Garden visitors

Some recent garden insect visitors during the last week. Thanks to Africa Gomez, author of the always fascinating BugBlog for IDing some of these for me.

I think this hoverfly, that had a conspicuously loud buzz and frequently returned to the same sunny spot when disturbed, is a narcissus fly Merodon equestris. Probably its larvae are even now feeding on our daffodil bulbs.

I think this is a small cuckoo bee (Nomada sp.?) visiting a Welsh poppy

An azure damselfly that hatched from our garden pond - didn't know until then that they were breeding there

A large hoverfly, identified for me by Africa Gomez as Myathropa florea

A sawfly Arge ustulata, whose larvae feed on the leaves of various hedgerow trees and shrubs

Two froghopper larvae that were inadvertently separated from their frothy 'cuckoo spit' when I was weeding the garden. They quickly blew some more bubbles.

An exquisitely metallic hoverfly soldier fly with interference colours in its eyes (thanks to Africa Gomez for the ID)

The solitary bee Osmia rufa collecting pollen and nectar from the poached egg plant Limnanthes douglasii. You can see here how they collect pollen on the underside of their abdomen. Thanks to Africa Gomez for the correct ID.

The best time of the day in the garden ...

During this heatwave, the best time of the day to be in our garden is between 6am., when the sun creeps over the hedge, and 8am. when the day really begins to heat up.

The first shafts of sunlight spotlight the tallest plants, like this dill ......

..... or illuminate individual flowers like this meadow cranesbill.

Some insects, like these Solomon's seal sawfly larvae that defoliate our Solomon's seal plants at this time every year, probably feed during the night and retreat under what's left of the leaves during the hottest part of the day.

This solitary bee, which I haven't identified yet but might be a Nomada species, has taken up residence in one of the hogweed stem tubes in the 'bee hotel' that we made over the winter, and emerged as soon as the sun shone into its residence.

Even at 6am. it's warm enough for bumblebees to be very active ....

....... and as soon as the sun spotlights the tall monkshood flower spikes they attract a lot of attention from bumblebees.

Other bumblebees seem to specialise in collecting pollen from newly-opened opium poppies. Their technique is to crawl under the ring of stamens, buzz and work their way around between the stamens and the petals, showering themselves in pollen that they later comb off into their pollen baskets. By 7am. this bee's pollen baskets were already full.

This tree bumblebee adopted a different technique, visiting Lavatera flowers that wilted and closed yesterday and extracting the remaining nectar by forcing its long tongue down between the base of the petals and the sepals. 

Some insects, like this drone fly that mimics a bumblebee, perch on the lavender flower spikes just to bask in the sun ...

... while this common carder bumblebee was busy collecting nectar from the same plant.

Other early morning insects today included a green capsid bug which I think might be Lygocoris pabulinus, feeding inside a marigold ...

...... an anxious-looking froghopper, newly emerged from its 'cuckoo spit' cocoon of bubbles ........

.............. and a crane-fly that will probably soon end up in one of the many spiders' webs that are beginning to appear around the garden...

Strange Bee-haviour

I found this little cuckoo bee (Nomada sp. - possibly N. succinta, but there are scores of rather similar species to choose from!)   clinging on in his strange way to a developing Amelanchier fruit in the garden this afternoon, apparently feeding on something that looks like it might be a fungal mould. It has beautiful eyes but rather less attractive habits, since it's a kleptoparasite of the nests of other solitary bees. 


Africa Gomez over at BugBlog has just posted some very fine photos of its victims and Annie Gates, a gifted young wildlife photographer, has another photo of a cuckoo bee, much better than mine, over on her father's blog at The Living Isle.

It's a Hard Life being a Miner

Tawny mining bees often visit our garden, sometimes feeding on the gooseberry flowers in spring, but I've never managed to find evidence of their nests here. But they must nest somewhere fairly close, because we also receive regular visits from two of their parasites.

Bee-flies lay their eggs near tawny mining bee nests and their larvae crawl down into the underground nest chamber, eat their host's grub and monopolise the store of pollen that the bee lays down for it. Bee-flies are relentlessly active, which means it's almost as difficult to photograph one at rest as one in flight. But this one paused just long enough on the fence to have its photo taken, displaying its furry bee-mimic body and long straight proboscis, used for sucking nectar from deep within flowers.

And this is another enemy of the tawny mining bee, feeding on our forget-me-nots. It's a cuckoo bee (Nomada sp.) - a solitary bee that also behaves like a cuckoo, laying its eggs in bee-fly nest holes where its larva steals its host's pollen supply. Notice that it has few body hairs and no pollen combs and baskets on its legs for collecting pollen to feed its offspring; that's done by the unfortunate tawny mining bee.