All posts by Chris Gibson

The Swiss Alps by train: joining the 6% club

Overseas Tours - other, Travel by Rail

At the very end of August, we made our first trip to Switzerland, and had our first taste of long-haul rail travel. The rail experience was superb, each train on the journey there and back on time, to the minute, clean and comfortable, as we watched the landscapes of France slip by. And in the Alps, the local trains and cable cars getting us to high altitude with ease, again on time, regular and with exemplary integrated public transport information, on train and station. We are now proud to be part of the 6% club, as compared with the carbon cost of flying.

The journey down was broken in Strasbourg, two half-days to explore the abundant historic delights of La Petite France, the Gothic Cathedral (the fourth-tallest church in the world) and the Rhine-side wildlife. One abundant feature of the attractive floral displays was the Brown Marmorated Stink-bug Halyomorpha halys, new to us, and new to Europe as recently as 1998 when it arrived from the Far East on roof tiles imported for repairs to the Chinese Garden in Zürich. One to watch this, as it is starting to be found in pest proportions on fruit and vegetable crops, both in Europe and North America.

Another non-native insect was Isodontia mexicana, a North American wasp which is now established in Southern Europe, and seemingly at home – last year I even saw it apparently migrating south through the French Pyrenean valleys in September.

And so to Switzerland and the Bernese Oberland, a place of stunning mountain scenery. We were staying in the delightfully traffic-free village of Wengen, overlooked by the Jungfrau massif, from where we had easy access to the higher ground by train and cable car. The alpine meadows around 1200m were blooming again after the first hay cut, with Knapweeds and Willow Gentian, Masterwort and Yellow-rattle, Eyebright and Purple Lettuce, among many others.

 

In perfect weather and a landscape relatively unscathed by agricultural poisons, insects abounded. Butterflies included several Fritillaries, Marbled White and Sooty Copper, among a whole host of other moths, bees, flies, beetles and bugs.

The timing of our trip was deliberate, to visit when the snow cover was the least and hopefully find some of the botanical specialities at high altitude. Highest of all, Jungfraujoch – ‘the Top of Europe’ – at 3454m was almost above vegetation, though the few areas clear of snow had tussocks of hardy flowering grasses. And very little else, aside from begging Alpine Choughs and magnificent views, at least when the clouds parted. Magnificent, albeit worrying to learn that the glaciers are only a shadow of their former selves, melting as a result of climate breakdown.

500m lower down, the summit of the Schilthorn was substantially snow-free, and high alpine flowers were on show, their relatively large flowers (to attract the limited number of pollinators at those altitudes) springing from cushions and mats of rock-hugging foliage.

Again the food-beggars were out, here a Snow Finch, but sadly no Ibex to be seen, although a group of Chamois as we headed back down was some compensation.

The Männlichen cable car from Wengen took us to 2300m, a ridge-top with Snow and Field Gentians, Monkshoods and Grass-of-Parnassus. A Stoat flushed a fledgling Alpine Accentor, and it was here we saw our only Golden Eagle: this part of the Alps is sadly lacking in large predators and vultures.

 

Of course, plants on extensive mountains can be difficult (or dangerous) to search out, so the Alpine botanic garden of Schynige Platte was a final day treat, at the top of an incredibly scenic cog railway, slow and expensive but absolutely worth it. Surely this is the most picturesque botanic garden in the world, with an unsurpassed collection of Swiss native alpine flowers.

As always, the flowers were only a part of the natural festival: Slender Scotch Burnet, Damon Blue, Dusky Grizzled Skipper and Painted Ladies were visiting the blooms, and Common and Green Mountain Grasshoppers and Wartbiters abounded in the flower beds. Presumed migrant Tree Pipits passed overhead, the wader-like piping of Alpine Marmots drifted from the more distant rocky slopes.

  

All the above, and much, much more. As always, a blog like this can only touch upon the absolute highlights of a week, and then only those that fit easily into the overall narrative. But there was so much more: take the the weeping brackets of Fomitopsis pinicola (a phenomenon known as guttation)…

…on a similar theme, a Noon-fly blowing bubbles…

…and on one memorable morning, swarms of unidentified insects in scintillating masses appended to seemingly every tree top…

…the awesome power of the Trummelbach Falls, both over and underground, but impossible to fully capture visually…

…and simply stunning scenery in every direction. And while expensive, as expected, it didn’t cost the Earth too much.

Return to Gunnersbury Triangle: wasp galls on an oak tree

Britain's Wildlife, Travel by Rail

A couple of years after our first, delightful visit to Gunnersbury Triangle (see here), we were again in the vicinity last week, and took the opportunity of a perfect, mellow, sunny autumn day to sample its delights once more. In practice, we spent most of our hour there staring at just one tree, a three-metre Pedunculate Oak on the edge of a clearing, simply laden with galls…

Oak is of course renowned for the number of insects it supports. Many of those cause the formation of galls, abnormal growths in the host plant triggered by its interaction with a gall-causer. While many gall-causers are tiny (and essentially identical without microscopic examination), different species can be told apart by the shape, colour and texture of the galls in which their larvae develop. Those caused by Gall-wasps (Cynipdae) are some of the most distinctive, and all those shown below fall within that group.

