A couple of garden ticks

A quick 15 minutes with a tray and a stick yesterday, resulted in loads of spiders that I have neither the desire nor the skill to identify plus a load of plant hoppers. I let those all go on their merry way and concentrated on what I thought I could probably identify.

Along with several Meligethes aeneus and a couple of species of larger ladybird I managed to get a couple of ticks.

The first was the tiny ladybird Nephus quadrimaculatus. At only 1.7mm it really is small. It was beaten off mistletoe but apparently is often found on old ivy and there's quite a bit of that nearby.

The second new species for me was a sawfly. I have never knowingly identified one before seemingly knew what it was as soon as I saw it. A quick romp through the key took me to Abia sericea and a female to boot.

A very stunning beast with the most immense jaws too. But although I tried, I just couldn't get a pic of them so the above will have to suffice.