Today’s running around encompassed both Evesham and Stratford, and by the time we made it back home again I was tired and grumpy, and fairly disinclined to go back out in the garden hunting invertebrates. Luckily though, I spotted this sleeping bumblebee – a male Common Carder (Bombus pascuorum) – almost as soon as I stepped out into the back yard.
The only problem I had was that the toadflax flower from which he was hanging was just a few inches above the ground, so I had to kneel down on the wet gravel and then bend myself over like Quasimodo, to try to get as much of him in shot as possible. That done, I levered myself back upright, lost my balance, and had to skitter sideways like a drunken folk dancer to get my feet back under my centre of gravity, before I found myself going for yet another involuntary flying lesson. It’s an age thing, I think. Or a stupidity thing – one or the other.
I’m adding a second photo, of a Juniper Shieldbug on a viburnum leaf, because I really love the autumnal tones. On any other day the bug would probably have made top spot, but a sleeping bee is adorable, a male bumblebee in November is unusual – and the combination of the two is irresistible.
