In the same patch of grass and nettles there was this fresh
Shaded Broad-bar moth...
And this slightly sinister mass of Peacock butterfly
caterpillars…
In terms of dragonflies I missed yet another
Broad-bodied Chaser in the village (fourth of the year) but I did see my first Southern
hawkers.
Rarest find was this Wool Carder Bee (photographed by Chris
Knight). A mainly southern species, this was the first record for the parish but also the first for north-west
Yorkshire.
I’ll finish with this sighting outside the parish, Yorkshire (or Thistle) Broomrape. A rare plant now only known from a handful of UK sites
and all of them in Yorkshire.
A really striking species which lacks leaves and chlorophyll
and gains its nutrition by parasitizing thistles. With such a common host plant
it seems strange that it isn’t much more widespread.
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