Sea Lemon, finally

I had seen lots of Sea Lemon eggs, or so I thought, and was vaguely aware that I had seen on at a bioblitz in St.Andrews (hosted at Oceanographic Institute), but when I fumbled the ID of another sea slug earlier this year I decided I didn't have any choice but to remove it from my list. Now, thankfully, it is back!

This means that I've recorded FOUR species of sea slug from Dalgety Bay this year. So far...

That definitely exceeds my old expectations. Now I have new expectations.

The Littlest Sea Slug - Limapontia capitata

While patiently waiting for some Flustrellidra hispida to open for a photo I noticed a small critter sliming its way across the surface, and idly thought, "hah - that looks like a tiny sea slug!"

Limapontia capitata

I didn't think anything more of it until I was trying to nail the ID of a sea lemon (as yet un-nailed). Suddenly I spotted a figure in the Marine Fauna that looked a lot like what I saw yesterday. Sure enough, about 4mm long this tiny slug isn't a baby of any sort - it's the whole thing! 

There's a video here

Time and tide

Got up early this morning to scrape the frost off the moth trap, and decided t recce the lower shore at Braefoot, Dalgety Bay, for tomorrow's low tide. The rocky coast isn't ideal rock pooling material really as there are precious few loose rocks to look underneath. It was a beautiful morning, though.

And after pottering about for a bit I noticed a small, bright object in one of the pools, which turned out to be te delightful sea slug, Fjordia lineata.

Another new one for me was the Chameleon shrimp, Praunus flexuosus

Hopefully this is a sign of good things to come tomorrow, but after that recce do I try a different shore? Decision, decisions ...

And I looked and Behold! there was a Pale Tortoise Beetle

Fourth new species for Fife from the same grass cuttings pile at Cullaloe LNR was this Cassida flaveola at lunchtime today. Not easy to spot, as it's quite small and, as you can see, not very colourful. It's quite a bit smaller than C.rubiginosa that I've had before.

THERE WILL BE NO MIRACLES HERE

 Aficionados of modern art will know that this piece is in Edinburgh, rather than Fife

Yesterday I had to take my car for a service, and so was in the Lothians rather than the county-line restrictions I've been recently adhering to. As if I ever leave the county! Pfft. However, I was aware that a plant of very limited distribution in Scotland was near the garage at the Museum of Modern Art.

Ironically, I must have walked under these plants unknowingly hundreds of times. Maybe the lack of miracles is a failure to look up!

Mistletoe

As Oscar Wilde famously said, "We are all in the gutter, but there are probably some decent tardigrades and aquatic hyphomycetes if we look close enough"

Conifer-loving bug Tetraphleps bicuspis at Cullaloe LNR

Beaten from Scots Pine, this Tetrapleps bicuspis looks to be a new addition to the county fauna, though it's probably massively under-recorded. Looking at the Highland Biological Recording Group area "dots" on NBN is usually a good indicator. 

It overwinters on conifers as an adult so maybe it's missed. Or maybe not that many people are beating conifers in spring. I suspect more dots could be put on the map with a bit more conifer bashing.

Through the rear(ing) window

Spaziphora hydromyzina, female

Loch Gelly, NT2092

24.ii.2021 (pupa), emerged 3.iii.2021

A pupa, picked up on the edge of Loch Gelly on 24th February, bore fruit today when an adult female Spaziphora was seen bumping about in the pot. It was still teneral and its face hadn't settled in, so when I started to key it later I thought I was going to be in the Sciomyzidae! When I looked again at the now coloured-in specimen the face had receded and it was more identifiable as a scathophagid.

This is the second time I've had this species, albeit it's not on the Fife list. The previous one I remember I had sufficient doubt about it not to record. Be nice to compare if I can track down the specimen in my store boxes.

pupa

teneral, with partial balloon-face

after drying out

The bees knees

A routine visit to the playground this lunchtime resulted in finding a small aggregation of bees around the loose soil a the base of trees nearby. Two very different bees that I managed to pot turned out to be Andrena clarkella and, new to me, Andrena barbilabris. The silver guys were very cute indeed. This is why I always carry pots!