The Lyons Share

When I first started this blog ten years ago, saproxylic beetles featured really heavily. In fact, the first time I went out looking for a beetle on a hunch was 2009, when I figured I might have a chance of seeing Leptura aurulenta at Ebernoe and I found it! I was hooked. Over the last few years though, spiders kind of took me away. This year though, I've really started getting back into them. Earlier this month, at an undisclosed site in Surrey, I found a new one. I beat the Nationally Rare Grammoptera ustulata from Hawthorn and I could not believe how beautiful it was! Look at those gold hairs!

I have now seen 38 species.

I have not seen, any species of Saperda, Grammoptera abdominalis or Molorchus minor.

I pulled out how many records I have of longhorns, 349 in all. Now this is a bit behind, as I am still to enter most of last year's records and this years but it gives a good indicator. Here they are in reverse order.

Acanthocinus aedilis (Timberman) - Nationally Rare - 1 record
WOW! Look at its antennae!!! I picked this up in the wood yard at Abernethy when Mark Gurney and I were doing bird surveys for the RSPB way back in spring 2007.

Asemum striatum - 1 record
I have only ever picked this up once, way back in 2010 at Iping Common where several were flying around pine trunks. Didn't get a photo.

Glaphyra umbelletarum - Nationally Scarce - 1 record
Another one I have only ever seen once. This time feeding on Hemlock Water-dropwort in Furnace Meadow at Ebernoe Common. I have a rubbish photo but it's on my old work computer.

Mesosa nebulosa - Nationally Scarce - 1 record
Recorded in April 2016 by a young lad on a BMIG weekend at Sheffield Park, semi-emerged in a fallen log. This is one of the smartest beetles I have ever seen.

Rhagium inquisitor - Nationally Scarce - 1 record
Also at the wood yard at Abernethy back in 2007. I found a hard copy of the photo!

Aromia moschata - 2 records
I have definitely seen this three times, the first being in flight at Lakenheath around 2005. Such an impressive beetle.

Arhopalus rusticus - 2 records
I last recorded this under pine bark at Old Lodge in 2013.

Paracorymbia fulva - Nationally Scarce - 2 records
I first picked this up in Jersey in 2017, recorded twice since in Surrey in 2018.

Poecilium alni - Nationally Scarce - 2 records
This doesn't seem right to me, I am sure I have seen this more than this and I have recorded it at least twice this year already. Like a tiny budget version of Anaglyptus.

Pogonocherus fasciculatus - Nationally Rare - 2 records
It's only known Sussex site is Graffham Common where it's not hard to find on low pine branches.

Stenostola dubia (Lime Beetle) - Nationally Scarce - 2 records
I beat one from foliage on the edge of the glades at Ebernoe back in 2009 and the nothing until May 2020 when I beat one from a veteran lime in West Sussex, amazingly I thought to my self, I wonder if this is how you get Stenostola?! It also flew off before I could get a decent photo! It was quite a lot bigger than the first one I saw.

Stictoleptura scutellata - Nationally Scarce - 2 records
I have only ever seen this in the New Forest, way back in 2011 and not seen since.

Agapanthia villsoviridescens - 3 records
Still not all that common in Sussex but spreading. Spectacular but not saproxylic.

Leiopus sp. - 3 records


Pyrrhidium sanguineum - 3 records
Spreading rapidly in Sussex, already had it twice this year. Lovely colour/texture, quite unlike any other beetle.

Never before have I agonised over the order of my top ten natural history highlights but I do not exaggerate when I say 2019 was the best natural history year of my life. Anyway, spiders are here lumped as one and will get their own top ten at a later date. So here they are in reverse order.

10. Carabus intricatus (Blue Ground Beetle) with John Walters in Devon. 

It was hard keeping John in eye sight on the side of the hill so I was glad that he was able to find us one of these astonishingly smart beetles. December was an exceptional month for me in nature.

