Lots of small insects flying about in the sun this lunchtime. Only butterfly amongst them though was a male Brimstone on a non-stop mission. A large moth had decided to buck the trend and take it very easy with some sunbathing. I'm calling this a Grey Shoulder-knot.....please shout if I've got this ...

I'm not seeing many butterflies at work now bar Speckled Wood, the odd Red Admiral and very rare white. Haven't seen a Small Copper or Wall Brown for a couple of weeks....and I'm very jealous of Allan's bugs ! We do have a Knot Grass caterpillar that has been on the same pot of ornamental grass for ...

Fantastic to see all these exotic beauties visiting our shores extending the season's excitement. Without going the full Al Murray though, it's good to know there are some beautiful, beautiful British charmers still out there. Walked round the fields next door to me yesterday and saw 3 different Bro...

Took my son to see Georgie Fame at Ronnie Scott's last Saturday. Fair to say at 27 he fitted comfortably into the youngest 5% age group, but he loved it. We sat next to a charming couple from the States. She has 8 books published. Historical romantic fiction is not my genre though....heaving bosoms ...

As Bugboy says Katrina, highly interesting but understandably unnerving Tippi Hedren experience for you to go through. I certainly would have done the same as you by the way in making my excuses and leaving. The seagulls of Whitby definitely understand the dark arts of intimidation, but I've never e...

Well said Neil - Good old Jack Hargreaves was also a hero of mine and his simple laid-back explanations of how to cast a fly or similar on "Out of Town" really did make a big impression on me a s a kid. He was also perfect for (and I think came up with the idea for) "HOW!" the p...

Hummingbird Hawk-moths are having a phenomenal year locally Mike. My wife and daughter went on a walk round the block yesterday evening where they watched 6 flitting round one garden Buddleia. Amazing looking things. Their bodies look almost bird or small-mammal like at the front and crustacean-like...

Zigzag - a good candidate for moth larva A is Lychnis Hadena bicruris , which looks very much like this and a species I've reared from Dianthus species a few times (it also uses campions). There are a couple of related but less common moth species that will also use it, which have similar larvae. T...

Definitely a bit less about now at work than a few weeks ago. I did spot at least 5 impressively large vespas this week (and I'm not talking about traffic passing the nursery on the way to the Brighton bank holiday mod weekender). We also had Hummingbird Hawk-moths visit every day. They love the lav...

Thanks very much for the link Phil....interesting stuff. Just to add to the fun, I asked the boss where the fern plugs originated. He said that they came via a UK firm, who have several UK centres, but the company has a strong link with a major Dutch supplier, so it's perfectly possible that the fer...

Hi Phil, I really appreciate the consideration and the clear logic behind your thinking. I spoke today to the lady who found it. She confirmed it was on the floor but that it was very close to where she was working cleaning and labelling a large selection of ferns in trays and pots. So there's certa...

Many thanks Phil, really appreciate the input. It was found by a colleague at the garden nursery I work at (in mid Sussex). She brought it to me to have a look at and I'm fairly certain she said she found it on the floor. We do find quite a few on the floor as they get shaken off when we move trays ...

Hi All,

I posted this yesterday in my weekly sightings, but am also putting here as it's the more proper ID request channel.

Beautifully coloured, with a blue/grey background and yellow/orange hairs. Small but very striking.

Any help with an ID appreciated as always.

Cheers

Thanks Allan, I've just taken a look and there's some very similar looking ones online for White Ermine, so I make you spot on - cheers ! Yes, the other one was a striking looking thing in terms of its background colour and yellow hairs. I'll put it on the ID page to see if anyone knows it. Looks li...

And I can confirm that working on a bed full of lavender is more of an olfactory delight than one of ornamental cabbage.

Love those voles, ZZW. You're so lucky to get that close to them. :mrgreen: Thanks David, looking out for nature is definitely one of the perks of the job. I was "caught" photographing these, but I told the boss I was trying to get him a picture for the nursery's Christmas card ;-) The tr...

Sorry, I think it's Rush Veneer I'm seeing a lot of right now rather than Dusky Pearls !

Definitely seeing a lot of Mother Of Pearl as well though.

Yes, you're seeing some great stuff Deborah. To my eyes there can't be too much difference in tail size between a STB and a LTB... Although not as many as Stevie (that legendary hill of his keeps delivering !), I did spot one Painted Lady at work yesterday. In pretty good nick too. Am seeing quite a...

Many thanks for taking time out to answer my questions Brian. I had wondered (hoped in fact) if butterfly collecting was quite a big thing among school children in your butterfly-favourable location, but I guess football (of whatever code), cricket,fishing etc have always had a very big pull on scho...

I'm not sure you needed to go quite so far in praising Steve's looks, David. I'm sure he'd have answered your question anyway