Black-headed Gulls
The early nesting Black-headed Gulls at Ternery pool have now fledged, while others are still nest building! This juvenile is practising food handling with a stick…
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Archive for June 10th, 2010
10th June 2010, Thursday
10th June 2010, Thursday
Red-shanked carder bee - No longer an R-ex
On 7 April Chris Bentley found a Bombus ruderarius queen at Rye Harbour LNR, the first record in the Rye area since 2001, and the first we have seen in the RX area since it was last found at Dungeness in 2004. The trouble is that these bees are very mobile, and unless more specimens were found collecting pollen this was not evidence of nesting. Yesterday three workers were found in a meadow three kilometres away.
Although very similar to the red-tailed bumblebee, this species is smaller, has a shorter, rounder body, but the most important features to watch for are the orange hairs (not black as in the red-tailed bumblebee) on the pollen basket of the females (in circle below) and the spine lower down the same hind leg (see arrow pointing to metatarsal spine)
10th June 2010, Thursday
Brede High Wood
It was time to start checking for Golden-ringed Dragonfly exuviae this week in Brede High Wood, and yesterday I was lucky to find two females in the final stages of emergence and still clinging to their exuvia.
This female took her maiden flight shortly after this picture was taken.