After work visit to George’s Hayes SWT for the wild daffodils and others on a pleasant grey April evening @staffswildlife.bsky.social

Finally seen my first ever Otter!! At Leighton Moss, swanning around in the midst of the water off Lilian’s Hide. That’s two new mammals for me this year already and not even trying

Belated Christmas gift from my wife which arrived yesterday. A phenomenal and comprehensive achievement, thank you @graemelyons.bsky.social! Recommended to naturalists of any stripe or hue

Picked up usual range of freebies and other bits at the Staffs Invertebrates day 😀

Quick twitch to Westport for the Scoter before heading off to Meir for the inverts bash… Joined the Friends of Lyme Brook and gawped at teeny tiny mayfly larvae and freshwater shrimps

We go again. Eristalis tenax today on dandelion

Starling murmuration over Silverdale this afternoon #staffsbirdnews

Thirty-one years and two months to the day since my last Yellow-browed Warbler (by the Wey Navigation in Guildford), the Westport Lake bird is my third overall and first for Staffordshire. I feel there should be a rubbish record shot to accompany this dull, fact-heavy post, but agile+tiny+iPhone….

Lost a lot of scales in the bathtub poor thing but is this identifiable? ObsID reckons Clepsis consimilana @sj84turner.bsky.social Micro Man and @thevicar70.bsky.social the Clepsis King 😀

One of four Rusty-dot Pearls flushed from a flower tub out front of the house VC39 13/8/2025 #teammoth @migrantmothuk.bsky.social

Moths by day #3 #teammoth IDs open to correction!

Some bits and pieces from the last couple of days

Other random flies from recent walks

Moths by day #2 #teammoth

Moths by day #1 #teammoth

Beetles of Audley

Sawflies - from along the old railway line in Audley

Some recent sightings round the village: Hoverflies #2

Some recent sightings round the village: Hoverflies #1

Bryotropha affinis on the inside of my cardboard recycling bag this morning #teammoth

Saturday morning dogwalk naturespotting

The obligatory HMHM video. Garden tick ✅

Small Blood-vein accidentally flushed from our bamboo thicket and obligingly posing on fence. This takes the garden list I don’t keep to about six…

Not Lacura but lacuna! 😠 #AisleofAldi

Second lifer of the day this fabulous stripey Rosemary Beetle at work. My cup runneth over!

Friday 13th started well with a frantic Lozotaenia forsterana in the kitchen at 05:10. I don’t ‘do’ moths as such and this was almost quite exciting

Hot larva! Peacock caterpillar looking all spiky and rebarbative

OTD 57 years ago: Carnforth shed-bash on the Thursday of half-term. Unforgettable experience and privilege. And with the end of steam less than two months away #nostalgia

One of the things I’ve always said I’d Never Ever Do - and I don’t mean the pink Prosecco…😡 So now I just have to eat sashimi while wearing a bucket hat and that’s all my taboos and self-respect shot to pieces… 😂

Twelve plant lifers at Brean, not including a hairgrass Koeleria sp. and an eyebright Euphrasia sp. (which I really wanted to be K.vallesiana and E.tetraquetra respectively but can’t honestly claim). Best though has to be my first ever broomrape - Ivy Broomrape, weird as expected! #wildflowerhour

Bank Holiday weekend in a static caravan at Brean, Somerset. Sunny and windy for a Sunday morning march over Brean Down

From Brean Down, Somerset this weekend for #wildflowerhour: Milk Thistle, Navelwort, White Rock-rose, Wood Sage

Highlight of the morning’s poochmooch was this sluggish hoverfly Merodon equestris on a sunny leaf, a bumblebee mimic which is common and widespread but I hadn’t consciously encountered before

Vivid colours from the past week for #wildflowerhour: Japanese Rose, Germander Speedwell, Grass Vetchling and Siberian Iris, the first and last being escapees of course!

Dipped Four-spotted Chaser at Silverdale mine water pool (but thanks @johnmathers84.bsky.social for the heads up), compensated by Common Blues, Grass Vetchling and Cydia ulicetana (yes, a Micro-Moth! Ha!). Grasshopper Warbler a belated year tick

“Long ago in 1945 all the nice people in England were poor, allowing for exceptions.” With this ambiguous sentence begins Muriel Spark’s delightful novel ‘The Girls of Slender Means’, which starts on VE Day and ends on VJ Day (with flash forwards to the 1960s) #VEDay

Under-recorded monads (VC39) is a project of mine this season! Found 3 locally with <20 records on the DDb and on Sun added c60 records to one of them (best: Wood Speedwell). There’s another local monad apparently unbotanised since 1999, so that’ll be getting a visit too….😀 @bsbibotany.bsky.social

For the #CabbageFamily this #Wildflowerhour here is some American Winter-cress Barbarea verna from a promising patch of wasteland at work

As usual some fun insects brightened a cloudy day. St Mark’s flies much in evidence, plus hoverflies including this friendly Eristalis pertinax. Bonus collateral on the bird front: my first Lesser Whitethroat of the year giving it large from a hedgerow

My first @bsbibotany.bsky.social field meeting, VC58 - lanes and fields around Acton, Cheshire. An instructive few hours, thanks to the VCR and other 7 participants! New to me were the attached

It’s not all about the horse sport at Kelsall Hill: Wavy Bittercress Cardamine flexuosa by one of the ponds #wildflowerhour all six stamens present and correct

Two #tinyplants or at least tinyflowers for #wildflowerhour: Hairy Bittercress and Ivy-leaved Speedwell, both ‘weeds’ from my garden

Less animated horses at Kelsall Hill

Sun actually came out briefly at Kelsall Hill while we watched the show jumping from the Terrace #eventing #horsetrials

Kelsall Hill horse trials - but spectating for a change, rather than officiating. A bit chilly and windy but bearable #eventing #horsetrials

“So you’re ‘513 BOU’, huh? Impressive… I’m only 278 BOU.” But I don’t care, cos I’m 775 PSL!! Pan-species listing is definitely the way forward @panspecieslisting.bsky.social - brings a whole new dimension to nature spotting for this jaded old low-lister. I had FIVE lifers yesterday. Mad, innit? 😀

Cross-country obstacles from the weekend at Eland Lodge #eventing #horsetrials

Looking for all the world like a hanging basket, Herb Robert, Geranium robertianum, growing as a wall plant in the car park at Selhurst Park (home of Crystal Palace FC).

Three from Stafford for #wildflowerhour - Dove’s-foot Crane’s-bill at St George’s Hospital, and at Doxey Marshes my first Meadow Buttercup of the year, and Slender Speedwell

Two of those solitary bees I never knew existed until a couple of years ago: Osmia bicornis the Red Mason Bee (currently three males hanging around my bee hotel) and [record shot of] my first Andrena cineraria the Ashy Mining Bee