Galls can form on any part of the tree, but most obvious are those formed on buds and acorns, and those on leaves, often on the undersides. Perhaps surprisingly given its abundance in recent years, ‘our’ tree had no signs of the large, sticky, woody acorn distortions (Knopper Galls) of Andricus quercuscalicis, but other bud/acorn galls were obvious. By now we are reasonably familiar in Essex with both Ram’s-horn (Andricus aries) and Cola-nut (Andricus lignicolus) Galls, the latter like small, rough, scaly versions of the Marble Gall (Andricus kollari), one of the commonest species everywhere but again apparently missing on this tree. All four of these are relative newcomers to this country (Marble 1830s, Knopper 1960s, Cola-nut 1970s, Ram’s-horn 1997) and have now spread more-or-less widely.

But especially exciting for us was one we hadn’t seen before, the Hedgehog Gall of Andricus lucidus, dramatic pompoms of blobby-ended spokes. Another newcomer, this was first found in Britain in London in the 1990s, but has hitherto shown few signs of spreading far.

London is seemingly the initial focus for many of these new arrivals, presumably in part due to the heat-island effect of the city, keeping winter temperatures 5°C or more higher than in the countryside, and favouring these species originating from more southerly climes. Another contributing factor could be the relative abundance of Turkey Oak alongside native Pedunculate Oak in London’s woodlands. This tree also originates from southern Europe (although the fossil record shows it to have been native here before the last Ice Age), and interestingly all the galls mentioned above (except possibly Ram’s-horn) rely on both oak species for specific stages of their life-cycle. With two generations a year, the sexual generation requires (and forms galls upon) Turkey Oak, while the asexual, late-summer generation is the one we were looking at…

Ands so to leaf galls. There are three widespread and familiar Spangle-galls, the Common Spangle Neuroterus quercusbaccarum, the Silk-button Neuroterus numismalis, and the Smooth Spangle Neuroterus albipes.

All were present on our tree, with Smooth Spangle typically the most scarce. But most certainly not present and correct, because most of the Smooth Spangles, instead of being flattened, smooth, whitish or pink discs, were puckered into the most beautiful flower-like forms.

Another new one for us! But what was it? Eventually, we came up with a name from the internet. Neuroterus albipes variety reflexus. Or perhaps Neuroterus albipes subspecies reflexus. Or just perhaps even a separate, as yet undescribed species, ‘Neuroterus reflexus’. It seems nobody really knows what it is, or even where it is: the normally reliable Fauna Europaea database shows it (as ssp. reflexus) scattered across Europe, but perhaps significantly NOT in Britain or Ireland, nor indeed France, Germany and the Low Countries.

From our observations, we could well believe it is something different to albipes altogether, both from its distinctive, consistently variable shape, but also giving the strong impression of being more strongly associated with the main leaf veins than true albipes.

But there are perhaps other possibilities too. A reflexus gall on one leaf was being closely attended by a tiny 3mm wasp. Completely the wrong time of year and indeed the wrong shape for one of the gall wasps, this looked more like a parasitic species with a long ovipositor. Could the ‘reflexus‘ galls simply be parasitized Smooth Spangles? After all, big fleas have little fleas upon their backs to bite ’em, and little fleas have lesser fleas, and so ad infinitum….

Whatever the truth, a delightful hour of Gunnersbury Triangle magic provided us with new and interesting sightings, and more questions than answers!

#WildWivenhoe Botany & Bug Walks: October – Cockaynes Wood

Britain's Wildlife, Bug & Botany Walks, Cockaynes Reserve, WildWivenhoe

It has been said that ‘Words are easy, like the wind’, but some words we learned on our walk today were not particularly easy, in fact decidedly complex!  Pangaea and Gondwanaland two for starters, not to mention Samara and Parthenogenesis….

The first two cropped up in relation to two beech trees, the European Beech and Southern Beech which stand at the edge of the track down to Cockaynes Wood, the destination of our Botany and Bug walks this month.

These two distantly related species, albeit in different families, share a common ancestor which occurred many millions of years ago on Pangaea, a supercontinent that included all the landmasses of the Earth. That subsequently broke up into Gondwanaland (present day South America, Africa, Arabia, Madagascar, India, Australia, and Antarctica) and Laurasia (everywhere else).  When the separation occurred, the common ancestor went with each landmass, but different climates and natural selection pressures drove the evolution of two now-separate families. It was recognition of such relationships which gave some of the most convincing evidence for the new theory of continental drift, as recently as the early part of the 20th Century.

