It was an increasingly long, hot Summer!!

Well..
it is November now... and we haven't posted for four and a half months....
it is difficult to really know where to begin...
so, being 'Bwitsh', I will start with a cuppa and mention the weather....
it had been an increasingly long, hot Summer...
everything is parched...
we had a record temperature of 41.6 Centigrade on the 24th August...
and any rain has been totally negligible.... and at the wrong time of day....
which meant that it evaporated off before it could do any good.
And that lack of rain continued into the middle of October...
which then turned colder... but not necessarily wetter...
the end of October up to last weekend we had 40mm in total....
we can't be more specific than that...
as something seems to have glued up the rocker in the raingauge...
hmmph! Spiders.... or a mason bee....?
The total above is from the "analogue" gauge... the ground just swallowed it....
two days after the last rainfall and veggies pulled out of the ground were dry!
We haven't yet been round the pré, but out there.... in mid-October....
there were cracks in the soil that were around 30mm wide and 20cm deep...
the millstream hasn't changed height, nor has it gone cloudy.

The Norway Maples by the Aigronne a few days ago....

....and the potager as day breaks at the beginning of October!

So... onto the wildlife....
The Barn Owls raised at least one owlet... without a camera inside the box, it is impossible to know with certainty...
the eggs hatch at intervals...and they fledge the same.
We are basing the count on the "one" we have records of on video...
our only hesitation being that "the one fledgling" stayed at the nestbox for rather a long time!!

This is the only picture that shows more than two owls at the same time!
Our presumption is that the fledgling is the middle one....

All the usual suspects were around... Swallows, Black Redstarts, Wrens, Tits [asst'd.], Stonechats, Warblers, Woodpeckers, Moorhens, etcetera...
the Swallows appear to have managed three broods this short Summer... as have the Wrens...
a pair of Great Tits didn't read the nestbox guide... and used a deep, open-fronted box destined for other species.

Look, would you please read the  manual!!

With the felling of the poplar plantation that bordered our verger, we lost the close proximity of the Golden Oriole... we heard them regularly, but distant.
However, our Turtle Doves made it back across the Mediterranean!!

Welcome back!

Despite the soggy... nay, sodden, Winter and Spring this year, the Aigronne and the millstream have become sparklin'ly clear and the weed has managed to grow properly.
We've been graced by bountiful numbers of dragons and damsels...

A female Western Spectre dragonfly... possibly our dullest insect raptor...

and a brighter, female Migrant Hawker [I think....?]

And one of our Beautiful Damselflies

and, having been loaned Martin's marvellous moth trap last year, we invested in a new, portable one ourselves... more from that in a later post...
but we've run it four times at approximately monthly intervals and found fascinating and beautiful moths and other insects....
the most numerous being the caddisflies... the larvae of which will be food for the aquatic predators...
setting up close to the millstream has also snared water boatmen, "may"flies, midges of all types and aquatic beetles.
You will have to wait for the wondrous moths... but here is a very small sample of "the other insects"...

Eight, on the outside identical, ground beetles*, two other small beetles and a micro-moth....

.... a tiny leafhopper.... 4 or 5 millimetres long....

....and one of the ichneumons... possibly an Ophion species*....
along with a small caddis fly and a little rove beetle!!
These are all interesting bycatch from the moth trap and shows the diversity of insect types.
* These have been identified... see Susan's comment.

On the mammal front we've been visited by martens, deer, stoats and hedgehogs....
the "pieges photographiques" showing us all but the Stoat, which has now been seen twice from the bedroom window....
just on the other side of the bridge. Both times, viewed going the same way... seems to indicate a waterside patrol...
probably after our Watervoles and the Moorhen chicks.
Baron has caught some Yellow-necked mice....according to Faune Touraine they don't exist here...
or didn't until we supplied photographic evidence!!

This is a marten... probably a Fouine or Beech Marten...
investigating a hole carved by a woodpecker...
and, no, it isn't this light at 3.46am at the beginning of September...
I have "inverted" the picture to make it easier on the eye!

The pré is now reasonably wooded in the intended places... but with more work to do yet...
however, the corridors for the wildlife are established...
though sadly, locally, many more are being lost as local farmers enlarge their fields...
or remove them to allow ploughing closer to the edge.
So... that is the state of Pré at the moment...

The Ivy

.. is the name of a famous London eatery. It's also a vital resource for insects - and therefore insect-eating birds - as the year comes to a close. Friday was sunny much of the time, and the ivy plants on the bridge over the bief were swarming with insects.

What I know about insects could be written on a very small postage stamp, but Tim helped me with the identification, as far as the family level anyway. One critter defeated us both completely, my thanks to Susan for identifying it. There were some very striking animals among the ones we saw and I can understand the fascination that insects have for so many people.. Here are a few.

