Cream spot ladybird

Finally added this little cream spot photograph to the ladybird page.

I photographed it way back in April.  It was on a birch tree in the garden, but had been blown off, so I took the pic and put it back on.  Today the leaves from that tree are blowing everywhere - it is a very blustery day.  The Bombus pascuorum are still hanging on though - they are the only species of bumblebee left in the garden, but there are still plenty of flowers for them to forage on.

Been given my husband's old HTC phone.  It is lovely and does lots of things, but it is a bother to carry around.  My old tiny Nokia fitted quite happily into the pocket of my jeans, but this one doesn't, or rather it  does, but the touch screen keeps getting touched (squashed more likely) by my jeans, and eventually I get a beeping phone telling me it has little or no battery power left.  I have a little pocket thingy that fits on my belt loop, but I don't wear a belt with all of my jeans, and it look silly when I have a long jumper on, so what to do?  I don't carry a bag when I go out dog walking, or when I'm in the garden, but I do need my phone for the odd occasion that somebody remembers I exist.  Must I get extra baggy jeans?  It is getting colder now, so I wear jackets when I go out, so it is not too much of a prob. but what'll I do for next summer?

There must have been at least 4 or 5 days this year when I went to the woods with a short sleeved t-shirt, jeans and non-waterproof shoes - this is called summer up in Scotland - we don't get it every year, and it comes as quite a shock when it happens.  My dog has to go into the burn and lie down to cool off when it's hot, actually she has to go into the burn on most days.  I've seen her on a day of icy blizzards jump into the burn with icy water swirling around her at belly height, and you can tell she is just loving it - it's the heat that gets to her.

Just started Dawn French's Dear Fatty good so far, and expect it will be all the way through.  Also got, at great expense, the New Naturalist's the world of Spiders by Bristowe, oh they don't make them like him any more.  I could live, study and write for 100 years and never come close to these guys.  Any time somebody complements me on the web site or my knowledge of creepy crawlies, I am aware of just how little I really know compared to them.  Oh, well Flossie says it is time to explore the woods for an hour or two to make sure everything is as it should be.

Pterostichus madidus a ground beetle

Just added a photograph of Pterostichus madidus to one of the ground beetle pages.  It is similar to Pterostichus niger, except that niger is slighly bigger - though their sizes do overlap - and niger has reddish antennae and a differently shaped thorax.

Well autumn is truly here.  This is the first day this year that I have lit my wood burner in the daytime.  It is cold and rainy outside.  And as soon as I have finished this I'm off to the woods with my dog for a wet walk.  She loves it, and I confess that after the first few minutes I do too - provided I'm dressed for it.

Went to try to buy a pair of waterproof boots this morning, but failed.  Every pair of boots I buy leaks after a while - it can take weeks or up to 3 months, but the so-called waterproof boots aren't.  You can hike, trek and climb mountains, but you cannot saunter through wet grass!  I wax the leather with Nikwax, and that helps a bit, but they will leak within days in wet weather.  Consequently I have about 6 pairs in various states of drying out waiting to be waxed.

I know I should wear wellies, and I do sometimes, but I like the support that boots have, and they are much more comfortable.

Bombus pascuorm workers are still foraging off the herbs and lavender in the garden.  A few queens of terrestris and lucorum are still around, but I haven't seen any pascuorum or hortorum for days.

I've just finished reading "Thinking the unthinkable, might there be no way out for Britain" by Tim Morgan from Tullett Prebon.  Scary reading, especially after reading Adam Fergusson's When Money Dies. Why don't those in power just admit how bad things are, then silly people with jobs and guaranteed final salary pensions might not want to go on strike so that others have to contribute so much more to their pension that they have none left to put into their own.

All people care about now is their entitlements.  We are not entitiled to anything.  We have responsibilities.

Taxes are there to run the country and to help the old, young and sick.  Ooh I am getting angry, but isn't it about time we paid our way?

To take a quote from one of my all time favourite books David Copperfield
“Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen pounds nineteen and six. Result happiness.
Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six. Result misery.”
I'm with Micawber on this, and the result is not just a miserable country, but a miserable world.

