Monday 18 June 2018

Thursday 14 June 2018

Invertebrates


The 'Birding' may be a little slow but there is plenty to keep the brain engaged. Apologies for not naming all these but I thought I'd post pictures whilst the weather is keeping me indoors.






Tephritid Fruit Fly


Burnet Moth (larva and pupa)


(Mystaides nigra)
Caddis Fly


Diving Beetle (and Tadpole ... vertebrate)


Small Copper


Four Spot Chaser


Large Red Damselfly


Ghost Moth?



Weevil (Nettle?)


Common Blue



Fourth Record for Northumberland
(see previous post)
Under recorded or Expanding Range?


Tenthredo livida



Yellow Shell
on
Yellow Rattle


Silver-Y



Tuesday 12 June 2018

A Second Record for Northumberland! Get In!

Sorry!

It is not a bird ;-(



Found these mating Robberflies.
I spent over an hour trying to ID these.I managed a close resemblance on a Netherlands Website.Unfortunately the translation didn't include the species name.



I posted the picture on Twitter and got a reply saying it looked like a rare species for Northumberland but they needed more pictures to rule out the Neoitamus species which was what I had found online.




I went back to the site this morning (not very hopeful) but was staggered to find one less than a metre from the mating pair photographed yesterday. This time I managed  a shot with the wings and Tweeted it immediately.

It was confirmed!
Second (and 3rd for today) recorded for Northumberland! The first record was 2017 by John Bridges.

So here it is!
Pied-winged Robberfly
(Pamponerus germanicus)



Sunday 10 June 2018

Cuooot?


A picture of a Little Owl was in the press last week. I'm sure the swirl tool on the imaging software had been used. This was just a lucky snap as the chick on the right shook its head.



Embarrassed sibling


Synchronised Preening

Strangely these three photos got a total of 3 likes on Twitter. I thought they were pretty good. Guess they're not OWLY enough.


Rumours that the Hovis Van at East Chevington was ordered by NWT were complete lies!
 It was Warburtons ;-)  

Fully Winged and Un-ringed as the tick sheet shows!


30+ minutes of pure joy as I watched this Bittern (even if it was a little obscured) on its roosting perch (probably only 20 metres away). It preened, scratched, rested and was alert to arriving bikers and closing car doors. Magic, and even better to have someone else share the joy. Finally it crept down the reeds and out of sight, no doubt looking for its breakfast.