2019 WILDLIFE HIGHLIGHTS

2019 wildlife highlights

As its nearly the end of the year, I have allowed myself a nostalgic stroll back through 2019, and compiled ten highlights. As usual in no particular order and a mixture of species, places, surveys and searches, which avid readers will have already read about.


1. Bradfield Woods
Cathy & I have a sort of tradition where we make sure that we visit a wood with lots of Bluebells every spring, and this year we decided to make a first visit to Bradfield Woods in Suffolk. One of the reasons for choosing this site was that it also contains Oxlips, a scarce species that I'd never seen and where the native populations are probably extinct in Norfolk. It was a chilly day as we sat at a picnic bench for our lunch, before setting off on a walk around the wood. We saw lots of woodland flowers including the hoped for Oxlips, and as a bonus I recorded the several tachinids including my favourite, Phasia hemiptera, and one possib ly new to Suffolk, Tachina lurida.

 Phasia hemiptera

Tachina lurida

2. Duke of Burgundy
A few years ago I'd looked for Duke of Burgundy in the Chilterns without success, so this years trip outside East Anglia was a return visit with Carl Chapman. We visited the same area although at the other end of the ridge, and this time I got to see them! Our first sighting was of one flying past at speed, and I was worried that would be it, but fortunately I then found one on some Hawthorn blossom and we went on to see quite a few more of these lovely orange butterflies.

3. Small Fungus Weevil (Platystomos albinus)
Who lives in a fungus and looks like bird poo? No it's not Spongebob Squarepants, it's a small fungus weevil called Platystomos albinus. It's listed as Nationally Scarce B, but it might well be overlooked. After many years of looking I had finally seen it's larger relative the Scarce Fungus Weevil in 2018, so I was very pleased to find this out of the blue whilst in the Chilterns. I found it near a small gate so everyone had to wait for me to photograph it before they could come past!

4. Wheatfen Cowbane rust hunt
A brief description of the day could have been "a small group searched for a small rust fungus on umbellifer leaves and didn't find it", which doesn't really sound like a highlight. However brief descriptions often omit some key detail (remember the viral Wizard of Oz summary "Transported to a surreal landscape, a young girl kills the first person she meets and then teams up with three strangers to kill again"). In fact I had a thoroughly enjoyable time boating around channels and broads, checking out each clump of Cowbane we saw, and although we didn't find the fungus we were looking for being out on the water was a perfect break, particularly for someone who grew up reading Arthur Ransome books. Afterwards we had tea with the warden and then the group gamely set off into some boggy tidal carr woodland, all to look for a rare moss that most of them hadn't heard of (and we did find that!).

5. Rhombic Leatherbug
Shieldbugs and leatherbugs are two of my favourite groups, and Rhombic Leatherbug was probably the commonest species that I hadn't seen before. As described at the time I did my best to still not see it, accidentally dismissing it as a juvenile Dock Bug before being put right. As is so often the case, having seen it for the first time I saw three more later in the year, firstly at Earlham Cemetery and then finding a couple more in the Brecks.

6. Wildlife gardening
Each year the garden has developed a bit more, and this year we did some pond dipping with Rose, grew some Raspberries (in turn attracting some sawfly larvae), watched a spider shed its exoskeleton, had regular visits from two Coal Tits and various other species. I didn't do much moth trapping in 2019, but coming home over summer and being able to spend a bit of time out in the garden was definitely a highlight.

 Cladus brullei

7. The garden of the bees
One of the best wildlife sites for insects in Norwich must surely be the Bartlett's garden, and I was fortunate to visit on several occasions to see interesting things. Some seem to be attracted by the flowers and habitat generally, whilst for others a particular plant has been grown to attract them, as was the case with the Mignonette Yellow-face Bee. Of course attracting them is only half the job, and Vanna still has to identify them! Nomada zonata and Coelioxys inermis were two of the other new species that I saw there this year.

