Strensall Common with Hull Nats

A warm and humid day with welcome, scattered clouds. We start our walk from the railway line crossing car park. There are several clumps of creeping thistle buzzing with insects, including a diverse cast of butterflies. The common is very dry, we walk on two board walks over a parched landscape, which was probably wet in the winter. An area shows the signs of fire, black ground, birches and pines with the purple moorgrass sprouting, two paths appear to have acted as firebreakers. I stand on the path and point the bat detector to the burnt area: silence. I turn round and point at the chugging calls of the Bog Bush crickets on the other non burnt side.

Small Skipper.

Meadow Brown.

Large White.

Large Skipper.

Comma.

There is a ditch with tussocks of Purple Moorgrass by the car park. I have a look before we all assemble and quickly find a Long-winged Conehead nymph and a Bog Bush Cricket. There are also Common Green and Meadow Brown Grasshoppers. My bat detector allows me to hear the reeling of a Roesel's and chugging of Bog Bush-crickets.

Long-winged Conehead nymph.

Bog Bush-cricket.

Meadow Grasshopper.

Female Bog Bush-cricket.

Sandy coloured Bog Bush cricket female.

We are lucky enough to witness a female Bog Bush-cricket nymph moulting. The whole process is quite fast. The next three photos illustrate it.

Moulting Bog Bush-cricket.

We are moving very slowly indeed and we reach the following car park after an hour and a half. There the heath is under open woodland and there seems to be more nymphs than adults, in large numbers. I stop trying to record each Bog Bush-cricket I see. This one got its antennae entangled and was trying to sort them out.

Female nymph Bog Bush-cricket.

Lesser Spearwort.

Round-leaved Sundew.

Eyed Ladybird, netted by Bill Dolling.

We move onto Worlds End Wood, where we go to a large pond. An Emperor lands on a birch during a cloudy spell. 

Four spotted chaser.

Labyrinth Spider.

Brown Hawker ovipositing.

Ruddy Darter.

Emerald Damselfly.

Large Red Damselfly.

A Bog Bush-cricket male by the pond. I found they were singing even from bracken areas with Molinia underneath.

Mottled Grasshopper.

An unfortunate Common Green Grasshopper fallen prey to a Labyrinth spider.

Common Green Grasshopper is plentiful around the common, here on a sandy path.

It was very quiet on the bird front. Of note were some fledgling Stonechats on the large bracken patch and a Reed Bunting.

Stonechat juvenile.

Reed Bunting.