Warmer weather, more insects!

Out and about in the forest yesterday, even with the approaching stormy weather, there was a feeling of more life




(hand held on an overcast and windy day)

I'm not quite sure where to put this, so it's ended up with insects even though spiders aren't insects and even though it's not even a spider. But you know what I mean

Oh, stunning! I'd happily have that on my wall

A day of special finds, and I don't yet know what either of them are

Firstly, this was a visitor in the greenhouse while I was (laboriously) repotting leeks. It was so loud I thought it was a hornet. To give you a sense of scale, the last shot is with a large marker pen





(I didn't turn it upside down, it did it itself)



Not great shots, but I rushed to get the camera before it flew away, which it promptly did once photographed.

Then this was on a rose, merrily chomping its way through a leaf

Very cool. My spot of the day was two dragonflies breeding on the community plot. A first for the bed.

Did they make that lovely heart shape?

No, just whizzing about conjoined

It looks like the beetle is a rose chafer beetle, Cetonia aurata. According to the RHS, it's found in compost heaps. The greenhouse is next to the compost bins so maybe it was looking for a way in.

And the caterpillar appears to be Erranis defoliaria, or the mottled umber moth. The females are wingless, it seems. I'd not heard of a wingless moth.

Yes, looks like a rose chafer. I found one in the house a few weeks ago - so irridescent and shiny!

Insects everywhere





I love flies!

flies look like they have so much character close up. Mad sunglasses

Your first fly shot is excellent. Really majored on the legs. In fact it looks rather spidery, especially if you hide the wings.

I like his legs too!

Another little beastie for the collection

wow. Quite rare these days.

A lesser stag beetle? Dorcus parallelipipedus. Goodness knows what it was doing in the garden, but undoubtedly from the forest.

Fly with goofy footwear

An amazing photo!

Fabulous! Flies are just the best

And here's another (or actually the same as above, but with the Raynox)

Sorry, but I'm having an insect fest. A few for now but (many) more to come

These aren't super sharp - taken on day 2 of the Raynox in light that was too low, and hand held. But I've never achieved this details before





And the obligatory fly

The butterfly is without the Raynox, partly because of the size and partly because it takes longer to get anything in focus and the butterfly was flitting, in a butterfly sort of way. The rest are with, all hand held.



A little shield bug





And a couple of ants. Given ants don't stand still, I'm pretty please with these, especially the 2nd one





I dithered about whether to get the 150 or 250 Raynox, but it's those itty bitty critters that swung it.

Oh wow Liz! Cooking with gas. Think I'll have to get me one of those, once I can figure out if it still accommodates a hood on my lens (cos' I can't do without one of them).

I've put some thoughts in the photography section, Paul, including on the hood.

These are without the Raynox. I think it's a Xylocopa violacea, or violet carpenter bee, or that's what Google Lens says!









Looks like he's got some passengers.

A lucky one. The bee photo-bombed my Iris shot.