ANOTHER MUDDLE. (08/07/14)

This morning dawned or started to at fourish. The sunrise was fine but although there was a big tanker on the horizon I couldn’t move far enough to silhouette her against it. I didn’t bother clicking. Around five thirty after a coffee or two I took the dogs out for a run on the beach.   Moll reasonably dry.

   Alf soaking. They found a golden Labrador to chase in and out of the wavelets with.

I was getting eaten alive by what I think were sand flies or tiny midges. We set off back after twenty minutes and on the way back saw a Dipper.

    See. It’s the first one I’ve seen here and there is a bit of a wall to hide behind. I’ll try and creep up on it.

By ten it was bright and sunny with enough breeze to drive the little biting insects away. Off we went with ring flash and 100mm macro lens. I sat down in a big heap of vegetation and in no time at all was surrounded by insects. It was a bit windy but I love watching the tiny flying pollen eaters.

 

There were lots of these. Exactly which Carder Bee it is I don’t know. I looked in the book and the Scottish one is lighter than the English one. A fine Bumble Bee. I am sorry I got no end of shots of these but either they were flying, I’ll have to have a look at some of those. Or their heads were buried in the Birds-Foot trefoil. Amazing that their wings are blurred when frozen by a strobe. They must flap at one hell of a rate per second

I at first thought this was a Hoverfly but it had it’s wings closed so I am going to either have to rely on one of you readers or just settle for an Empid Fly of some sort.

       No Idea isn’t the name of the fly. I don’t think Collins bother much about flies till they get to half an inch long. I did look on the internet but little flies are in advertisements and tasters for expensive books. This is a little beauty.

I have got a Hoverfly and I’m 99% certain I have got the right one. There is another one that is black and white but it has slightly rounder white bits at the middle of it’s back. It’s a Scavea too Scavea pyra something.

     I’m 90% sure this is a Sand Wasp. I’d been sitting for half an hour looking at Bumble Bees. They kept shooting off. I don’t know how it got here as it appears to have mislaid it’s wings. I usually take a magnifying glass. I couldn’t find it this morning. I do have a couple of 35mm film cans but when I tried to coax it in it hopped into the ground litter and I couldn’t find it..

   

Lady’s Bedstraw is the flower bit. Whilst focussing I thought I’d found a Frog Hopper but it looked very hairy. It did shoot off to I know not where when I gave it a poke with a bit of grass so maybe it is a Frog Hopper. It looks a very hairy little beast so perhaps it’s something else.

All images will enlarge with a click.

It’s raining hard here with a capital ‘P’.

Have fun.