Onwards: backwards

 I've been adding to my P-SL in the last few days, but also, as I regularly do, removing things. Goodbye Tachina fera, at least for the moment, whilst I investigate whether my photos are good enough to split it from Tachina magicornis. I've also removed my Lehmannia slugs as current thinking is that these cannot be reliably determined except by dissection. However, I've just achieved 2,500 species to my list, despite the subtractions. Onward to 3,000.

This is ok as Tachina fera methinks, colour of front tarsi and breadth of frons. Pic from 30 July 2018.

I've not tried dissecting slugs, messy I expect!

Not much bird news, nothing to match the excitement of  last time's Stock Dove anyway. Spotted Flycatchers are in and calling noisily. Swifts screaming. A Carrion Crow added to the "in the garden list" and a first ever Starling to the bird feeders (feeders are now mostly retired for the summer), I just occasionally put a bit of nijer out or scatter a little bit on the ground.

Squirrel Squad activities are now in full swing. Louise and I completed our arduous training - PH took us around the traps and showed us what to do! And we've had one kitchen ID session checking the hairs on the stickies.

Red Squirrel

How does it work? There's food in the box, yummee corn, peanut and sunflower. Squirrel has learnt to lift the lid and get the food. On the inside of the lid is a sticky which takes a small hair sample from the squirrel. Every fortnight we replenish the food and check the stickies. If the hair is all Red Squirrel, all good! But if a fiendish Grey Squirrel has visited it will leave a hair sample and we will know. PH then deploys traps (live traps). The difference between the hairs is not especially easy to discern, Grey Squirrel hairs have a sharp demarcation of colour whilst with Reds the colours blur into each other more subtly.

Grey Squirrel hairs indicated by the arrows in this sample.

This is the front-line in the battle with the Grey invasion. The Highland Boundary Fault is the divide. Yes there are Reds in the borders and south of us but there are many, many Greys there. I'm yet to see a Grey Squirrel here, Louise found a dead one the other side of the A822, and there are reports of them in the winter up Monument Rd. This is a line that needs to be held as Greys spread disease and compete with Reds. However, the resurgence of Pine Marten is thought to be good for Reds and bad for Greys.

Great fun (ha, ha, yes FUN) with the pheromone traps. and some nice catches.

Epiblema scutullana

 This species just loves the FUN lure. Today I was showing a group round the Community Woodland but because of the rain had not deployed the traps. However, I brought a trap and a FUN lure to show folk. I demonstrated how the trap worked and left the trap armed with lure on the floor of The Hub. Within a few minutes we had Epiblema scutulana males buzzing around the inside of shelter.

At home I've caught both Pammene obscurana but also now a few Pammene albuginana (a rare moth in Scotland, and a single Pammene fasciana. Also added P. obscurana to the Community Woodland list.

Pammene albugiana

Pammene fasciana

The Pammene albugiana came to FUN, JAN and MOL and the P. fasciana to the Large Red Clearwing lure. 

Other new moths have been Nematopogon swammerdamella, netted by a participant on a CCW walk I was leading. And to light in the garden Beautiful Brocade and Scoparia pyralella. New for the garden was Small Elephant Hawk-moth, a species I've not seen for about 20 years.

Small Elephant Hawk-moth

Beautiful Brocade

Scoparia pyralella

 

Scorched Wing, always a treat to see.

Large Longhorn Nematopogon swammerdamella a very nice surprise. Well netted that man!

I was somewhat reluctantly engaged as transport one afternoon to go to Glen Artney Church. Anyway, with some dragging of feet on my part we set off. It's a bit of a drive up a somewhat tortuous road and although a relatively short distance takes a relatively long time. When we got there the other singers (it was a singing event) were nowhere to be seen. I mooched around the churchyard. Right by the path I found this monster, only the second I've ever seen.

Meloe violaceus, a beast with a fascinating biology (give it a google)

 And here's the site - 

The Violet Oil Beetle was right by the path, which is why I picked it up and moved it to safety, as despite its isolation there are regular visitors marching up the steps.