9. Purple Emperor (Apatura iris) larva beaten from willow at Holmwood Common.

Not a really rare species but my first encounter with the larva in September produced some unforgettable photos.

8. Snow Fleas (Boreus hyemalis). 

Both on purpose in the Wyre Forest, Shropshire in February and by accident on the Roaches in December.

7.  Mega rare moths found in the field, who needs a moth trap?

I found a LOT of rare moths, probably the rarest was this Purple Marbled that I managed to capture even without a net at Seaford Head during a bioblitz. Others this year including sweeping a Dewick's Plusia in a park in London and netting a Hornet Moth in flight on a freelance job in Kent. 

I did the lookering yesterday at Butcherlands and had a quick look for spiders as I went. I was keen to check up on the Pardosa paludicola that we found there back in 2017. It took about 30 seconds to spot one. They are HUGE compared to the wealth of commoner Pardosa that are everywhere. I saw two females and a male (all adult). They are very leggy and spiny compared to other members of the genus and have another skill up their eight sleeves; they're surprisingly good jumpers and unlike the other species, can jump clean out of the tray!

And a male.

Other species new for the year included a few young female Sibianor aurocinctus (I took this photo of a female last year).

Pardosa pullata

Walckenaeria antica

Pelecopsis parallela

Dictyna arundinacea

I found the cows. All good.

Then I had to service some of the dataloggers in Ebernoe and thought about what Matt said about searching Amaurobius webs for Oonops. On one very dark and shady oak in deep Holly shade there was a huge web (which in hindsight was probably a Tegenaria's). I shook this into the tray and found an amazing five specimens of the nationally scarce BAP Dipoena inornata (Silky Gallows-spider). Now this is only the second time I have encountered this spider (the other was as new to East Sussex from Eridge Rocks in a very different habitat - shaken from fern litter growing on sandrock) and was really surprised to see it in this habitat. New to Ebernoe and the 10 km square. They are meant to eat ants, I would imagine that this would just about be suitable for Brown Tree Ant Lasius brunneus but why were they in this web and in such numbers?!

And the male under the microscope showing the novelty front end. So funny.

Then today the weather wasn't any good for a lunch time jaunt until I saw Matt Prince was on 132 species too. So as I was leaving work I beat the soggy Box bush outside the office window and got THREE species new for the year in ten minutes, putting me on 135 species for 2019.

Clubiona comta (my 6th Clubiona for 2019)

Neriene peltata

Padiscura pallens

I have only ever seen Dendroxena quadrimaculata twice; in 2009 at Ebernoe and again in 2012 at Parham Park. Today I found a single elytron in a spider's web when servicing the data loggers at Ebernoe Common. There are less than ten records for this nationally scarce species in Sussex and all from the West, we didn't find it all during a repeat survey there in 2016. I love identifying beetles from body parts. It's like sea-watching for invertebrates. Distant and tantalising glimpses at the edge of your ability. This one is pretty distinctive though. A caterpillar-predating carrion beetle with unusual markings.

The most abundant beetle elytra behind the loggers in the spider's webs is what I am now coming to know as my least favourite beetle: Nalassus laevioctostriatus. A beetle that has way too many syllables for something so ubiquitous and dull. It truly is the Meadow Pipit of the beetle world. Most of the time if you find one intact, it's covered in fungus. I think they are so slow moving that they can't even outrun a fungus. What's your least favourite beetle?

Most of the spiders were Amaurobius but I did spot this HUGE Tegenaria gigantea which popped out from under one of the protective flaps hiding the loggers. I didn't jump at all.

Later on I noticed this mass of regurgitated beetles. Almost all of them looked to be the Woodland Dor Beetle Anoplotrupes stercorosus but there were a few carabids in there too. I wonder what had selectively sought these beetles out? It seems to have been lying here for some time. Hawfinch calling around the Brick Kiln too and my first Chiffchaff of the year at Woods Mill.