 Mignonette Yellow-face Bee

 Nomada zonata

 Coelioxys inermis

8. Minsmere
Despite being in Suffolk Minsmere actually has a lot going for it for the naturalist who wants to go out with the family, including some decent surfaced paths (albeit not all of the way round, hence on one visit Cathy gamely pushed the pushchair through some very loose sand along the eastern edge!), a cafe, baby changing facilities and of course lots of wildlife. We ended up visiting four times, with interesting stuff seen on each one. Our amazing encounter with an Adder swallowing its prey has to be the most notable, but I also enjoyed seeing (and hearing) Green-eyed Flower Bees, plus my best ever views of Dartford Warbler and lots of interesting fungi as well.

 Green-eyed Flower Bee

 Fluted Birds-nest

Fly Agaric

9. Sawfly leaf mines
In recent years I've recorded quite a few fly and moth leaf mines, so this year I tried to pay a bit more attention to the mines caused by sawflies. Handily Andy Musgrove has put together a website for Norfolk sawflies, so I was able to see how many species there were to look out for in the main tribe of leaf miners, the Fenusini. There were 21 species down for Norfolk, and I managed to find 14 of them, plus one not recorded in Norfolk before, Heterarthrus cuneifrons.

 Fenusella glaucopis in Aspen

Heterarthrus cuneifrons in Sycamore

10. A Breckland jaunt
In late summer I headed down to the Brecks with Jeremy and Vanna for a multi-site visit looking for a mixture or scarce plants and invertebrates. At Santon we saw large numbers of a type of Treehopper found with Broom, whilst I don't think we actually reached Cranwich Heath proper due to the time spent looking along the plants growing at the edges of the main ride. We saw Smooth Rupturewort, possibly the least impressive flowering plant I've seen, but also things like Small Scabious Mining Bee and a new conopid, all in glorious sunshine surrounded by Breckland plants.

 Gargara genistae

 Small Scabious Mining Bee

 Hedychrum sp

Smooth Rupturewort

My 2018 wildlife highlights

This year saw the birth of my daughter, with the attendant change in priorities and outlook that comes with having a small child. Thanks to the support of my lovely wife I was still able to indulge my hobby, but there was a change in emphasis with fewer early mornings and all day trips, no travelling outside East Anglia and more time spent around Norwich. I have come up with ten of my highlights from the year, taking in particular species, trips and groups. Because of the varying nature of these experiences I have not attempted to rank them.

1) The Hornet Moth Experience

My only previous Hornet Moth sighting had been one attracted to a lure in James Lowen's garden. Whilst impressive, I wanted to find one on a poplar, and over the past few years have checked the base of various poplars, often finding emergence holes but no moths. Having found a few local trees with these holes I visited regularly for a period, narrowly missing out as I found freshly evacuated chrysalises but no moths. That was until one day, when I noticed a chrysalis sticking out of a hole with the moth still inside. I was just in time, it emerged several minutes later. I was able to watch it pump up its wings before returning it to the tree trunk. An amazing creature to see and well worth the effort.

2) Whitlingham Wheatear

In spring at the coast when amost every bird you see moving is a Wheatear, they can get a bit frustrating, but inland they are usually a good find. This one had been found at Thorpe Marshes by Gary White one evening in April, and having not seen a patch one in 11 years of trying I was keen to see it. For those who keep lists, or even a mental note of what has been seen, any new bird is exciting, but this was just a really enjoyable evening. Upon arrival the Wheatear was soon on view on a gatepost. It flew down onto the marsh for a bit when some people walked past, but then returned to its post, showing beautifully in the evening sunshine.

3) Postwick wildlife survey

In spring I was asked to help carry out an informal wildlife survey of some private woodland near Postwick along with Jeremy & Vanna Bartlett, Ian Senior and Nick. I made two visits, seeing a range of species and enjoyed spending some time in a new and relatively unexplored location. On the second visit we found a long-term target species of mine, the Cramp Ball Weevil Platyrhinus resinosus, and other new species included Alder Signal Moth.