Our main focus this month was the trees and fungi of the wood, and some of the creatures therein.  Whilst fungi were not particularly plentiful, we found some of interest including a ‘troop’ (yes, it is the collective noun) of Puffballs forming a fairy ring, a Deceiver, Birch Bracket, plus our old favourite the Fly Agaric.  This familiar red and white toadstool grows associated with Birch, and although there are many of these trees in the wood ( so plentiful in fact that they need to be managed to keep them under control, particularly in the open heathland areas), we only found one small patch to admire.  Fly Agaric is renowned for its hallucinogenic properties, and being plentiful in Lapland has been associated with flying reindeer, and the whole red-and-white Santa Claus phenomenon.

A Witch’s broom, often mistaken for a bird’s nest, is often also caused by a fungus, in this case the fungus Taphrina betulina on Silver Birch, one of several microfungi we encountered. Others included the powdery mildew Microsphaera alphitoides on Oak leaves and the rust fungus Phragmidium violaceum, red splodges on the upperside of Bramble leaves, and erupting volcanoes of black spores below.

A few invertebrates were also on show.  A suite of our favourite bugs – Squash, Green Shield and Forest;  a splendid Devil’s Coach Horse beetle which adopted its fiercest pose; Pine Ladybirds; plus a pristine Painted Lady basking in the weak morning sun.  It is hard to believe that these fragile-looking creatures are migratory and able to fly thousands of miles.  Those on the afternoon walk missed the adult, but an eagle-eyed member of the group spotted the caterpillar, itself an amazing beastie.

Spiders and harvestmen (arachnids, not insects, due to not having the requisite six legs) were out in force ready to catch careless flies for lunch.  Some, like the familiar Garden Spider, produce sticky webs to effect this whilst others rely on stealth.  It was also a privilege to see the very active Hornet’s nest in a hollow tree.  These huge, beautiful creatures are much maligned, but if left alone are not aggressive or harmful, and they do much good in gardens and woodlands, helping to control the legions of aphids and other ‘pests’.

And so to another of our words of the day, ‘parthenogenesis’, meaning asexual reproduction.  The wonderfully named Virgin Bagworm, living on assorted fence posts, indeed lives a pure lifestyle.  These weeny wingless moths produce tiny bags which they decorate with lichen, and in which they (all females, no boys allowed, in fact they don’t exist) live for their whole life.  They can produce babies all by themselves with no help from anyone.  Hope it doesn’t catch on!

As for the trees in the wood itself, Sweet Chestnuts were plentiful, in places their leaves sculpted by the excisions of leaf-cutter bees, along with Holly, English Oak and Silver Birch. Hornbeams were at the fruiting stage, producing masses of dangling papery bunches, bunches of winged seeds or ‘samaras’, the last in our lexicon of odd words.

We finished the day with a flourish, seeing a Common Lizard basking in the glorious afternoon sunshine, an amazing aggregation of Scatopsid flies (aka Black Scavenger Flies), plus a veritable collection of Odonata  (dragonflies to you and me) hanging around, catching the last rays of the day: a Migrant Hawker, a few Common Darters, and  several Willow Emerald damselflies, a recent colonist of the British Isles, assumed to be one of the (rather few) upsides of Man-induced climate change, better thought of as climate breakdown, catastrophe even.

As always, many thanks to you all, old friends and new, that joined us .

The Beth Chatto Gardens throughout the Seasons: September

Beth Chatto Gardens, Britain's Wildlife, WildWivenhoe

Summer returning with a flourish, sun streaming from a cobalt sky, but the signs are there… autumn is upon us, the leaves are turning. And also falling, seemingly on the early side, perhaps one result of a droughty August.

Before the fiery flames of high autumn sweep through Nature’s realm, delicate pastel shades  are more to the fore…

…with colour-bursts and blasts to remind us of the summer now departed.

A lower sun extracts hues, textures and patterns from the garden that may otherwise be missed.

Still plenty of nectar and pollen sources around…

…and insects to take advantage.

Others basking wherever they can, to warm up enough for the the final act, their legacy, producing the next generation. It was especially good to see several shrubs festooned with the metallic green matchsticks that are Willow Emerald damselflies, only recently established in Britain, but now a reliable feature of early autumn here.

 

In the wider countryside, Ivy is the final main course of the season, its flowers vats of nectar and pollen, enveloped in a heady, sensual, musky poll of scent, and the persistent hum of a myriad of visiting wings. Even with blowsy blossoms as a distraction, the allure of Ivy which has decided to make the garden its home still pulls them in.

Down at the ponds, Thalia, that (not very ) beautiful assassin (see last month’s blog), is still exerting its fatal attraction.

Spiders too are taking their toll on the insects, but at least they – unlike Thalia – eat their victims.

And it was particularly exciting to be shown a Wasp Spider which has taken up residence in the Dry Garden, feasting on the local grasshoppers. While not uncommon in rough grassland right by the estuary, this is the first time we have seen it in the Beth Chatto Garden, a space for plants and all that they encourage.

