February Round-up

So that's me completed the second month of my 2020 Vision Challenge and I know exactly what you're thinking - was February any better for me than January was (could it really be any worse?)

At the end of January I'd managed to find and identify just ten species of beetle and eleven species of fly. That's poor, very poor. I realise that January doesn't exactly offer the best opportunities for finding insects, especially not up on Skye, but I really was hoping for more.

Luckily for me, come mid-February, I managed to skive a whole three weeks off work and immediately headed south to meet up with The Ghost and Mark Telfer, both of whom pulled out the stops to ensure we all spent quality time in the field (and Whipsnade Zoo's hot house!) Sadly the weather was still pretty crap; wet, cold and windy being the norm. Even the brighter days were still cold, hence I didn't add very much in the way of dipteran interest. The beetles were pretty good though. 

Chromatomyia scolopendri on Hart's-tongue Fern - the pupa is visible in the mine

And if you think that is scraping the barrel....

Time flies like an arrow, fruit flies like a banana

This was from inside the butterfly house at Whipsnade Zoo. Despite being abundant over the heaps of rotting bananas left out for the butterflies, they were a complete bugger to catch (I hadn't brought my butterfly net into the butterfly house - I figured that would be pushing my luck too far). I haven't gotten around to even attempting to ID the fruit flies yet, though Drosophilidae was an unexpected family tick for the year. Coz yep, I'll take anything to stay ahead of The Ghost, though I fear I'll be at the back of the pack soon enough, once spring arrives. 

I took the opportunity to take my fungus gnat haul to BENHS at Dinton just in case fungus gnat guru Peter Chandler was in attendance. Guess what...

Get in!!!!

Sadly I only had two species (out of twelve specimens) but he's happy for me to send him more specimens near the end of the year for the national recording scheme that he runs. Hence I'll hopefully glean a few more for the tally. The other good news is that I now recognise the diagnostic wing patterning of Mycetophila ornata, so I don't have to collect any more of those. 

Beetles came thick and fast, many species from a small patch of reedbed flood debris, yet more from a couple of decent leaf-litter sieving sessions in South Hampshire. One that particularly surprised me was this beast

Paederus littoralis - high up on a calcareous hillside!

Previously I've only ever seen Paederus in wetland habitats and the name littoralis would suggest this is a shoreline species. Except I was halfway up Magdalen Hill Downs near Winchester. However, the mandibles don't lie (they were black) and it transpires that Paederus littoralis is just as happy in dry habitats as wet. Cool, a very smart lifer too.

Speaking of lifers, I accumulated quite a few during February. A very meagre total of just three new flies, but a somewhat healthier seventeen new beetles. The 2020 Challenge totals at the close of February stand at 17 species of Diptera and 46 species of Coleoptera. As a sneak preview, the start of March was pretty magical for beetles. So I better hurry up and blog about that too.