19 September 2017

We went to Apedale in the morning, it was a very foggy morning indeed, although the sun was trying to break through a bit by the end of our walk.

The view back towards the nature area and car park was obscured by fog.

Everywhere was absolutely covered in cobwebs:

Hawthorn leaves covered in webs.

Cobwebs on a teasel.

All the spiders had obviously been incredibly busy:

This web, we think, is made by a sheet web money spider (Liniphiidae), because it has a flat platform section plus a pyramid section above.

Here’s a another web – this time you can see the spider right in the centre, if you look closely. This web was quite high in a tree, so I could get underneath it to take a photo. Again it is a Liniphiidae spider of some kind.

This ghostly looking gorse bush is absolutely covered in webs – we wonder if some of them might be the webs of gorse spider mites (tetranychus lintearius), but we couldn’t any closer because the bushes are on the other side of a fence in a wildlife conservation area.

This fly has met a very sticky end….

We were on the look out for galls on oak trees again:

We are not sure about this funny looking gall, but wonder if it might be a cola nut gall created by the gall wasp Andricus lignicola.

Autumn is well underway – the leaves are starting to turn. 

In spite of the huge numbers of galls this year, some beautiful acorns have managed to come through! 

This slug was enjoying the very damp weather! We aren’t sure on the ID of this one –  it could be a tree slug (Lehmannia marginata) or a juvenile leopard slug (Limax maximus).

The eyebright is still going strong, although will probably last only a bit longer now, it flowers until the end of September.

The automatic sensor on mum’s camera thought that this was a sunset, because of the lovely rusty orange colours of the rose bay willow herb. 

There were loads of goldfinches flying around in gangs – a group of goldfinches is called a charm. Mum managed to take this slightly rubbish photo of 3 of the group. 

Two seven-spot ladybirds on the dead seed head of wood angelica. Ladybirds often overwinter in the hollow stems of these plants. 

Finally we have some fungi for you:

We spotted these puffballs in the woods.

This tiny fungi on a decaying tree stump is called Candle snuff fungus (Xylaria hypoxylon).  

We also spotted these 2 strange fun guys in the fog:

As yet, we have been unable to identify these weird creatures…