YNU the Naturalist No 1093 TEXT
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
December 2016 Volume 141 Number 1093 Yorkshire Union Yorkshire Union The Naturalist Vol. 141 No. 1093 December 2016 Contents Page Sarah White, President of the Union 2016-17 161 Moth trapping for 'river flies' Sharon Flint and Peter Flint 163 Field note: Mixed fortunes for broomrapes Phyl Abbott 166 A bilateral gynandromorph Orange-tip Anthocharis cardamines: Some 167 observations* David R. R. Smith Freshwater plants and SSSI canals in the East Midlands and North of 169 England 1: Leeds & Liverpool Canal and Huddersfield Narrow Canal R. Goulder Drystone walls and the ecology of snails: some preliminary findings* 185 Michael Pearson A key to the parasitoids of Coleophora serratella (Linnaeus, 1761) – a 192 work in progress! Derek Parkinson Recent observations on Agrypnetes crassicornis (Trichoptera : 196 Phryganeidae) the Malham Sedge, Yorkshire's critically endangered caddisfly P.W.H. Flint & S. Flint Carrion Crows with white/grey feather markings Richard Shillaker 197 Field Note: 'Extinct' plant found near Kendal Pete Shaw 200 What's hit is history: Key Yorkshire bird specimens in the collections at 201 Whitby Museum: a tribute to Thomas Stephenson* C.A. Howes YNU Bryological Section: Report for 2015 T.L. Blockeel 214 Yorkshire Naturalists' Union Excursions in 2016 221 YNU Calendar 2017 240 Letter to the Editors: p237 Response: p238 Notice: Yorkshire Naturalists’ Union Conference 2017 p239 An asterisk* indicates a peer-reviewed paper Front cover: Bilateral gynandromorph Orange-tip Anthocharis cardamines found at Askham Bog (VC64 Mid-west Yorkshire) on 13 June 2016. Photo: Mark Coates Back cover: Leeds University MSc Biodiversity and Conservation students at the training day on identification skills given by the YNU, September 2016. Photo: Judith Allinson Sarah White, President of the Union 2016-17 My childhood was spent in suburban Birmingham, perhaps not the most promising start for an interest in natural history, but my father loved the countryside and particularly birds, so we had wonderful trips into rural Worcestershire at weekends, and to the Welsh Border country in search of Buzzards, then confined to the western fringes of the midland counties. I saw Kestrels in the Birmingham suburbs - they nested on the church opposite my school and were a distraction from lessons - but it was many years before I saw a Sparrowhawk or a Peregrine, both city birds now. Summer holidays were all UK ones in those days and a favourite was Norfolk, sailing at Blakeney and birdwatching on the saltmarshes. I was inspired by reading RSPB stories of returning Avocets and Ospreys and joined the YOC, winning a book about Kingfishers on the river Test, which showed me all birds I had yet to see. From Birmingham I progressed to Cambridge and a Natural Sciences degree. The short terms and demanding academic work left little time for much else, but I remember coppicing at Hayley Wood with Oliver Rackham, cycling to Wicken Fen to see a Great Grey Shrike and the first of many visits to the WWT at Welney. Determined to pursue a career connected with wildlife, I went to Durham to do an MSc in Ecology and made my first acquaintance with the wonderful North Pennine dales of Teesdale and Weardale. Our field course was to the North-west Highlands and I was overwhelmed with The Naturalist 141 (2016) 161 the wildness and richness of Torridon and Inchnadamph. My supervisor was the late Peter Evans, a superb ornithologist and conservationist. Then, at last, the road led to Yorkshire and a graduate studentship with Michael Usher in the Biology Department at York. I had managed to survive my MSc at Durham without gleaning much botanical knowledge and it was thanks to Michael that I eventually learned my plants. He was very active in the then YNT and I got to know Stephen Warburton, the Field Officer, who lived round the corner from me in Heslington. Through him I became involved in the campaign against navigation rights on the River Derwent. When the time came to find a job, I was fortunate that the Nature Conservancy Council was looking for a number of new Assistant Regional Officer posts and I was offered one in the York office with responsibility for the county of Humberside. This was a wonderful time – exploring the fabulous habitats of the East Riding with the help of knowledgeable naturalists who were so generous with their time, their knowledge and their hospitality, like Brian and Shirley Pashby, Derrick Boatman and Eva Crackles. A major project was the survey and extension of the Derwent Ings SSSI to protect the flood meadows against agricultural improvement. This also led to the land purchases which were the start of the Lower Derwent Valley NNR. It was at this time that I worked with John Bowers, who advised us on the economic arguments against land improvement, a pioneering field. I would have been very happy to stay longer in Humberside, but after 5 years I was moved to