Wash and Brush Up

Moth Quiz 6

Is this Debrett's favourite beverage? 

Answer:    Early Grey

Moth Quiz 7

Separates parishes on an OS map - good eyes or an eyeglass needed

Saturday, May 2

On an essential (for sanity) local outing yesterday, we pulled in to a muddy field entrance in order to listen for birdsong. Immediately, I noticed birds washing in a brown puddle. A family of Linnets. Quite delightful.

Then, a Whitethroat sang from a very close bramble bush. Pam could see it through the windscreen. It then flew to a different bush behind me before flying back again. This time, I managed a few photographs but none of them were sharp. Like this. The automatic focus was going in and out like a slide trombone. My fault, I should have switched to manual, but then I wouldn't have got any photos. Is this better than none? Well,. it will go into the year folder for starters.

A Dunnock posed on top of a fencepost as we tried to locate the Blackcap singing from the woods.

I spent some time trying to photograph the myriad St Mark's flies zooming about the luxuriant Alexanders and Cow Parsley, undercarriage dangling. I've never noticed as many before, they're even in our garden. I associate them with Titchwell, where they can be a real nuisance to walk through.

The St. Mark’s Fly is a species of true fly, known as Hawthorn flies. This species belongs to the Family Bibionidae and 20 species from this family are found in the UK.

St. Mark’s Flies (Bibio marci) are so called because they emerge around St Mark’s Day on 25th April every year and can be seen in flight in May. They are found around woodland edges, hedges, rough grassland and wetlands and can be seen throughout the UK in spring.
The St. Mark’s Fly has a very short adult life cycle, being in flight for approximately only one week.

The morning was spent watching Adrian tie up the bean canes I placed yesterday, before planting runner bean and beetroot plants. He then tied up the tomato plants.

Moth Catch

Again very few moths, but I'm not going to complain when one of them was a superb Lime Hawkmoth.

Pam (bless her !!) also found a 4 mm long micro moth in the kitchen. Another one for R I reckon - and it's not a good photo. It was hopping about like a flea, inside the pot, and I daren't even take the lid off.

Elachista rufocinerea. Thank you Richard