Smelly moths & a Woodchat Shrike

Painted Lady, Bovingdon Brickworks

Bovingdon Brickworks (BMT): If the weather thinks that by throwing in a reasonable day of sunshine yesterday, I’ll forget the preceding week of grey skies, showers and low temperatures, it’s sadly mistaken. Last week was one of those unremarkable, uninspiring, plodding sort of weeks. Even netting a Vapourer moth (Orgyia antiqua) near a Brickworks Buddleja didn’t return the spring to my step although reading about this day-flying species afterwards was fascinating. Antennae so sensitive that they can sniff out a female more than a mile away! And, whilst the males are blessed with these extraordinary scent detectors, the females are flightless and basically live to “stink” and reproduce. I’m glad I’m not a Vapourer moth!

A very worn and slightly disabled male Vapourer moth (Orgyia antiqua). 

The moth requires both antennae to be in tact in order to determine the direction of scent and to navigate accurately. 

The close up shows the antennae are covered with thousands of tiny hairlike olfactory receptors

I had hoped the Painted Lady passage would continue this week but, if there were any around, they weren’t flying or visible: both are possibilities due to the weather and the inaccessibility of the scrub in their favoured area. In spite of that, most visits have included c5 of each fresh Red Admirals, Peacocks and Speckled Woods, 2-3 fresh Brimstones, 2-3 Small Tortoiseshells & Commas, a fresh Small Copper, a few Common Blues, Whites sp, worn Meadow Browns and Gatekeepers and, on Friday, a very tatty Ringlet.

Still plenty of noisy Chiffchaffs, Willow Warblers and Blackcaps around or passing through, and there are large family parties of Goldfinches throughout the site and smaller groups of Linnets.

On Friday, during a spell of sunshine, one of the Southern Hawker females perched up for a moment.

Yesterday, I escaped the local and got to see a new bird: a Woodchat Shrike. A juvenile turned up on Friday at Blakehill NR, near Cricklade in Wiltshire, and, much to everyone’s relief, had stayed put overnight. The species’ nearest breeding territory is southern Europe, whilst winters are spent in open bush country in Africa, south of the Sahara. This youngster had obviously found itself blown in the wrong direction and will hopefully get back on a northerly, heading south, in good time. Although not quite where it’s supposed to be, it was feeding very well, flying to the ground, catching grasshoppers and other large insects and returning to a perch to devour them. It remained pretty distant (100+ metres away) but that’s what telescopes are for, I guess.

Blakehill NR, location of Woodchat Shrike plus the worst digiscoped photos ever! Heat haze + distance = cr*p photos.
Still, you can just make out the pale rump, pale scapular patch and pale primary panel on the bird.

Brown Hairstreaks, Silver-spots & migrants

Saturday was a good day. It started with a Wood Sandpiper at Wilstone reservoir, which admittedly, at a distance of c600 metres, was dangerously close to being a featureless bird-blob; and it finished with an infinitely closer, fiery male Redstart, flicking his beautiful red tail, catching insects in the late afternoon light at the horse paddock on Nettleden Road, Water End. In between, there were my first Silver-spotted Skippers at Aston Rowant NNR, followed by my first Brown Hairstreaks at Otmoor RSPB. During a wander around the marshes at Otmoor, a couple of Ross’s Geese, a Marsh Harrier, a pair of Brown Hares, my first Roesel’s Bush-cricket and good numbers of common dragonflies were all enjoying the dry weather after 2 days of rain. A fresh Painted Lady fluttered past and there had obviously been a good second generation of Common Blue butterflies at the reserve. Here are a few photos from the day, starting with the Silver-spotted Skippers.

Mating Silver-spotted Skippers (Hesperia comma), a national rarity, on the wing late June - early Sept

Silver-spotted Skipper. Larval foodplant: Sheep's-fescue (Festuca ovina)

After the sun-loving Skippers (they don't bother flying on overcast days - very sensible!), it was on to Otmoor RSPB for another butterfly rarity, the Brown Hairstreaks (Thecla betulae). We were as jammy as Jammie Dodgers and walked straight up to a chap who was watching 3 of them! Last weekend this same chap had spent more than 3 hours waiting for a sighting without success, a scenario I know all too well.

The views were far better than I had ever hoped for. The icing on the cake would have been a fresh female but I was truly content with the 3 males, one of which was in pristine condition.

Male Brown Hairstreak (Thecla betulae). The UK's largest hairstreak species. Primary foodplant is Blackthorn

Brown Hairstreak, open-winged (male)

Two males. Fresh v Worn

Nothing like standing on your rival's head to get the message across!

A couple of final pictures: a female Southern Hawker dragonfly (Aeshna cyanea) and a female Roesel’s Bush-cricket (Metrioptera roeselii). I’d only ever seen the latter in photographs and didn’t really think my ID was correct. I fired off a burst of 3 shots with a view to checking when I got home. Kicked myself when I realised I was right and really should have made the most of the opportunity. Ah well, another place, another time...I hope. Incidentally, the rather large (and lethal-looking!) sickle-shaped protrusion at the rear of the Bush-cricket is the ovipositor, and the reason I know it's a female...