Lambing - No. 85, your time is up!

Ever wondered where those beautiful spring lambs spring from? Well, it's from a lambing shed. Here's Dean showing how it's done......

Recipe for honey

Warm, sunny, windless, perfect for the newly emerged bees. Here's one of the solitary bees, taken in Souter Park, Whitley Bay:

Tawny Mining Bee - female

Tawny Mining Bee - male

Back at the ranch the frog spawn is now turning to tadploes, so the newts are starting to return.

Palmate Newt - this one is an immature (larva) from last year

And in a sunny corner I found a few Spotted Wolf Spiders sunning themselves. I've not seen these in my garden before.

Spotted Wolf Spider

More garden treats

Diurnea fagella

Early Thorn

Two new moth species for my garden this weekend, Early Thorn and Diurnea fagella. The Early Thorn lived up to its name by being two weeks early than the previous first record for Northumberland.

And here's a Marmalade Hoverfly seen a couple of days ago.

Marmalade Hoverfly Episyrphus balteatus

Tree Bee - Bombus hypnorum

Tree Bee Bombus hypnorum

Unmistakeable with it's ginger head and white tail - only arrived in the UK  in 2001. Now in my garden today for only the 2nd year.

Cherry Making

Honey Bee on Cherry blossom in the warm spring sunshine, at the bottom of our garden.

Durham tinea (Acrolepiopsis betulella) re-discovered in England!

0474 Acrolepiopsis betulella - photo courtesy of Tom Tams

Last night Tom Tams and Keith Dover took a specimen of 0474 Acrolepiopsis betulella, from a site in County Durham. This is the first record of this species for over 120 years. It was believed to be extinct in England.

A stonking discovery!

Spawn!

Away for a couple of days, and I have returned to a frog frenzy. Spawn is filling the garden pond, two weeks earlier than previous years.

Queen Bee

First queen bee of the spring for my garden - Red-tailed Bumblebee (Bombus lapidarius).

And lots of amorous 7-Spot Ladybirds

Winter Shade Moths

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1025 Winter Shade Tortricodes alternella

Finally caught some moths in the trap this morning, the first since 23rd Nov last year.

Just 3 moths; Common Quaker, Common Plume and a Winter Shade. Winter Shade is proving to be widespread and numerous this year with numbers this year already exceeding the total recorded since it was first recorded in Nothumberland in 1889!

Rippit!

Common Frog

Frogs thrashing around in the pond since yesterday, a couple of days earlier than last year when we had a very mild February. Will they spawn before the 23rd March, my earliest garden record?

Oh, and a Blackbird is nesting in the Ivy :)