 

Standing up for Phyllis Currie Reserve – September

Britain's Wildlife

Our fourth and final planned visit of the summer to Phyllis Currie was sadly blighted a little once again by uncertain weather: cool, dull and breezy, not the long days of insectivity we had been hoping for at the outset. Nonetheless, examination of the various leaf-mines and galls helped to swell the number of species we recorded  – feeding signs are just as valuable a biological record as seeing the critters themselves!

And searching among the foliage did of course reveal some invertebrates, especially arachnids and flies, along with numerous Box Bugs at every stage of development from egg to adult.

Even if the weather had been suitable, our usual method of looking for nectar and pollen resources would no longer have been especially productive. In contrast to the flowery swathes of past visits, it was down to Water Mint by the ponds, and Wild Carrot in the meadows. Just Ivy to come and it will be time to buckle up for winter.

But as the photos show, some of the most noticeable changes at the reserve since our last visit were the developing fruitfulness of the shrubs and trees…

…and the general shift from summer greens to autumnal hues, a tendency to russet in both the leaves and the insects.

 

So what of our summer’s explorations? What we haven’t done is found anything so rare that it would be a showstopper for the adjacent development. But then again we never expected to. We have added a whole raft of species to the reserve list, which are evidence – evidence of wildlife value – which will hopefully play a part in the local actions to protect and enhance Phyllis Currie into the future. And it gave us the impetus to seek out and explore this hidden gem of Essex, well off our usual beaten paths: it is a delight to know such places are still there for all to enjoy.

Our previous blogs are linked here:  April  June   August

#WildWivenhoe Botany & Bug walks: September – Ferry Marsh, after The Flood

Britain's Wildlife, Bug & Botany Walks, WildWivenhoe

 

Ferry Marsh is part of the Colne Local Nature Reserve, owned and managed by Colchester Borough Council, and this was our destination for September. In days of yore, part of this area was a grazing marsh, but more recently, since the housing development on West Quay, it has been set aside for nature conservation purposes. Rainwater falling on the roofs of the new properties is directed onto the marsh;  this, together with springs and tributary streams, keeps it damp and the channels full of water for their famous occupants, the Water Voles. The idea is that the sluice into the River Colne allows excess water to drain out at low tide, but as locals know this system has been prone to go awry and for the past couple of years the whole marsh has become more or less permanently flooded. How did this affect the wildlife? Well this is the question we were interested in.

Although the weather forecast had been good, hey ho, the wind and the rain plagued us in the morning session, with a resultant meagre selection of insects. The sunshine in the afternoon warmed up some additional species, including both Ruddy and Common Darter dragonflies, two colour-forms of the tiny Slender Groundhopper and a picture-winged fly Ceroxys urticae.

But the morning session was not without its entomological interest, and we were treated to four butterfly species, including a splendid fresh-out-of-the-pupa Red Admiral, as well as Green-veined White, Small White and Painted Lady, plus some wonderfully-named Long-winged Coneheads and a stunning Roesel’s Bush-cricket.

Having been totally inundated for some considerable time, most of what is currently supported by the marsh has only been present since the water-level subsided. This is obviously true for most of the plants, but also for creatures such as the Green Shield-bug, which we saw in various stages of development. An adult earlier this year would have flown in and laid eggs on a suitable food plant. The subsequent baby bugs ( known as instars), unable to fly, gradually munched their way through the relevant herbage, shedding their skins up to five times, until they reach adulthood and only then acquired wings, and, as Chris would say, ‘ naughty bits’.

Talking of sayings, you may know the phrase ‘Sedges have edges and Rushes are round ‘. This was demonstrated to be true whilst examining the plant life. Confusion is only just round the corner, though, as the Club-rush is actually a sedge, whilst what we think of as a Bulrush, is not a rush at all, nor a Reed, but a Reedmace. The joy of our inaccurate English names!

Whilst the beautiful Common Reed takes pride of place, both visually and aurally, at present, we also discussed some of the many other plants which have colonised, including  Gipsywort and several species of yellow ‘composites’ like Prickly Ox-tongue, Prickly Lettuce, Fleabane and Sow-thistle (some of which were covered in this glorious purple blister-gall, caused by a gall-midge Cystiphora sonchi).

A surprising find was a single plant of the rare Jersey Cudweed, in a very different habitat to the cracks in the paving slabs on West Quay which it colonised five or so years ago. As we saw at the end of the walks, it flourishes there and seems not to be met with a barrage of glyphosate – do go and admire it if you haven’t already.

Unfortunately, no one spotted a Water Vole, though we understand they are doing well, and were able to survive the flooding due to the foresight of Darren Tansley and those who constructed the water channels and built a high bank in between them, which provided a refuge. The Spotting Award this month must go to one of our afternoon group, who incredibly saw a Common Lizard basking in the sun, not on the ground as you might expect, but nestled a metre or so up in a hedge!

