, the warm weather had another stunning gift in store.

On Sunday morning the moth trap was particularly busy with micros, the over night minimum temperature being 17 degrees. I was being as diligent with them as I could not wanting any to escape as there was a good chance of a garden first in these conditions.

As I rolled back the covering towel to extract the last egg tray I was struck by a real shocker! Sat there was a proper Blackpool Illumination of a moth, a Scarlet Tiger! Wow, what a stunner and full Northumberland first too, for both VCs 67 and 68. Looks like the most Northerly UK record too.

When I looked back again, the egg tray was empty. The moth was flying circuits around the trap. Shaking in case it got away, I took the whole trap into the greehouse just in case it did get out where I could at least have another chance, As it happened the potting went well and I could relax.

I had only seen my first last year at Cley, Norfolk. In my post last June, I say, 'only found in the south' never expecting one in the garden a year later.

My friend Ian Fisher was keen to twitch the moth so I kept it until late afternoon then released it after a photo session. Iain Leach commented on Scottish Moths that they had also been recorded in Dumfries and Galloway and Carlisle in recent times, so I wouldnt take bets on us being blase about these in 5 years time. 

Unusual or extreme weather even far away can drop some interesting stuff in to the garden...

Scarlet Tiger

More thoughts on PSL...

How things can change in a week. Sometimes we need to have a word with ourselves, to bring us back to reality, a grounding if you like. In recent times I have not only been birding or mothing. I have been looking at everything from Spiders to Mosses and Beetles to fruit flies. All that I have identified or had identified for me have been carefully added to my list. What used to be on a crappy old spreadsheet is now on a fabulous all singing and dancing searchable website.

Today, the alarm bell has rung. While I was already awake.

Seth Gibson, Alastair Forsyth and Steve Gale have all debated the topic on their blogs, that I have read with great interest. These three naturalists and bloggers are a real inspiration to me, so when one speaks I tend to listen.

The thing is, with the rise of PSL there is perceived to be a decline in actual biodiversity recording standards whereby listers are not being as rigorous as they should be when listing a new form of life.

Where people are concerned, no recording system with a competition factor will be clean. Looking on the PSL website, I see that Red necked Nightjar has been included by one observer, who would need to be at least 180 yrs old to have seen the only British record! That's their choice I suppose, but the species on my list are at the very least, plausible, and most are accurate with a few being aggs, or the commonest of a bunch based on distribution etc, but I if I tick a species on that basis, I will not add a congener as I couldnt be sure its different to the one I already have. For example I have Dandelion but not to species, I have Mouse Spider as Scotophaeus blackwallii as it is by far most likely but Ive not had any scrutinised. Mouse Spiders twin will not be added without both being checked and the same with Dandelions etc. 

Things are added to iRecord but if they don't meet the verifier's criteria that's ok, I'll have learned something and will move on.

I know birds, moths, mammals, butterflies and most fish even, quite well, but once these groups are  becoming less likely to be a new addition, along comes flowering plants, fungi and invertebrates. Anyone who has perused the Naturespot site or the British Arachnological Society page for example, will know full well that very few of these can be brought to accurate species level without the use of various scientific methods and equipment. Yet we novices ( maybe not the right word? How can I be a novice after 50 years of wildlife watching?) still plod along trying to match species to images and text in books on websites and in social media. Maybe we ( I) are /am deluded?

I think I know the reason. I am not and never will be a scientist. I was and probably still am an Urchin, a Poacher, a Tresspasser, Billy Casper, BB, Ennion, Iain Niall, a Ladybird book, a throwback to times past. 

I don't have a microscope and have never really used a Dichotomous key. I might like to, but will I ever? I'm not sure it matters enough to me but who knows, never say never. I like to find new things for much simpler reasons, and no, its not to add to a list. It is to enjoy the chase, the find and the beauty. The list just keeps the treasures in an order where I can find them again. 

So I'm sure I and many others will continue in this way until we either see the light or give up. Keep on Listing folks, but try to keep it as real as possible!  

Oonops. Its one of the two...

Wool Carder Bee, added to the list today after finding my first in the garden on Sunday. A scarce species in Northumberland 

Pan Species Listing.

 This title might crop up on here from time to time...

Since I read Graeme Lyons book and did a blog post in April I have been quite project driven. When I say driven, I mean in my amatuerish plodding way rather than Graeme's '6,000 species in a year' driven. Check out Seth's Blog Here to get a better idea of my inspiration...

What I have been doing when out and about birding or whatever, even at work or shopping, is keeping an eye open for anything different and unknown to me. In the last two months that has turned up 60 lifers. To convert that into birder speak that would take me 10 years to get, not two months.

These records and any other stuff are added in to iRecord via the phone app or back home on the PC. iRecord is a second project running in tandem with PSL, where I am trying to add dots to the biodiversity map of our region. In the period there have been 240 new records added, not including birds that go through on eBird,, again paltry compared to Mr Lyons who will think nothing of adding 200 in a morning, but for me, its ticking along nicely. Some of those new species are being discovered retrospectively from photos, social media posts etc going back to 2019.

Today I have added three to the list - Three nerved Sandwort, Raspberry Weevil and a small Caddis Holocentropus picicornis. Yesterday I added Pepper-Saxifrage and Meadow Plant Bug Leptopterna dolobrata. All common enough species nationally but I've not knowingly met them before. 

I could do with getting a microscope really rather than relying on the help of others and photo ids, but I don't have  lot of space for a set up. Maybe one day...

Raspberry Weevil Otiorhynchus singularis

Pepper-saxifrage Silaum silaus

  

Three nerved Sandwort Moehringia trinervia

Flaming June!

 Well, not so much flaming in the heat sense as flaming June in the cold, annoying, sense!

This month has been a downer after that warmer week at the end of May, so here is a catch up.

In late May a Goldfinch built a nest in the apple tree just outside my home office window. We could watch her weaving the structure together with her finely pointed bill and rounding the cup with her body pushing downwards. By 27th May she was sitting, so we looked forward to the family developing. Sadly, that was not to be because after two or three days she just left the nest never to return. At the same time a poorly looking female Goldfinch was in the garden on the other side of the house. It may have been her, who can say.  

Goldfinch on the nest. Its a shoddy image as it is taken through an old cottage window so as not to disturb her.

  At the beginning of June, small numbers of Painted Lady arrived with half a dozen in a morning passing through the garden and with them a couple of Hummingbird Hawk-moths were seen.

Painted Lady looking a bit dishevelled after its flight from Africa.

Hummer on valerian on our drive.

More unusually, unprecedented in fact, was the arrival of Small Mottled Willow. Before this year I had only seen 3 in my life, but 22 have graced the trap so far in last few weeks. Shame there were no Eastern Bordered Straw that deluged as far north as Tynemouth.

Small Mottled Willow

  Insect migration soon dried up as the wind swung back NW with a colder edge and has been there ever since. Other resident garden and village wildlife included -

 

Large Pine Weevil, a lifer for me and randomly was found in our bathroom. I put it on the valerian before identification so I could get a photo.

 

Pammene aurana on verbascum when it should be on Hogweed...

Nemaphora degeerella seems to be having a good season.

We have 5 Mullein caterpillars across three Verbascums in the garden. This was the biggest of them and its enjoying the plant.

The first of the garden Tree Sparrows are out and about now, with adults taking nest material into boxes to refurbish for a second brood. We also have House Sparrow, Pied Wagtail and Blackbirds all with young. 

Pied Wagtail with fledgling .

Tree Sparrow juvs.