I had a number of errands to run today, so I didn’t have much time for hunting invertebrates, but a quick whisk around the garden at lunch time netted me this pair of Helophilus pendulus hoverflies, getting intimate on the marginal vegetation of the wildlife pond. Result!, I said to myself smugly – which now I think of it was probably much the same notion as was going through the mind of Mr H. pendulus at the time.
Experience has taught me that these hoverflies are perfectly capable of flying while in cop, and therefore you can’t just march up to them and assume that they’ll stay put. So I approached with caution. But even so, they took exception to my initial attempts to get within macro distance and moved themselves a couple of feet, landing again without ever losing their tie. In many ways their new position was better for me, being higher up the plant and with a better-diffused background, and but for the large blob of dried bird poo this would probably have worked up into a competition shot – but you can’t have everything, and at least I knew I had a decent image to post tonight, so I was able to go off out to Evesham with one item already ticked off my to-do list.
Speaking of to-do lists, I’ve just got round to posting a selection of the invertebrates I found last Sunday on my Facebook page, if you’d care to take a look.