As always, thanks to you all who joined us.

Review: Our new toy – a compact portable moth trap

Britain's Wildlife, Reviews, WildWivenhoe

Living in a top floor flat has many advantages – the light, the views, the health benefits of 53 stairs to climb – but it isn’t really compatible with regular moth-trapping. Lack of space means our large Robinson trap is now relegated to the loft space, emerging only on special occasions, and those are restricted to times when we have access to mains electricity or a generator.

A chance meeting in Cambridge Botanic Garden alerted us to new style, truly portable LED traps now available from our friends at Anglian Lepidopterist Supplies. Run off a rechargeable small battery pack, LEDs have been sourced which emit strongly in the UV light spectrum, the frequencies which many moths respond strongly to. This helped overcome our scepticism about LED traps, and we decided to invest.

The trap has now had four outings, so time for a review. Our expectations were managed at the outset with the suggestion it was likely to be most effective in very dark conditions, so we had no high hopes when we ran it in a friend’s urban garden with skyglow, only 10m away, but shaded from, his 125W MV trap light. It was good to see the light still on first thing – the battery had performed to expectations – but compared with the adjacent MV, fewer free-range moths outside the trap. However once inside, it was a very pleasant surprise to find a goodly proportion of the species from the big trap, including a Privet Hawk, three Elephant Hawks, Scarce Footmen, Least Carpets and Brown-tails,

Apart from the greater number, the only things in the big trap which turned us appropriately green with envy was a Green Silver-lines and an L-album Wainscot, and we had several species not in the big one, including Bright-line Brown-eye, Iron Prominent and Latticed Heath, together with the distinctive nose-down micro Pediasia aridella and a Sexton-beetle.

Second outing was close to the Wivenhoe Barrier, overlooking salt-marshes, a generally dark zone but again with distracting intrusion from security lights. Almost instantly the LEDs attracted hundreds of Water Veneers, a short-lived whitish micromoth which emerges in a coordinated way to maximise the chance of meeting and breeding.  Ruby Tiger, Yellow Shell, Diamond-back, Cloaked Minor and Dingy Footman also popped in, along with the mayfly Cloeon dipterum, several caddisflies, and from an entirely different habitat, a Nut Weevil.

Two nights’ later in the same locality, it was a rather different picture. A little cooler, a little breezier, a more lingering twilight, and no emergence of Water Veneers. But again a few moths came in the hour or so of dark we were there, mostly LBJ micros (many being Bryotropha species) with only one different macro, a Rosy Rustic.

Finally, a truly dark location, Wivenhoe Old Cemetery, an old Victorian graveyard which has grown up into woodland, where trapping sadly terminated a bit early because of rain. The attraction was instant, the diversity reasonable, including several Orange Swifts and Straw Underwings, together with micros such as Nephopterix angustella (still considered to be an Essex Red Data species, despite recent increases) and Mint Moth, and the usual variety of hangers’-on, including caddis-flies, Nut Weevils and damsel-bug nymphs.

In a nutshell, this LED trap will never supersede an MV trap for numbers (of individuals or species), but not everyone has the time to process five hundred or more moths in the morning. But with the phasing out of mercury, MV bulbs are on the way out. And the portability (and flatpack storage) of the LED trap means that is likely to be the future of mothing for us.

 

Standing up for Phyllis Currie Reserve – August

Britain's Wildlife

In the eight weeks since our last visit, the Phyllis Currie reserve has undergone a transformation – the wonderful hay meadows have bloomed and seeded, and been mown and fenced for aftermath grazing, and the hedgerows are starting to bear fruit.

But fragments of the summer bounty remain uncut, especially along the fringes, and here Knapweed, Wild Carrot and Rest-harrow were still flowering profusely and a magnet for passing pollinators and other insects.

Sadly, once again, the weather wasn’t kind to our search for insect life, being largely overcast and with a little rain, so we started off scouring the site for galls, leaf-mines and other diagnostic species’ signs. When surveying, it isn’t necessary to see all you record, provided the signs of its presence are unequivocal!

Any invertebrates we did find were sheltering, deep in the foliar gloom, making photography difficult, but included a range of bugs, flies, bush-crickets, scorpion-flies and spiders:

It was interesting to see numerous Tuning-fork Harvestmen Dicranopalpus ramosus, all horizontally-splayed legs and eponymous palps: although first found in Britain in 1970 near Clacton, we rarely see it on our home patch of north-east Essex.

Nor indeed does the attractive micromoth Metalampra italica, first recorded in Britain in 2003 in Devon, seem to have found itself in the Wivenhoe area as yet. It seems to be spreading rapidly, but the latest map from the Essex Field Club shows only five occurrences in the county,  none in the vicinity of Phyllis Currie.