1. Ivy bee - Colletes hederae

Colletes hederae is a  recent addition to the list of European bees, being described as new to science in 1993. It was first recorded in Britain in 2001. Appropriately, it is collecting ivy pollen.

2, Colletes hederae

3. Colletes hederae

4. Tapered Drone Fly eristalis pertinax, male

5. Tachinid - Ectophasia crassipennis (male)

6. Ectophasia crassipennis

7. Ectophasia crassipennis

8. Ectophasia crassipennis

9. Left -  Ectophasia crassipennis   Right - drone fly eristalis sp

10. As above, lightened

11. Episyrphus balteatus - the marmalade hoverfly

12. Milesia crabroniformis

13. Milesia crabroniformis

14. Drone fly eristalis spp (centre) with another small fly, probably Amphidae

15. Drone fly eristalis sp

16. The German wasp or European Wasp,  vespula germanica, la guêpe germanique, and a friend

Proserpina in the underworld

Yesterday I was harvesting shallots in the potager when a creature surged out of the freshly-broken ground in front of me. My first thought was that I had disturbed some kind of snake, with a pointed snout and a grey, apparently scaly, back. Any small predator such as a weasel would back off immediately when confronted by this display. Then the tail emerged revealing the animal to be a chubby critter just over two inches long, rather short for a snake, although at full stretch in "attack" mode it was a good three inches! Tim came over hastily from mowing and pronounced it to be a hawkmoth caterpillar, but not one he recognised. It has a single eye spot in the middle of its tail, tiny spots of blue and red in black rings on its sides, and lacks a tail spike.

Actually it's rather cute!

Shown against Tim's finger gives a scale to the beasty!

Consultation of the "oracle" (Michael Chinery) identified it as proserpinus proserpina, a species lacking an English common name but whose French name, Sphinx de l'épilobe, translates as the willowherb hawk moth. It also feeds on evening primrose and purple loosestrife, and has been identified as a pollinator of the greater butterfly orchid, platanthera chlorantha. The INPN web site informs us that this is a regulated species on the Red List of insect species for France. The Inventaire National du Patrimoine Naturel only has three records for Indre-et-Loire. Since its home had already been destroyed by accident, we placed it on a molehill in the meadow by some willowherb plants in the hope that it will be able to bury itself again if it so prefers, with its food species nearby but out of reach of large bipeds with gardening forks.

Back on the ground, "scales" showing up nicely.

The scientific name, considering that the caterpillar came out from under the ground, is interesting in itself. Proserpina (Persephone in Greek myth) was the daughter of the Roman goddess Ceres (the Greek Demeter), who was the Earth Mother and "the protectrice of agriculture, and of all the fruits of the earth". Proserpina was sleeping in a flowery meadow when Hades, the god of the underworld, saw her, fell madly in love and carried her off. Ceres pined for her and winter came into the world. Proserpina pined for her mother and her flowers, and generally made life hell for Hades. Eventually husband and mother came to an agreement: Proserpina would spend six months of the year with Hades and six months with Ceres. Winter ended, spring came and the cycle of the seasons began.

Another side view... showing the tail end.

The catterpillar getting an advanced look at what it will become.

The biggest Daddy Longlegs in France

When I went into the bedroom yesterday afternoon, I was stopped in my tracks by an enormous leggy insect on the window (outside, I'm rather glad to say). Tim was busy elsewhere so I went and fetched my new camera, which I've just dropped on the floor as I've been told that's the way to treat them. The manual is (a) massive and (b) on the computer so I did a bit of experimenting and got the macro feature to work after a few dud shots. It was the biggest cranefly (tipule) I'd ever seen, and we identified it from the books as a female tipula maxima. It's rather a fine animal, even if those legs make me shiver.

One last butterfly on the wing

Still mild and moist and plenty of insects about. RonRon the nosy cat poked an ichneumon fly and got stung [they use the short ovipositor in defence], to her great indignation. A very small mayfly rested on the door of the laiterie, building up its strength for a mad short life. A red admiral was searching along the edge of the millstream in the sun - one last forage before hibernation.

Le Petit Peuple de l'herbe

In the vast barn of the Prieure at Le Louroux yesterday, we found a fantastic exhibition of photographs taken of the insects on and around the Etang by David Greyo. This exhibition was presented in conjunction with the Conseil Général d’Indre-et-Loire for just the two days of the Fête de la pêche. The superb pictures provided clear examples for educational panels describing the different insect groups - ideal for an entomological novice like me. There was also a slideshow of shots including the grebes, terns, ducks and owls that make the Etang such a valuable wildlife area. An absolutely unmissable achievement - and all for two days? More about David Greyo and "Le Petit Peuple de l'herbe" can be found on his Blog