Treasure Hunting

We've been hunting for treasure all morning at an event organized by the Chiltern Society. We set off with bug pots, pooters and tick lists and made our way along Whiteleaf Hill. We were mostly in the woods, so looked under lots of logs and searched for different leaves, then spent some time out on the grassland above the chalk cross.

The clipboard was very popular!

Under the logs we found lots of lovely big slugs, millipedes, centipedes, ground beetles and woodlice.

Leopard slug



Flat-Backed Millipedes

Banded Centipede

Millipede

Door Snail

Cellar Snail

Ground Beetle and Woodlice

We even spotted a Banded Centipede that appeared to have just molted. They have an exoskeleton, so as they grow they develop a new larger exoskeleton underneath the old one, then shed (or molt) the old one. You can see the discarded orange skin next to the very pale centipede. I assume the cenrtipede will soon darken up to its usual orange-brown colour.

Somebody (not us) found a toad hiding under a log.

Common Toad

Out on the grassland our best butterfly find was a Dingy Skipper.

There were lots of spiders lurking in the grass and we found soldier beetles and a common green shield bug.

Wolf Spider

Soldier Beetle

Common Green Shield Bug

We all had a look at each others treasure, then headed over the road to Brush Hill for a quiz in the woods.

Brush Hill

Just as we were getting to the end of the treasure hunt we found three owl pellets. We took them home and will dissect them later to see what the owls have been eating.

Owl pellets full of fur and bits of bone

All good half term fun!

Bug Hunting

We decided to visit the stream in the field behind our house this morning. After a quick splash in the water and a squelch through the mud, it turned into a bit of a bug hunt.

You never know what might be lurking in the mud!

The Yellow Irises were full of Amber snails and Long Jawed Orb Weaver spiders.

A tiny Amber snail - with a distinctively shaped shell

The Amber snails were on almost every leaf. The larger snails were in groups
throughout the Irises. You can see the damage they've done to the Iris leaves.

Long-Jawed Orb Weaver spider



We saw lots of these spiders - most had a parcel of food

 There were hundreds of Dock Leaf beetles all over the weeds at the waters edge.

Dock Leaf Beetles

The grass and nettles were full of all sorts of lovely beetles and bugs.

Tortoise Shield Bug

Tortoise Shield Bug

Red-headed Cardinal Beetle

Dock Bug

Grasshopper - fist one we've seen this year

Nettle Weevil

Soldier Beetle

We even managed to find a few Small Tortoiseshell caterpillars, that ended up having to come home with us to live on our nettle patch in the garden.

 

We saw several butterflies, including an Orange Tip, Peacock, Small Tortoiseshell and Large White. We also found a Common Swift moth hiding in the grass.

A lovely furry headed moth

Not bad for a quick walk with the dog and it's hopefully burnt off some energy (from the kids and he dog!)


Heading home

Updated 27/5: The shiny green beetles are Dock Leaf Beetle, not Mint Leaf Beetles (thanks to Martin Harvey for letting me know about my dodgey id!)

A 'slow, glow, blue-green, nearly blooming' brilliant morning

We've had a 'slow, glow, blue-green, nearly blooming' brilliant morning at Aston Clinton Ragpits. Where to start ...

Bug Mad Girl carefully checked under the metal sheets around the site and found three different slow-worms. We've only ever seen one per visit there before, so it was great to see so many. They are a real highlight for Bug Mad Girl and she couldn't resist picking one of them up. She made sure it was put safely back under the sheet afterwards.

 
There was also a vole under one of the sheets and we saw a little nest made out of moss.

We found a Glow-worm larvae that appeared to be eating a brown-lipped snail and a Roman Snail was out for a slither.

Glow-worm larvae tucking into a snail

Roman snail

We must have seen at least a dozen Common Blue butterflies and saw 3 mating pairs. They seemed to be in pristine condition, so must have only just emerged and were flying despite the gloomy conditions.

Bug Mad Girl spotted a Green Hairstreak, which was very well camouflaged in amongst the plants.

Apart from all of that, we were actually there to look at the orchids. We were thrilled to find lots of orchids just starting to flower, including the Fragrant Orchids and Butterfly Orchids. They are both starting to show their colour and the long down curved spur of the flower. Not long to go now until the buds open when they'll look stunning!


Fragrant Orchid

Butterfly Orchid

The Common Spotted Orchids have started to send up buds.

Common Spotted Orchid

Common Spotted Orchid

The star of the show at the moment was the Twayblade, which was everywhere. There must have been thousands of them all over the site. It's colour means it blends in with the other plants, but when you get down to ground level, you can see just how much of it is there. Some is flowering, but there is plenty more still to come.

And finally ... we found another plant that looks like an orchid, with large, long leaves and a huge flower bud. We can't work out what sort of orchid this could be - maybe it isn't even an orchid - but it will be exciting to go back and find out!