Down by the water’s edge, there was more activity especially when the sun peeped out, from dragonflies, including Common & Ruddy Darters egg-laying, Emperor and Brown Hawker.  Numerous picture-winged crane-flies Ptychoptera contaminata were resting on the emergent vegetation, and – another surprise, given it is known from only a few Essex localities – the Sponge-fly Sisyra nigra. Looking for all the world like a diminutive Alder-fly, this is actually a lacewing whose larvae feed upon freshwater sponges.

The abundant flowers of Water Mint always pull in lots of insects; today it was largely hoverflies  and tachinids (parasitic flies), part of the array of unsung pollinators. And shining brightly from the foliage, Mint Leaf-beetles Chrysolina herbacea, the beetles that carry around with them their own ray of sunshine even on an otherwise dull day.

So despite the unpromising weather, this was another very satisfying couple of hours. While we may not be finding masses of rarities, the diversity of species and the abundance of insects generally is a delight. These are the little things that make the world go round, and enclaves, like Phyllis Currie,  from the agrochemical onslaught should be valued as Arks of Resilience in an hugely uncertain world.

The Beth Chatto Gardens throughout the seasons: August

Beth Chatto Gardens, Britain's Wildlife, WildWivenhoe

High summer, those languid, lazy days of sunshine and leisure…if you are human. But for the rest of the world, a time of frantic activity, flowering, seeding, feeding and breeding. Many of the flowers are fading, evidence their job is done, though some like Echinacea and Asters reserve their finest show for the later months, just as the throngs of insects need it the most.

And what a range of insects and other invertebrates, from butterflies and bugs to micromoths and flies, with as always spiders taking their share:

But  wear and tear on leaves is also a positive sign, indicative of the feeding activity of those mobile garden adornments which will bring movement, excitement and joy to next year’s borders.

Down by the water’s edge, summer was only just bursting, with swathes of colour, and flashes of magic from dragonflies and damselflies.

But all was not as serene as it seemed. Large clumps of flowering Thalia dealbata in the ponds were clearly a magnet for insects of all sorts, hunting nectar and pollen…

…but on closer examination, each flowerhead was riddled with corpses – hoverflies, lacewings, bees, wasps and blow flies – a mortuary for those valuable garden assistants, pollinators and predators alike, all stuck headfirst into the mouths of their nemesis.

The scale of the carnage, was quite simply shocking. Some, still alive, like this Honeybee we managed to release, but most were dead. Lost to the world.

Reference to the internet shows this is a recognised phenomenon. The plant has no reason to kill its visitors – it doesn’t digest them like a truly carnivorous species: it seems that the flowers have an elastic style, used in explosive pollination which can and does trap insects In its native central American range it is normally pollinated by large and powerful Carpenter Bees, capable of extricating themselves from the flower’s fatal embrace. Anything smaller, mere collateral damage, cannon fodder in the battle for life.

But at times of an Extinction Crisis, that is one pressure our array of pollinators, necessary not just for the plants but for our species’ continued existence, can do without, dozens of pollinator lives extinguished unnecessarily for each flowerhead. The Beth Chatto online sales catalogue does at least draw attention to this antisocial behaviour of Thalia, but none of the other websites I have visited, nor the RHS make any reference to it. Time for a campaign, maybe a ban, but at least removal of the flowering spikes before they open. It’s not as if they are especially attractive, the main value of the plant being its architectural emergent foliage.

On a happier note to end with, one of the great advantages of being naturalists is that people bring us specimens. And so it was today when a proffered pot revealed its treasure, a Tanner Beetle Prionus coriarius that the Education Team had just found, something that neither of us had seen before.  A large, blackish longhorn, it is considered to be rather rare in Britain, found at scattered localities in the south of the country, and is usually associated with ancient woodland or extensive natural landscapes like the New Forest. Its larvae, like those of Stag Beetles, develop over several years inside rotting wood, and the National Biodiversity Network map shows one previous record close to Elmstead Market, but very few others in and to the east of Colchester.

 

 

#WildWivenhoe Botany & Bug walks: August – The Shipyard and Barrier Marsh at dusk

Britain's Wildlife, Bug & Botany Walks, WildWivenhoe

We decided to try something new this month – the long warm nights seemed too good an opportunity to miss –  so we spent two very enjoyable evenings with some of you local nature-fans enjoying the beauty that is Wivenhoe, with some wildlife thrown in!

The jetty is a wonderful spot for admiring the river, the salt marshes and the big Essex sky.  Looking heavenwards on Saturday we were privileged to witness a ‘Sun dog’.  This phenomenon only occurs when the time of day, year, and weather conditions are just so.  Sun dogs come about when the “22 degree halo round the sun intersects with the parhelic circle centred on a point directly the observer” (phew!) and are manifested as two fleeting bright spots like rainbows, either side of the sun.  And like rainbows we all see our ‘own’ version of them, directly in line with our visual gaze.

