Devilsbit Scabious patch, Caerau

With the hoverfly season starting to decline and new blooming flowers hard to come by at this time of year. I have to select areas with late blooming flowers such as Devilsbit Scabious, luckily Caerau has a large patch of this flower on the colliery spoil edge near the Newtown Bungalows and stream. So I spent 2hrs just in this patch which also has Heather, Goldenrod, Hemp Agrimony as supporting blooms. I recorded 21 species of hoverfly, amongst the commoner species were Melanostoma mellinum (1), Platycheirus granditarsus (1), Eupeodes corollae (1), Eupeodes latifasciatus (1), Eupeodes luniger (1), Helophilus pendulus (7), Helophilus trivittatus (1) and Sericomyia silentis (5). The most numerous hoverfly was Eristalis tenax (50) followed by Eristalis pertinax (20).

Butterflies also seem to like this patch and I recorded Painted Lady (1), Small Copper (5), Speckled Wood (5), Small White (1), Common Blue (1) and Small Heath (3). I also recorded 3 species of Shieldbug in Gorse Shieldbug, Red-legged Shieldbug and Tortoise Shieldbug, the latter I have no records of, so its new for me if not the valley.

Over the last few days there has been a Wryneck at Foel-y-Dyffryn, found and photographed by Colin Gittins. I've been up twice and missed it both times. The Wryneck is a rare and elusive passage migration species in Glamorgan with only a few records a year. I have added Colin's photo to the post for posterity. This bird is the 3rd record for the valley

 Devilsbit Scabious patch

 Eristalis tenax

 Sericomyia silentis

 Painted Lady

 Tortoise Shieldbug

 Gorse Shieldbug

 Red-legged Shieldbug

 White-crust Lichen on Larch, initially I thought someone had marked the tree for felling as it looked just like paint, but closer inspection showed it to be a lichen, I know nothing about lichen so I don't know the species, maybe Ispot can sort it out.

Wryneck - 3rd valley record, found and photographed by Colin Gittins at Foel-y-Dyffryn moorland on the 28th, also present on 29th.