I saw several of these tiny (4mm) dung beetles recently at the Green Beach and Devil’s Hole. I thought they were an Aphodius sp. but Gary Hedges sent them to the national dung beetle expert and, despite my dreadful photographs, they came back as Aegialia arenaria. This is fairly common and widespread but largely coastal...
Rob Duffy: Sidewalk Botanist – Early Spring Notes
Last Saturday, the 14th, was the warmest day (at 14 degrees celcius) in nearly 5 months and an excursion across the Roby fields and ponds was a positive pleasure. Beyond the M62 bridge, a huge field of young winter wheat covers a kilometre in length and somewhat less in width; within it a series of...
Hugh Harris: Lunt Meadows and Wetlands Nature Reserve, SD3402
Lunt Meadows is an entirely new 77 ha wetland nature reserve, located along the River Alt floodplain, owned by the Environment Agency, in North Merseyside. It is sited adjacent to an area of raised bank suspected to be the first point of overtopping in a flood event. In July 2010 the River Alt bank did...
Jim Pearson: The Purple Fumitory
Purple Ramping-fumitory is a nationally scarce and endemic to the UK, the only place it grows naturally in the world. It is an annual plant which used to be widespread in the mixed farming and arable areas of Britain. However, during the last 50 years it has undergone a drastic decline throughout its former range...