Monday evening was different,  a more traditional cloud- and water-scape sunset, but those who were waiting on the jetty a few moments before we started were lucky enough to hear and see a Kingfisher, quite unusual for this time of year, although a frequent visitor to the dock in the winter months.

We  discussed the history of the river, and the various benefits/ disadvantages of the barrier.  Of course, it keeps Wivenhoe and much of Colchester safe from flooding  (a distinct benefit!), but at the cost of altering river flows. Along with the cessation of dredging now the upstream ports have closed, this means silt is building up.  This in itself is not all bad news of course – the accretion of mud is allowing salt marsh plants to become established.

Some, like Sea Aster, are useful nectar sources; others such as Marsh Samphire are edible for us humans (though possibly being so near the sewage works at the Hythe makes that a  less-than-appetising prospect!). Sea-purslane is noteworthy, being its own desalination plant – it takes in salt water and excretes crystals of salt from its leaves.

Common Cord-grass has an interesting provenance, being a hybrid of two types of cord-grass, one native and one from America, but unlike most hybrids which are generally infertile has now become able to reproduce by seed and as a consequence is spreading.  At present it is not a problem here in Wivenhoe, but its aggressive growth, at the expense of native plants, is proving troublesome on some salt marshes.

The two-leaved form of the Four-leaved Allseed is a small and unprepossessing plant, but very rare and grows for unknown reasons along patches of Walter Radcliffe Road.  This is despite the best efforts of Trinity Estates to eradicate it  (along with anything else that has the audacity to try to grow along our roadsides) with highly toxic chemicals.  This plant used to be known only in the far south-west of England, but recently been spotted along the Thames Embankment and has now arrived at Wivenhoe.  On boots, boats or car tyres?  We shall never know.

The seawall beyond the Sailing Club is well stocked with plants particularly suited for the salty conditions – including Strawberry Clover and Dittander – which bring some welcome colour and of course food for insects.

On Barrier Marsh itself are myriads of anthills, some very ancient, a good indicator of unploughed and infrequently inundated marshland.  Though we well remember December 2013 when due to the ‘perfect storm’ conditions of low pressure and spring tide, the sea wall was overtopped – here’s a flashback, and perhaps a vision of the future:

A walk across the marsh did not unfortunately bring forth any Glow-worms on either evening but the presence of three species of bat was picked up thanks to our clever detector.  This ‘Batscanner’ automatically switches to whichever frequency is being emitted by any passing bat – each species uses a unique frequency to ‘echolocate’, so if you can find out one you can work out the other.  On Saturday two species of Pipistrelle were picked up, and on Monday the larger, more uncommon Serotine.

Talking of new toys, these evenings  were opportunities  for us to try out our new battery-operated portable LED moth trap.  Not having being road-tested before, we were delighted how far that little candle threw his beams, attracting several species of those most mysterious of nocturnal creatures.  On Saturday a huge number, hundreds in fact,  of tiny white Water Veneer moths, appeared.  These have a very short adult life-span, sometimes only hours, so we were glad to provide an opportunity for lots of them to ‘get together’ to do what moths do, and hopefully when we turned the light off at 10.30 they all had the opportunity to fly off and lay their resultant eggs (the females anyway!).

Other moths that paid us a visit included Ruby Tiger, Dingy Footman (dubbed by one of our group as the ‘Pumpkin seed moth’), Cloaked Minor, Yellow Shell, Maple Prominent and Garden Carpet. Don’t they have brilliant English names?  Of course they all have their Latinised scientific names too, but generally moth-ers only refer to the tiny micromoths, which do not have catchy common names, by these.

But there are exceptions: Water Veneers have already been mentioned, while the Diamond-back Moth, of which a couple dropped in, deserve a common name by virtue of their distinctive markings and habit of arriving on our shores after migrating from the Continent on wings only 8mm long.

Other creatures popped in to say hello too, attracted by the light – Harlequin Ladybird, caddisflies, a  mayfly and a cute Nut Weevil.   Once everyone had had the chance to have a look, all were released and allowed to carry on their nocturnal business unharmed and undetained.

It was surprising how the difference in conditions (more breeze, less cloud cover resulting in a lighter evening) made the mothing less productive on Monday.  Interestingly there was not one Water Veneer, supporting the theory that these, and many other creatures, all emerge at precisely the same time.  After all, it is no good hoping to mate if there is no one else around to mate with!  A few tiny micromoths fluttered in and out, but the main catch of that evening was a Rosy Rustic.

All photos in this report are our own, but other than the moths and sunsets, most were not actually taken on the nights in question, due to poor light conditions.  We hope that everyone who came along enjoyed this venture into the unknown!

The Beth Chatto Garden throughout the seasons: July

Beth Chatto Gardens, Britain's Wildlife, WildWivenhoe

It’s a garden, so yes there were flowers. Spectacular blooms, interesting forms, a multicultural mix of plants from over much of the world.

