Insects

The Hawthorn Shieldbug overwinters as an adult, although they have been known to reappear from hibernation during periods of unseasonable warm weather in the winter.

The Spiked Shieldbug is a large and distinctive predatory shieldbug, with a pair of unmistakeable thorn-like spikes on its shoulders and bright red legs and antennae.

Until the late 1990s the Alder Sawfly was thought to be extinct in Britain. It has since been found in southern England and has been slowly spreading northwards.

The Birch Shieldbug overwinters as an adult in leaf litter, after which they emerge in the spring to start mating.

The Red-legged Shieldbug is a sap-feeder and uses piercing mouthparts to withdraw the liquid.

The Noon Fly lays its eggs in cow dung. It is ovoviviparous and the eggs hatch prior or within an hour after being deposited.

There are two generations of Tachina fera per year.

The Parent Bug is a medium-sized brownish-red shieldbug with a black and white chequered pattern along its sides.

Female Sicus ferrugineus pounce on worker bumblebees and inject an egg into the bee abdomen, using their specialised ovipositor.

The Gorse Shieldbug is a large shieldbug with two adult colour forms.

The Furry Dronefly is a very furry, bumblebee mimic.

The Common Banded Hoverfly has a black body with a pattern of yellow bands and a yellow ‘moustache’ on their face.

Carder Bees get their name from their habit of combing material together, known as ‘carding’ to create a cover for the cells that contain the larvae.

The male Bright Horsefly can be seen hovering in woodland glades in early morning sunshine waiting to pursue and copulate with passing females.

The Early Bumblebee is one of the most common in Britain and as the name suggests, it is a spring specialist, being one of the earliest bumblebees to emerge from hibernation each year.

The Pearly Green Lacewing has a green body, pearly blue-green wings with black veins and several black markings on its head, thorax and under the abdomen.

The Black Snipe Fly is carnivorous and catches smaller insects in flight, taking them back to a perching spot to eat.

The adult Common Green Capsid can be seen from June to October and they feed on various plants, especially nettles, but will also eat aphids, caterpillars and mites.

Grypocoris stysi is a genus of ‘true bug’ known as a Mirid Bug.

The Tawny Mining Bee mates in spring, after which the male will die and the female will begin building a nest.

The Ashy Mining Bee or Grey Mining Bee is one of the most distinctive springtime solitary bees, with striking black and grey-white markings.

The Common Green Grasshopper is mostly green in colour. The male can be olive-brown but the female is always dorsally green. Their eyes are either brown or yellow.

The Meadow Grasshopper doesn’t have hindwings, making it the only flightless grasshopper in Britain.

The Giant Cranefly is the largest of the British Craneflies, having a leg span of 100mm.

The Scorpion Fly belongs to the ancient group of insects known as the ‘Mecopterans’.

Marsham’s Nomad Bee is a small cuckoo bee and is a wasp mimic with yellow and black stripes.

The Oak Catkin Mirid Bug is of the family Miridae who are inflorescence specialists on European trees, feeding on the staminate catkins of a variety of deciduous trees.

The larva of the Tapered Drone Fly is a rat-tailed maggot

Rhamphomyia sulcata is quite a large fly of the Dance Fly species.

The Hook-banded Wasp-hoverfly is a very boldly marked hoverfly.

The Marsh Cranefly is possibly the most common cranefly in Britain.

This Red and Black Froghopper is a without doubt an unmistakable species.

Metatropis rufescens is a large and umistakeable orange-brown stiltbug.

Achaius oratorius is a medium-sized black Ichneumon Wasp with white spots measuring around 11–15 mm.

Ptychoptera albimana is a distinctive orange and black insect with a pale hind tarsi, which is unique within UK members of the genus.

The Yellow Dung Fly, as the name suggests, is a fly that lays its eggs on dung, most often on cowpats.

The adult Common Green Shieldbugs breed in the spring and the offspring go through five changes before becoming an adult.

The Common Wasp can be identifed by the four large yellow spots at the back of the thorax and the equal thickness yellow stripe on each side of the pronotum.

The Common Flesh Fly is a common and widespread fly, that can be seen all year round in many habitats.

The Alder Spittlebug is probably the most common and widespread, of several similarly patterned, large froghoppers.

A large, unmistakable and very striking black and yellow leafhopper.