New Forest Gump

Posted by Graeme Lyons , Monday 15 September 2014 22:23

I spent the day in the New Forest and surrounding area with Seth Gibson yesterday and what fun we had! I had 28 ticks in total, including 15 plants and one fish. I really was in the mood for letting someone else do all the work whilst I just drank it all up but it turned out I earned my keep in the end. Where to start? Well, the highlight was a trio of ticks all within a few centimetres of each other (two of which were new to Seth too). The first being Coral Necklace, a rather fine species I've wanted to see for years. I knelt down to have a closer look and spotted some Allseed, not a tick but we were talking earlier that it often grows with Chaffweed and right next to it, there it was! Tick number two!
But that was when I noticed the third new species, the TINY Yellow Centaury! I really struggled to get a decent photo but here it is anyway.

Not the most amazing photo in the world but you get the idea with this one.

Nearby, my first UK Large Marsh Grasshoppers, the females are huge!!!

And the rather gross eggs of the Horse Bot Fly Gasterophilus intestinalis.

I think the most ridiculous species I added to my list must be Duck-potato. I had never even heard of this until the other week, Anyway, quite close to the native Arrow-head, here is Duck-potato growing on Hatchett Pond.

It really is great getting out and about seeing other things on other people's patches. I love days like this, they really encapsulate what PSL is all about to me and I'm looking forward to many others! Nice one Seth! Oh bugger, I totally forgot the Grayling in the river...

1 Response to "New Forest Gump"

Silversea Starsong Says:

Stunning...I've been crawling on my hands and knees trying to find many of the above species for several years at Hatchett Pond after a tip-off in 2006. Insane to see them all together like that. I did not know chaffweed was found there though.

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