Padfield

[David M]

I hope I don't run out of names and have to resort to things like 'Tesco sweet easy peeler'!

Yes, you haven't given yourself a great deal of latitude there, Guy.

Mandarin, satsuma, kumquat....maybe Cointreau?

[Padfield]

I'll bear those names in mind for the next hatchees, David!

For the moment, Clementine and Tangerine are still gently wandering around their flowerheads, showing no signs of wanting to graduate into 2nd instar. According to Frohawk, based on caterpillars hatched at the end of May, they should spend only a few days in each early instar, yet these hatched 9 days ago. Unless I am mistaken, they are both 1st still:


(Tangerine)


(Tangerine with an ordinary, small ant for scale - there are ants all over her garlic mustard but they have left her alone)


(Clementine)

A fresh egg has been laid on Clementine's plant:



Guy

[Chris Jackson]

I love the early stages, Guy, and its interesting to see them on host plants other than those that I'm used to.
In particular your camera (still a bridge ?) picks out the detail. My camera has difficulties with 1st instars .
Let's hope you can follow these cats a long way through their development.
Chris

[Padfield]

Hi Chris. Yes, still a Canon Bridge camera. It's OK for eggs and small instars but not ideal - and in the case of these orange tips, it's actually quite difficult focusing with all the flower parts getting in the way. This photo (of Tangerine, taken today) illustrates the problem:



My present method is to focus on something - anything - then move the camera towards and away until the larva is in focus. Otherwise, the camera simply doesn't know what I want. Here is Tangerine zoomed in a little:



The hairs help judge focus on the LED screen.

Beautifully sunny today but I couldn't get out much. There are still brimstones and commas around, nearly two months into their 2019 season.



Guy

[Wurzel]

That Comma is aging very well Guy - some of the ones I've seen have been a slightly hammered, I suppose it depends what they've been feeding on and how thorny/rough the plant is?

Have a goodun

Wurzel

[Padfield]

I agree, Wurzel. This comma was at a woodland site so might have hibernated somewhere with predominant shade and not emerged until later than others.

I finally tracked down some local green hairstreaks today, in dense gorse and broom I have checked several times this spring, though not in the last week or so. Here are two different individuals:





All those I saw were wonderfully fresh males like this so I suspect the emergence is simply rather late at this site - and perhaps at others I've been checking.

This picture gives an idea of the site, which is right next to woodland:



Not far away I had a brief audience with a hairy dragonfly, though this flew before I could get decent pictures:



New for the year was common blue. I saw celina in Spain but no confirmed icarus. This being in a Suffolk wood is confirmed icarus!



Large red damselflies are now quite common in the garden:



Guy

[Wurzel]

I love finding Greenstreaks on Gorse Guy, the mix of colours is great Interesting looking Common Blue, a little bit bereft of spots

Have a goodun

Wurzel

[David M]

..I finally tracked down some local green hairstreaks today, in dense gorse and broom I have checked several times this spring, though not in the last week or so. Here are two different individuals...

I knew you'd get your quarry eventually, Guy! Nice to get the Common Blue as well; they've been remarkably reluctant to show themselves so far this year!

[Padfield]

Thanks Wurzel and David. Yes, green hairstreak on gorse and broom definitely makes for a richer photo than green hairstreak on snow ...

I wrote quite a long reply yesterday but must have left it on preview and not clicked submit as it is not here now. In any case, I now have to correct part of what I wrote (and no one read). I posted an egg I had first spotted on 12th May and assumed to be orange tip, but which was still white yesterday, three days later, so I revised my opinion to green-veined white. But today it was bright orange, so I must revert to the original identification. I now know it can take four days for an orange tip egg to change colour.


(12th May)


(15th May)


(Today, 16th May)

I also watched several female orange tips laying on hedge mustard yesterday. Here is one of them, and two different eggs laid:







Yesterday, too, this female holly blue was apparently laying on low holly flowers on our holly tree, but I haven't yet found any of the eggs:



Finally, Clementine has died but Tangerine is still very much alive, and now 2nd instar. This is her today:



The blue is not sky but a riot of alkanet in the weed bed behind her.

Guy

EDIT: Vince tells me Tangerine is still 1st instar. This is interesting as it is now 12 days since she hatched and she is about 5mm long.

[Padfield]

Tangerine this morning:



She is now thirteen days old.