the Yorkshire Dales and set up an office in Leyburn, initially single-handed, then joined by an expanding team. We worked closely with the National Park Authority and completed a Phase 1 survey in which the best hay meadows were identified. We also purchased land on Ingleborough, to extend the existing NNR at Scar Close. The job moved again, briefly to Cumbria and then to Newbury, where I still live. By this time, though, it had become managerial and less enjoyable, and so I reduced my hours to enable me to do a part-time degree in the History of Art which was a refreshing and enlightening change. When this finished, I attended birdwatching classes led by Ken White, an inspirational soul-mate, who is now my husband. Bird surveys are an important part of our life and we are joint BTO Reps for Berkshire. We make frequent trips abroad, including an annual pilgrimage to southern Spain for the raptor migration across the Straits of Gibraltar. I also keep up my botany with survey work for the BSBI Atlas 2020. I work as a Teaching Assistant in a local school and I have recently written a book on the wildlife of the school grounds. We would love to spend more time in Yorkshire – at the moment it is largely restricted to the VC61 Excursions which we organise – but retirement beckons and we may, before long, have more time to spend in that wonderful county. 162 The Naturalist 141 (2016) Moth trapping for 'river flies' Sharon Flint and Peter Flint email: [email protected] Introduction Our recent initiative through the YNU Freshwater Section is to encourage Lepidoptera recorders and others to record adult mayflies (Ephemeroptera - E), stoneflies (Plecoptera - P) and caddisflies, also referred to as sedges or sedge flies (Trichoptera - T) from their light trap 'by-catch'. Thus the acronym EPT, used in this article, refers to these three groups collectively. Somewhat confusingly these three taxa are often referred to as 'river flies' either individually or in combination, especially by the angling community. Not all of them, however, are associated with rivers so it is difficult to come up with an all-encompassing, meaningful term for this rather artificial grouping. The EPT acronym has been widely used in the scientific literature as the ecology of these taxa has usually been studied in combination in river systems, at least in their juvenile stages. This has inevitably seeped into the small number of academic studies (at least in the UK) on the adult ecology. Feeding, dispersal, swarming, mating and oviposition are all aspects of the ecology of the adults which have been very sparsely investigated here in the UK. Information, therefore, about where they occur and an indication of numbers could be a very useful starting point for further investigation. Adult ecology It has been generally believed that these animals are poor fliers and, therefore, poor dispersers. The findings of some researchers, however, have shown that distances of up to several kilometres are travelled by adult stoneflies (Kuusela & Huusko, 1996). It has also been shown that adult caddisflies migrated some 16km upstream from their emergence sites (Coutant, 1982). Petersen et al. (1999) showed that very few stoneflies and caddisflies dispersed laterally as far as 75m from the stream channel. Even these small distances could be important to reproductive success in a patchy environment. We need to understand what the adult habitat requirements are, where they lay their eggs (oviposition site choice), whether and what some of these species eat or imbibe as adults. Adult feeding is a prerequisite for successful completion of the life cycle for many stoneflies, particularly females (Hynes, 1942; Zwick, 1990). Stoneflies are known, from gut content analysis studies, to ingest lichen and algae (from tree bark). Caddisflies and mayflies do not possess chewing mouthparts but mayflies have been observed to imbibe sucrose solutions when offered them in feeding experiments. Feeding also has an effect upon egg maturation. Recording 'river flies' It is crucial to recording that reliable identifications are made so that more comprehensive distribution maps can be produced which will, it is hoped, enable further in-depth studies to be made into the whole life cycles and habitat requirements of these three groups. This should lead to more informed conservation management decisions which take into account the importance of both adult and juvenile phases of the life cycle. The Naturalist 141 (2016) 163 At a recent meeting of people recording adult EPT, the national recorders stressed just how under-recorded these three groups are in their adult stages and that recording should be encouraged, especially by moth trappers. Light trapping for moths is widespread and popular in the UK and there is potentially a huge amount of data that could be gathered about EPT from willing moth trappers who are prepared to have a closer look at their by-catch and send on voucher specimens to their county recorder.