22 Sep 26

Priorslee Balancing Lake and The Flash

12.0°C > 15.0°C: Fog / mist coming and going – mainly coming. Very light winds. Poor / very poor visibility.

Sunrise: 06:55 BST

* = a species photographed today
! = a first sighting of the species this year
$ = a new species for me in this area

Priorslee Balancing Lake: 05:45 – 09:00

(218th visit of the year)

Bird notes:
- six Tufted Duck noted.
- neither sight nor sound of any Little Grebes.
- at least 350 and probably as many as 450 Black-headed Gulls were present before the mist really closed in after 06:40. Just six were on the football field at 07:05.
- about 50 Lesser Black-backed Gulls were present before that mist closed.
- a big arrival (re-arrival?) of gulls from the East around 08:00 with c.250 Black-headed, 88 Lesser Black-backs and four Herring Gulls were counted.
- no hirundines were seen.
- today nine Chiffchaffs: just one of these heard singing.
- no Blackcaps

Bird(s) noted flying over here:
**all numbers affected by the mist etc.
- 4 Wood Pigeons
- 137 Jackdaws
- 20 Rooks

Counts from the lake area:
**all numbers affected by the mist etc.
- 20 (12♂) Mallard
- 6 (0?♂) Tufted Duck: arrived
- 7 Moorhens
- Coot not counted
- Great Crested Grebes not counted
- c.450 Black-headed Gulls: see notes
- 4 Herring Gulls
- >120 Lesser Black-backed Gulls
- 1 Cormorant
- 1 Grey Heron
- 1 Kingfisher

Hirundines etc. noted:

None

Warblers noted:
- 9 Chiffchaffs: of these one in song
- no Blackcap

Also noted:
Very little.

Bees, wasps etc.:
- Common Wasp Vespula vulgaris

Beetles:
- 7 Spot Ladybird Coccinella 7-punctata

On the West end street lamp poles before dawn:

Moths:
none

True flies:
- 1 Hooded Dryomyza Dryomyza anilis

Springtails:
- 7 *springtail Pogonognathellus longicornis-type

Beetles:
- 1 presumed Cabbage-stem Flea Beetle Psylliodes chrysocephala

Spiders, harvestmen etc.:
- 1 Stout Sac Spider Clubiona sp.
- 1 other spider, unidentified

My best photo to date of a springtail Pogonognathellus longicornis. There were seven to choose from today. The body is 6mm and the antennae about the same.

(Ed Wilson)

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In the Priorslee Avenue tunnel:

Moths:
none

True flies:
- 19 midges of at least three species
- 1 caddis fly Limnephilus lunatus
- 2 *moth fly Psychodidae sp. [Drain Fly or Owl Fly]
- 1 *fly Suillia sp., just perhaps S. flava

Arthropods:
- 1 White-legged Snake Millipede Tachypodoiulus niger
- 3 Common Rough Woodlouse Porcellio scaber

Spiders, harvestmen etc.:
- 1 *Noble or False Widow Spider Steatoda nobilis
- 7 Missing Sector Orb-web Spider Zygiella x-notata [Silver-sided Sector Spider]

This is one of the moth flies Psychodidae sp. NatureSpot illustrates a species Psychoda sigma with "wings which are held parallel to each other rather than diverging" - as here. The problem is that it also notes that the wings of that species have "a pronounced black transverse shade" which this photo does not show

Also a problem with this fly - but then again aren't many of them? This looks to be a fly from the genus Suillia. NatureSpot has a link to a photographic key to this group. It is quite beyond me to look for the arrangement of the bristles on various parts of the body, not only because I am not a trained dipterist but also because the photo is not of sufficient quality to see them. The shading at the wing-tip is only matched by S. flava though the text notes it is a "scarce, largely northern and western species" so probably unlikely.

This is a Noble or False Widow Spider Steatoda nobilis

(Ed Wilson)

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The Flash: 09:05 – 10:20

(213th visit of the year)

Still misty and the island difficult to see at times.

Bird notes:
- a duck Tufted Duck seen.
- 13 brownhead Goosander on the open water with at least another 12 inside the island.
- the daily change for the Great Crested Grebes: only one full adult and four dependent juveniles were noted. Two of the juveniles were together on the open water with no adult in sight. The other two were with an adult in the water near the nest site.
- the two Little Egrets remain.

Bird(s) noted flying over here:
- 2 Jackdaws

Noted on / around the water:
- 6 Canada Geese
- 6 Mute Swans
- 32 (19♂) Mallard
- 1 (0♂) Tufted Duck
- 25 (0♂) Goosander
- 8 Moorhens
- 18 Coot
- 1 + 4 (1 brood) Great Crested Grebe
- 28 Black-headed Gulls
- 3 Cormorants again
- 1 Grey Heron yet again
- 2 Little Egrets yet again

Warblers noted:

None

Noted around the area:

The sun was hot but had only just emerged so not much was active as yet.

Bees, wasps etc.:
- >6 Honey Bees Apis mellifera
- >6 Common Wasp Vespula vulgaris

Hoverflies:
- 1 Common Dronefly Eristalis tenax

Other true flies:
- 1 small greenbottle sp.

Spiders, harvestmen etc.:
- *presumed web of a Missing Sector Orb-web Spider Zygiella x-notata [Silver-sided Sector Spider]

Even more information about Willow Emerald Damselfly Chalcolestes viridis, as I photographed here last Thursday. I was reading Steve Nuttall's excellent daily blog from Belvide Reservoir [https://belvidebirding.blogspot.com/]. Whilst concentrating on the birds seen at this members-only reserve just 12 miles to the East of Priorslee he notes other sightings of particular interest. Last Saturday (19th) at least four Willow Emerald Damselflies were seen there.

It is Autumn. This is probably not, as suggested by Obsidentify, a Roe Deer! I strongly suspect it is the web of a Missing Sector Orb-web Spider Zygiella x-notata, the "missing sector" being in the 11 o'clock position (if anyone still remembers what a clock-face looks like now we have digital time read-outs everywhere)

(Ed Wilson)

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2008
Priorslee Lake
Water Rail
Common Redstart
(Ed Wilson)

The Flash
The drake Mallard x Pintail has returned for the 5th year at least
(Ed Wilson)

2007
Priorslee Lake
Gadwall
Redwing
(Ed Wilson)