Apr 2009

April 09 notes

04/04/09 20:36 Filed in: Monthly highlights | April | 2009

We (Adam and I) lately arrived back from a week away (in warmer climes) on a second year field course. When we left the UK there were only a few plants flowering now there are many more. Daisies are in flower everywhere on the playing fields and verges by the paths. Butterbur is flowering in profusion by the river in large colonies of pyramidal spires poking out of the soil; in places accompanied by large, matt, rhubarb-like leaves. But the real treat is the mats of soft pink-whites and pure whites of Wood Anemones in our woodlands. What a terrific sight they are in the dappled shade of the woodland floor. These plants are meant to be a sign of ancient woodlands and are in Peterken’s list of ‘ancient woodland taxa’. But there are common enough in mature well-managed woodland anywhere in the region.

There is also a run of other new arrivals; Field Speedwell is up on the verges of the playing fields and Early Violets are flowering in the dappled shade of woodland glades and paths.

Not to be out done several species of trees are also flowering. Blackthorn and Wild and Bird Cherries are covered branch to tip with paper-thin white and pinkish white flowers. Cherry trees are the source of plumes of beautiful fragrance wafting along the edge of hedgerows and verges, especially in mornings and evenings. Very nice indeed. Goat Willow and Hazel have almost finished flowering and are coming into leaf. White Willow and Hawthorn are or soon will be flowering, providing much needed food resource for our early bees, hoverflies and the like.

We have saved the last bit of this blog for one of our favourite organisms - bees. The sky and flowers are full of Bumble Bees and Honey Bees at the moment seeking nectar and pollen from the early flowers. But my favourite bee of the moment is Anthophora plumipes or using its very appropriate common name the Hairy-footed Flower Bee. This is another of our solitary bees and it is widespread across the south of the UK, becoming much less common in the north (see map here). It is an early flier active early in spring to mid summer (Feb -June) and it uses its long proboscis to feed in long thin flowers such as Lungwort (and other flowers with a similar structure).

The species is one of the Mason Bees and it lives in holes in masonry (walls) and banks of bare soil where it creates a run of small chambers each carefully constructed foindividual eggs. It is a terrific little insect and its name doesn’t really do it justice. It should be called metallic ginger hairy footed flower bee. It is an easy bee to identify although initially you’ll think it is two species as it is very sexually dimorphic. The females are black and look like small melanistic Bumble Bees, but they have bright orange/ginger hairs on their back legs. The males look completely different and are reminiscent of small ginger Bumble Bees but they have noticeable white faces. What really distinguishes them is their jizz (a word used by birders to describe the overall way a bird looks and feels when you see it; in short a gut feeling as to what species it is in relation to how it looks and what it is doing). They just look different in flight and they fly like hoverflies, zipping about from stationary hovering to high speed movement with ease. They also have fantastic eyesight and are quick to move when you enter their line of vision. In fact you can often see them hovering directly in front of you checking you out! Keep an eye out for these little pleasers in April and May.

Tags: spring, spring flowers