On a happier note I am just starting the the Goblet of Fire in my re-read of the Harry Potters.  And I'm glad to say I'm enjoying them as much the second time as I did the first.  I have also taken to P G Wodehouse's Jeeves and Wooster - rather late, I admit.  Perhaps it is the longing for a more innocent time.  I wish I had Bertie's standard of living and a Jeeves to look after me.

Oh well, the breadmaker has just pinged, so I'll take out the pine nut and pesto bread whose smell has been wafting from the kitchen.  Then off for a muddy walk, and back to warm bread and butter by a log fire - who am I to complain!

Silpha atrata, snail-eating beetle

This is Silpha atrata, it doesn't have a common name.  It is in the burying beetle family, but it is a snail eater.  It has a long head and a poisonous bite.  Both adults and larvae eat snails.

I found it on a woodland path in late May.  Unfortunately my dog had stood on it and killed it.  I noticed it because it was so shiny.  I imagine it had got washed out of a tree as we went for a walk after a heavy shower.  Since then I've seen a few more in the moss around the base of tree trunks and on the trunks itself.  I haven't seen one eating a snail yet though.  Perhaps they bite them then bury them.

Black-tipped soldier beetle

Uploaded this beetle to the Cantharidae page. It is also known as the bloodsucker, but I've never heard of it biting anyone let alone sucking blood. I wonder how it got this name.

I took this photograph on a lovely sunny afternoon, and this morning I walked past the same spot. What a difference! It is below zero and under snow, but it is still beautiful. The snow makes it easy to see the roe deer tracks and all the other tracks too. The deer - I think - have been digging away the snow to get at the moss and lichen underneath. And on the golf course the moles are still active even in this weather. They burrow between the snow and grass and leave a groove cutting through the grass exposing the soil beneath. The poor greenkeeper must really hate them

10 spot ladybird

I found this little 10 spot crawling over one of my tomato plants on a sunny July morning, so quickly grabbed my camera and took this photograph. By tapping the leaf I managed to get it to stop moving long enough to get this shot. Then I left it to get on with things. This year I had 3 different species of ladybird in the garden, but none in any great numbers, and never nearly enough to eat my huge number of aphids. Last year there were very few ladybirds. Perhaps next year there will be more.

Strangalia quadrifasciata

This is beautiful beeltle is Strangalia quadrifasciata. For a couple of weeks in August you could see quite a few of them feeding on cow parsley and ground elder in sunny spots, then they were gone. While they were feeding they were quite docile and very easy to pick up, but quick to fly if your shadow passed over them. I took this one home to photograph for my Cerambycidae page before taking it back in the afternoon

2 spot ladybird

I've seen far more ladybirds in the past couple of weeks than I have the whole summer, and I think it was the same last summer. This one was on my tomato plants, but there are no aphids there yet, so I took her off, photographed her and put her on my peppers where there are plenty of aphids, worse luck.

Soldier and sailor beetles

Last month I photographed both of these beetles. The Grey sailor beetles was scrabbling around in a buttercup flower, and probably eating the pollen, and is a sun lover.
The Yellow-tipped malthine is the opposite. It prefers shady locations, and I only spotted it because of the yellow tips to its wings.

Now both are on the Cantharidae page.

Carrion/burying beetle

Just added this photograph of Oiceoptoma throracica to the carrion/burying beetle page. I had never seen this beetle alive before, and unfortunately the one I found was dying.

Click beetle larva

Added photographs of click beetle larva to Click beetle page. Unfortunately my garden is full of them.

Pine weevil

Added the Pine weevil to the weevil page. This weevil has lovely yellow hair-like scales on its wing cases.

Beetle families

Well, it's been a long time, but now the blog is back up and running. I've just added a page of drawings showing the body shape of the beetle families featured in the Invertebrate section of bumblebee.org. After all beetles are my second love, and I still believe there is nothing on earth more beautiful than a beetle seen through a microscope - just wish I had a better one!