But it wasn’t the flowers themselves which grabbed our attention this time. It was the insects, burgeoning biodiversity benefitting from the floral resources, and repaying the debt with pollination and pest control, sprinkling the garden with stardust for anyone with an eye to see and appreciate them. No names here; indeed, we don’t even know some of them. But names are not the point: what is important is that they are here, delighting us, inspiring us, and doing their jobs.

This unpaid army of garden workers, not just bumblebees and honeybees, but solitary bees and wasps, sawflies, beetles, lacewings and a whole lot more are all too easily overlooked and ignored. And abused.

 

So it is good to hear that there are changes underway in the garden management phlosophy and practice at Beth Chatto’s. A trend away from over-tidiness and manicuring. No more slug pellets. Progressive reduction in the use of sprays, those poisons which now drench our world and threaten its life-blood. Step by step, every step of the way is one more step on the road to a sustainable future. All it needs is a more relaxed mindset: there may be some holes in the Hostas, shredding of the Solomon’s–seal,  but think of those as natural art installations, a badge of honour instead of a sign of ungardenerliness….

Would Beth have approved? Maybe, maybe not. She did of course come from a very different gardening era, when perhaps it seemed that it didn’t much matter what was done in the garden because there was abundant wildlife out there in the countryside. But no longer: as the wild world outside has become more and more depauperate, so have gardens assumed an increasing role as a haven for the little things that make the world go round. So thank you Beth Chatto Garden for moving with the times, and stepping up into your role as inspiration for gardens of the future.

 

 

 

High summer butterflies & moths (and much else!) of the Spanish Pyrenees

Overseas Tours - Pyrenees

Another successful Naturetrek tour to my ‘second home’, Berdún in the Spanish Pyrenees, with again the main focus being the lepidopteran delights, both by day and by night. While the number of butterfly species may have been a little lower than in previous years (see here), perhaps a legacy of the 40-degree plus inferno the week before we arrived, and the fact that we had a thundery breakdown towards the end of our stay, the abundance of many species was as high, if not higher, than in previous years. And anyway, who can complain at 105 species and counting, as the images of puzzling puddling blues, skippers and fritillaries are worked through?

As ever, the garden meadow at Casa Sarasa was heaving with butterflies – probably 25 species over the week – with Marbled Whites, Spanish Gatekeepers, Clouded Yellows and Great-banded Graylings especially numerous – together with a frantic band of pollinators working the Scabious, Knapweed and Chicory from dawn ’til dusk.

[click any image to enlarge to full size]

By night as well: five nights’ trapping, when weather conditions permitted, produced a very respectable list, with some stand-out highlight moths and other denizens of the night. And for the first time in four years we were not ‘plagued’ by thousands of Pine Processionaries. Either we missed the peak emergence, or local control schemes are having an effect.

It would almost have been possible to fill the week effectively without leaving Berdún. But as daytime temperatures peaked at 37°C, the prospect of ten degrees or more cooler at higher altitudes was a good enough reason in itself to chase up the higher mountain specialities.

Not just butterflies, but also those ultra-charismatic day-flying moths, such as burnets, foresters and clearwings…

…and a vast range of other exciting and entrancing invertebrates…

…with a wonderful floral supporting cast.

I could go on. Birds and other vertebrates. The food and wine. The views, weather and good company. All will feature in the comprehensive report to come. So I shall close with tales of serendipity, when the holiday was drawing to a close and circumstances conspired to give us three of the most hoped-for but unexpected and unplannable times of the tour.

On the penultimate full day, the weather was breaking down. Torrential rain was forecast, so we remained close to home, in a meadow at the top of Biniés Gorge, just 5km away. In drenching humidity, the Brambles, Dwarf Elder, Scabious and Knapweed were almost literally dripping with butterflies, burnets, beetles, bugs and flies of every description, such biodiversity and bioabundance it gives hope for the planet once the malign curses of pollution and pesticide drenching are consigned to history.  A cornucopia at every turn, everything seemingly feeding voraciously in advance of the coming deluge. And what a deluge that evening, 70mm or more of rain, so intense it caused a major cliff fall, blocking the road to our Garden of Eden …

The following day, after the storm, the air was fresher and fewer insects ventured out. We ended the final full day at Berdún Marsh, where our last gasp reward, as the butterflies tentatively came back to life, was our one and only, much hoped-for, but never expected Algarve Burnet, almost completing the set of possible Zygaenas.

And then on the way back to the airport, lunch at Agüero, among the Strawberry-trees. For a purpose, as I ruefully explained after lunch, given that the object of our desires had not appeared. But no sooner had I said ‘Two-tai….’ than Peter shouted ‘Two-tailed Pasha’ as one sailed around us, up into the treetops and away. No chance of photos, but our passion for pashas somewhat sated, we headed home blessed by happenstance that no amount of planning could have ensured.