I searched our nettles for peacock or small tortoiseshell larvae, without success, but did come across this tent:



I never open silked-up leaves and the best I could do for a shot inside was this:



I think what can be seen there is frass. Is this a red admiral tent or something else? I actually have no experience of red admiral larvae.

Also on the nettles were these shield bug eggs:



And on bramble among the nettles, this moth larva:



Guy

[David M]

...green hairstreak on gorse and broom definitely makes for a richer photo than green hairstreak on snow ...

How can we forget that, Guy? Only in Switzerland....

I'm enjoying your OT cats' exploits almost as much as your Emperors' in previous years. I find myself willing them to survive and am always upset when I find they haven't.

Keep us updated!

[Padfield]

Thanks David! Tangerine was awol today but whether or not she returns there will be more - there are plenty of eggs. In fact, pretty well every garlic mustard plant seems to have one on it, in my garden and everywhere else.

I thought from web photos that the shieldbug eggs I found the other day were hairy shieldbug, Dolycoris baccarum, and finding several of these today on the same nettles would seem to confirm this:



The eggs have not hatched yet.

Female holly blues are all over our holly tree, though they still seem to be feeding up, both on honeydew on the nearby sycamore and nectar from the holly flowers. I haven't seen any eggs yet:


(on sycamore)


(on holly)

That said, they are staying quite high up the tree at the moment, beyond where I can look for eggs.

Guy

[Wurzel]

Cracking Holly Blue shots guy Sounds like you might need to get out the step-ladder

Have a goodun

Wurzel

[David M]

At least you're finally seeing a few females, Guy. I must have seen over a hundred males this spring but only two females.

[Neil Freeman]

Hi Guy,

Some interesting stuff from your garden with some great photos

A possible candidate for occupying your rolled up leaf would be a Mother of Pearl Moth larva (Pleuroptya ruralis) which is the largest 'micro moth' in the UK.

Cheers,

Neil.

[Padfield]

Thanks Neil. Yes, I've seen this moth in the garden in the past but I didn't associate it with these rolled leaves. I have a feeling you're right.

Thanks David and Wurzel. What an explosion of holly blues this year. They seem to be everywhere - not just in our garden but all over town and everywhere there are trees.

I've been back to my green hairstreaks a couple of times, including a trip today. As the hawthorn came out, the adults retreated to that, and the nearby trees, preferring the arboreal lifestyle to nectaring on broom. The hawthorn is behind and beyond the broom and gorse, meaning I can only photograph them on superzoom:



I took these shots today:







I still haven't confirmed them at any of the other places I've looked, though it's possible I've seen some. There are so many small coppers everywhere, in the trees, in the bramble, on the ground, on the bushes, that that has to be the default for any silhouetted Lycaenid spotted tumbling over the vegetation. This copper was on bramble at one site I thought must have hairstreaks:



The local meadow has brown argus and common blue now and I saw my first UK small heath of the year in the woods today. Hibernators are still around, including brimstone, comma and peacock. These shots were taken today:





Damselflies are becoming common. Here are a common blue and an azure damselfly ...


(common blue)


(azure)

... and here a pair of large reds in my garden:



Guy

[Wurzel]

Great stuff Greenstreaks Guy especially the first shot - really puts the butterfly in context

Have a goodun

Wurzel

[David M]

...Hibernators are still around, including brimstone, comma and peacock.

Not often you see a Comma on the cusp of June, Guy!

Given their early start this year, I'm surprised the adult hibernators didn't wear themselves out by the first week in May. Brimstones and Peacocks in particular have had an excellent spring.

[Padfield]

Thanks Wurzel and David. Heavy rain moved in this afternoon so those hibernators might have to go back to sleep for a while now. But it's so warm at the moment things fly in the slightest cloud-break. I agree, Wurzel - green hairstreaks do look particularly at home on hawthorn. And they're very difficult to spot on it at a distance.

Tangerine, the orange tip cat, disappeared some days ago and I presumed she had met a grizzly end. But I think I have found her on an adjacent garlic mustard, where a 2nd instar cat has suddenly materialised out of nowhere:



She is now about 7.5mm long and still sporting little drops of fluid on the ends of her spines.

In the local meadow, in the centre of Woodbridge, southern marsh orchids have come into flower:



Guy

[David M]

Lovely shot of the meadow, Guy. Not too dissimilar to some of your Swiss images.

Nice to hear Tangerine is okay. Hopefully she'll go on to successfully pupate.