Ballachurry Reserve: some recent identifications and useful websites.

 As stated in my profile, I often have to seek help identifying the wildlife I photograph at Ballachurry Reserve. Professor Helen Roy of the UK Ladybird Survey has been helping me for many years now and I am indebted to her for identifying two recent sightings among the nettles.

"Such an important ring –
 I mostly see 11-spots without the rings but
 it is indeed also an 11-spot with the rings.
Characteristically a small ladybird. Great find! "
( Prof. Helen Roy, UK Ladybird Survey)

This next one is not a great photo but I think you can see that it had no rings round the spots

Professor Roy commented :  It is an 11-spot – an exquisite find! 

Hopefully the above two tiny ladybirds are of different sexes and will meet up!

http://www.coleoptera.org.uk/coccinellidae/home  is where you will find the UK Ladybird Survey.
http://www.coleoptera.org.uk/home is the home page for Beetles generally.

This ladybird is clearly a 7-spot but what about the Bug?

  "This one is tricky, but it seems to be rather the worse-for-wear Lygus wagneri..
 I just can't be 100% on that, although it wouldn't be at all surprising for Man."
(Dr. Joe Botting from britishbugs website)

https://www.britishbugs.org.uk/index.html  is a useful website. I have used it many times for  Shieldbug identification, in particular. I am most grateful to Dr. Botting and his colleague Dr. Tristan Bantock for all their help.

Late news: Dr. Bantock suggests this might be Lygus rugulipennis, the Tarnished Plant Bug rather than Lygus wagneri. I'll leave the two colleagues to fight it out but their website has the following information:
This genus is one of the most problematic mirid groups to identify. The five UK species can overlap considerably in colour, markings and size;The most reliable identification features concern the fine detail of the corium, and are visible only at high resolution.
My photo is hardly high resolution! Either way though we have a new record for the reserve.


Much closer to home this website may be of interest

https://isleofman.nbnatlas.org/   Top left has a search facility. If, for example, you type in 11-spot ladybird  you can find all the records for 11-spot ladybirds on the Isle of Man since records began! You will find that most of the recent records  come from Ballachurry Reserve! These 11-spots are so small they are easily overlooked and, I suspect, under recorded rather than rare.

It seems to be a good year for ladybirds, so if you spot any ( no pun intended!)  when out and about please do consider reporting them to the ladybird survey. The record will automatically find its way back to the IOM Atlas too.

And finally, with  more settled weather forecast for the coming week I hope to be back at Ballachurry soon. May is always a wonderful month on the Reserve.