4) Nomada bees

Bees in the genus Nomada are attractive yellow, black and sometimes red banded solitary bees that could easily be mistaken for wasps. Up until this year I had only recorded two species - I knew I had seen more but couldn't identify them (many species are very similar). Thanks to Steve Falk's book, the tutelage of Vanna Bartlett and feedback from people like Nick Owens, Tim Strudwick and the BWARS verifiers, I recorded eight species in 2018, six of them new. This included the three very similar species in the flava group, which I caught, photographed the key bits and released. This is a very good example of how recording can progress when a detailed, accessible and affordable guide is released for a species group (I underwent a similar upskilling with the release of the Morris & Ball Hoverflies WildGuides book).

Early Nomad - Nomada leucophthalma

 Marsham's Nomad - Nomada marshamella

Flavous Nomad - Nomada flava

5) Garden mothing

Most of the rented houses I stayed in following university were terraces with bisected or small highly overlooked gardens. Light pollution and neighbours meant that moth-trapping was unsuccessful or impractical, and my trap had mainly been used at my in-laws in south Norwich. It has therefore been a joy to be able to run a trap in my own garden and actually catch some moths! Trapping most weekends from spring through to late summer I caught a modest 160 species (light pollution is still quite an issue). This total has undoubtedly been helped by some sympathetic planting by my wife - the Nicotiana didn't attract a Convulvulous Hawk Moth this year, but patience is a virtue. Highlights included a vice county first, Scythris limbella, and red data book species Small Ranunculus, whilst Pine Hawk Moth and Elephant Hawk Moth were welcome additions to the garden list. I'm already looking forward to adding to our fledgeling garden list next year.

 Scythris limbella

 Small Ranunculus

 Pine Hawk Moth

Elephant Hawk Moth

6) Leaf mine recording 

The great thing about recording leaf mines is that you can do it whilst out and about. I recorded at least two species of fly new to Norfolk this year, one on the way to work and the other at Whitlingham doing some general wildlife recording. I also recorded a new species of moth to Norfolk, Paracrania chrysolepidella, from leaf mines at Wayland Wood whilst nominally looking for fungi. It's not all about new species either - I am now well in the habit of checking every Holly for the distinctive mine of Phytomyza ilicis. It is probably the commonest (definitely the most visible) mine to record, but each record contributes to the overall distribution information for this species.

 Paracrania chrysolepidella mine in Hazel (with beetle interloper)

My Phytomyza ilicis sightings (map from iRecord)

Nemorimyza posticata mine in Canadian Goldenrod

7) Snowy Owl at Thornham Point

Doesn't really need a reason - it was a Snowy Owl! A bird I'd wanted to see since getting my first bird book but had never really expected to see in Norfolk.

8) Buxton Heath

This excellent site is only a few miles north of Norwich, but I don't visit very often. A brief visit this year was very productive - I finally saw my first Marsh Gentians, saw some (reintroduced) Marsh Clubmoss, added a couple of new bees and generating most excitement was a Lesser Thorn-tipped Longhorn Beetle.

9) Crowned Earthstar

Earthstars are one of the most popular fungi groups (along with things like Waxcaps), but I seldom come across new species. Norfolk has records of almost all of the species found in the UK, but some have only been recorded once, or not for many years. Whilst discussing this with Mark Joy, who has travelled around the country seeing and finding earthstars, he mentioned that he had seen Crowned Earthstars in the Brecks and kindly gave me directions. This was Cathy & I's last wildlife trip out before Rose was born, and we had a nice walk in the woods, seeing the Crowned Earthstars and some Striated Earthstars nearby as a bonus.

 Crowned Earthstar

Striated Earthstar

10) Essex orchids

 

My one wildlife related trip that wasn't in Norfolk or north Suffolk was to Essex, where a small population of Tongue Orchids had been discovered the previous year. Local botanists and Essex Wildlife Trust had put a lot of work into organising limited access, and I managed to book a place on a walk to see them. We met nearby, and after a short walk to the site were taken to see them a few at a time. This was my first new orchid in a few years (admittedly mostly due to my inactivity in travelling outside Norfolk than because I've seen loads), and the intrigue around it all added to the experience. Unfortunately the landowner later had second thoughts and revoked access permission, so I didn't blog about it at the time and I'm not in a position to reveal the site, sorry.