So today I took a quick wellbeing and Tourettes walk to the library gardens to see if anything much was around on what was a rather cooler day to what we've been having recently.
At the moment, green alklet is the dominant wildflower in bloom at the moment, and the hairy footed flower bees absolutely love it. Males and females were zooming around like tiny aerial motorbikes, buzzing away and far too fast to photograph.
But it wasn't a bee that caught my eye.
Hunkered down on a bloom was a new ladybird species for me, a cream spotted ladybird. A little smaller than the 7 spots that were present in large numbers, this is a shiny brown lady bird with white spots that don't look particularly creamy.
I was very pleased to see it.
Also new to me was what I think might be a bicoloured mining bee on dandelion. Initially I thought it was just a honey bee, but looking closely I could bee that the banding on the abdomen was different. It was heavily dusted in yellow dandelion pollen.
Not far away, a vestal cuckoo bumblebee was enjoying the mahonias that are still in bloom.
Such a small space, but so much to see!
Si
All text and images copyright CreamCrackeredNature 09.04.26
