So I'm back to the velvet underground

I have been a bit quiet on the blogging front over the past couple of weeks partly due to being busy at work and partly due to a lack of seeing or finding much. I have been reacquainting myself with lots of plants which has made walks devoid of beetles more interesting.

I had a couple of failed attempts to see Musk Beetle at what I thought would be a nailed on site for it! Had the blog post all ready to go with a nod to the late great Peter Green and his Green Manalishi. It was not to be and I ended up looking at and sweeping riverside vegetation. I ticked the common rush species Schoenoplectus tabernaemontani, which I must have seen but wasn't on my list. I have also been going round the village and local arable fields recording common plants and re-familiarising myself with them.

I also had a day on the Suffolk coast with the kids. It was a beautiful day but very little in the way of beetles to speak of except the ubiquitous Rhagonycha fulva. There were a few plants, with Wood Sage being new or at least once again not on my list but I know I've seen it before! This will teach me to keep better records of plants. 

One I have seen before but was nice to see plenty of was Sea Pea. A lovely looking thing that was flowering on the tops of the shingle banks.

Lathyrus japonicus - Sea Pea

Apart from that I've been getting my natural history kicks from the moth trap. 

Pick of the recent bunch which not only was garden first but a full lifer was this Marbled Clover. It took me a while to figure it out as the plate in the TWL Guide doesn't quite do it justice.

Last night was looking amazing for insect dispersal with temps predicted to be above 20 degrees at midnight and a stready breeze. I stayed up with the trap recording the beetles that arrived in the first few hours. It was good but not quite as good as I'd hoped. The trap was heaving with Ophonus ardosiacus though. A species definitely on the up.

I still have lots of small fry to ID but these 2 species were both new for me. Both common, but just ones I'd not come across before.

The first one was obviously a Mycetophagus but it wasn't the one I usually see (quadripustulatus). I keyed it out to quadriguttatus but then it was politely pointed out that it wasn't. A re-key and I realised i had misinterpreted the antennal structure. It was the much commoner M. piceus. 

The other new species just shows how rarely I dip a net in water. My water beetle list is pretty poor and there are many glaring gaps. But no longer including the 3mm Hygrotus inaequalis.

Probably the best record was under the last egg box in the second of two traps and was pretty much the last moth to be revealed. A rather battered male Gypsy Moth. There are very few records from VC29 but this is a species that is gradually spreading from its London heartland. Not a lifer as I had the caterpillar earlier in the year but still good to see.

The post title inspiration has a nod to the post that never happened. After Peter Green saw his Green Manalishi and withrew from public life his band continued and morphed. Twelve years later they released this bit of 80s gold. Enjoy.