One of the best things about writing this book on pan-species listing has been the research. This is mainly taking the form of travelling to distant lands to meet various listers that I have not yet had the pleasure to meet. And last weekend was such a trip. One of those long PSL weekends where I forgot nearly everything else in the world accept what I was doing. Almost as good as a holiday for the head. Anyways, before I do a full write up of the weekend, I have to write this post separately as it would not do it justice to embed it within one of my larger posts. It's a story ten years in the making and concerns what is best described as being simultaneously my 3rd invertebrate, 2nd spider, 1st invertebrate and 1st spider, that I've had new for the UK. Confused? Me too.
I'll start at the beginning. Rewind nearly a decade and read read this post from a twitch to Cornwall to see a Hermit Thrush on the 31st October 2013. I draw your attention to the spider at the end...a very unusual looking Enoplognatha. Here she is again.
Unsurprisingly, the spider did not make it to maturity. In the last four years since befriending Tylan, we have spoke at length about trying to get back to the exact same section of wall at the car park at Long Rock. Now when I first got to Cornwall on Saturday and I went along the beach with Sally Luker to see the Sea Daffodils at Marazion Dunes, I realised that the car park we were in was the wrong one. Looking along the beach, it did seem that there had been some development here. The crumbly old wall I found the spider in was no longer there. It seemed even more like a long shot, so much so that it was the very last thing I did on Monday morning on the 16th October 2023 and even then I nearly didn't bother.
I ran the suction sampler through the sea defences by the car park, reaching down between the rocks. The vegetation was a mixture of Sea-beet, Bramble agg., Ribwort Plantain and large crucifers - nothing special. I took one suction sample and amazingly, ten years later, found an adult male in the first sample. In fact, there was an immature in there too. It's clearly been established in this area for at least a decade. So what is it?
Well, there is only one species of native Enoplognatha in the UK I have not seen, the rare oelandica, that has not been seen in the UK since 1997. It doesn't seem right for it. In the last couple of years, Tylan has been sent a few specimens of Enoplognatha mandibularis as adventives (and it's also established on the Channel Islands) so we were pretty sure it was going to be this and after looking at the spider in detail, it is indeed Enoplognatha mandibularis, new to the UK on 31st October 2013. How cool is that? My 536th UK spider and 372nd spider of the year! Here are a few more shots of it.
It's quite small, or at least variable in size. Heavily annulated legs and with very large chelicerae. A white v-shaped mark at the front of the abdomen and two white spots further back (making an inverted smiley face!) that's also visible on my 2013 spider (although that immature female is less pied and more tri-coloured).
In the intervening period, I have added over 4000 species to my pan-species list! So much has changed in a decade. Oh, and ten years ago I would have lost it at seeing just one Inflatable Cornish Pasty or Portuguese Man o' War but they were everywhere at Long Rock.
If you look really closely in the above photo, you might just be able to make out Cornish Elm. Yesterday I found myself thundering down the M5 with Mark Telfer, Neil Fletcher and Seth Gibson to, at very short notice, twitch the Hermit Thrush down at Porthgwarra. It put up a fight and we didn't see it for two hours or so, so it was all the better when it did show some five hours after being last seen. Prolonged views were had by all. I threw coffee all over myself and was only part way through my pasty when the inconsiderate bird appeared. It was indeed a pretty little thing. However, I was really surprised when I saw the above photo to see how small Mark's arms appear in relation to his head.
We called in VERY briefly at Penzance to see the beautiful Maidenhair Fern. So quickly that I forgot to take a photo. Several donuts later around B&Q car park and the immature Rose-coloured Starling was nowhere to be seen. I was itching to get down to the seafront and turn some stones over so we headed to Longrock Beach. I attempted to search for the White-rumped Sandpiper but my heart wasn't in it and I had non-avian ticks on the mind. Seth, scopeless, was already on the beach where he found these amazing Blue-rayed Limpets. A stunning species I have wanted to see for years. Grey Top Shells were also present.
Hope you don't mind me using your photo Mark!
I turned over some stones and found a very cool looking coastal staph called Cafius xantholoma that Mark identified. Also nearby was a cool little red linyphiid I identified called Ostearius melanopgyius also new for me. Mark found three specimens of a very scarce snail known as the White Snail Theba pisana.
Mark also showed me a few slugs, I still struggle to be interested in them. The thing that has got me most excited though was a specimen I collected from under a stone Seth turned over. It certainly didn't look like anything I had seen before and after dismissing the orb-weavers, I realised it was a well marked theridiid. It soon dawned on me that it was one of the more interesting Enoplognathas and after a few frantic emails back and forth to Peter Harvey today, he told me it is unfortunately not yet quite mature. No wonder I struggled to match it up to a species. It would seem that the most likely option is that it is Enoplognatha oelandica, which is RDB3 and would perhaps be new to Cornwall. If it's not that, it might even be more interesting. Here's the problem. I might have to keep it alive as long as May/June for it to reach maturity. So you might be watching this space for quite a while yet.
A massive thank you, particularly to Neil for driving all that way, that takes real stamina. The exchange of species during these encounters with other listers is thrilling, I really enjoy these times. Salad days indeed.
So I added at least 10 species, ate one Cornish pasty, watched a grown man lose it over a cloud formation (it was a VERY cool cloud formation), travelled for 15 hours over 600 miles to spend five hours in Cornwall but loved every minute of it and ended the day with this photo at a service station. What are the chances of that?! So where we going next?
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