The first five hundred

Feeling at a loose end this afternoon I took 30 minutes to poke around the garden. I was struggling to find much of interest and my enthusiasm quickly waned.

A last ditch effort with the vacuum sampler turned up a few of the usual suspects but in amongst these was something I couldn't put a name to. I knew I hadn't seen it before and despite the small size was an easy one to identify.

The staph Metopsia clypeata. Adult beetles are active from March until October, and occur among decaying organic matter in tussocks, leaf-litter, dung and fungi and have been recorded nocturnally at sap and under bark. Mine was from a bit of my lawn with yarrow and other plants. Probably some decaying material in there too.

Entering the record I realised that this was the 500th species of UK beetle that I have identified (there are many others sat in the freezer waiting for a name...). My hope had been to try and see another 200 by the year end and hit the 700 mark. I've already seen about 50 new species so far this year and was hopeful of reaching that target.

I'm pretty sure that won't happen now as I'm obviously restricted to my garden for the forseeable. There is obviously still plenty to find I will just need to be resourceful.