Handbags at dawn

I'm not really very interested in dragonflies. I don't know why, they just don't fire my imagination. Having said that, when a huge invasion of Yellow-winged Darters Sympetrum flaveolum occurred in the 1990's and a friend offered me a lift to Dungeness to see them, I felt I ought to go. It was something of an 'event' and I might be really in to dragonflies in the future and regret having missed out if I didn't go. That choice paid dividends as I also saw Vagrant Darter Sympetrum vulgatum and Camberwell Beauty Nymphalis antiopa that day.

Twenty-odd years later and I have little more interest in Odonata than I did back then but news of 30+ Southern Migrant Hawkers Aeshna affinis at Canvey Island was mildly tempting, more so because of the guarantee of Scarce Emerald Damselfly Lestes dryas at the same site. I was working in Kent on Friday and really couldn't face driving all the way home, only to turn around and head to the other side of the river first thing on Saturday. So I stayed in Kent till after 10pm to avoid the hassle of working out how to pay the Dartford crossing toll and then made the short hop round to the A13 where I managed a few hours sleep in a lay-by.

For once the weather did the decent thing and the overnight rain stopped at 5.30am and I was on site half an hour later (with my handbag of course, I felt I should try to fit in with the locals). It was still cloudy and cool but I soon found some roosting Scarce Emeralds. I soon learnt that my new camera doesn't like taking pictures of Odonata but you can at least tell what it is.

It took another hour and a half for the sun to come out and apart from a few Blue-tailed Damselflies Ischnura elegans and a few darters, one of which I managed to convince myself was Ruddy Sympetrum sanguineum, I had seen nothing else. The arrival of the sun did the trick though and a male Southern Migrant Hawker was suddenly there, a few feet from me, basking on a bramble stem. It only allowed one photo before departing and over the next half hour I saw no more. Returning to the original spot, I found that he was perched in exactly the same place but again his stay was fairly brief and then the cloud returned.

This was the best I managed but you can find much better on the web.

The cloud looked quite extensive so I headed off as I wanted to have a look around the Canvey Wick reserve which was just a couple of miles away. This brownfield site was threatened with development but a long campaign by Buglife saved it, much to my surprise I have to admit. It is now in the ownership of the Land Trust and is managed by RSPB and Buglife. I see that the idiots in the marketing departments have been hard at work and describe Canvey Wick as having 'as many species per square metre as a rainforest'. This of course is patent bollocks. Please give us your evidence for this statement, which square metre, which rainforest?

I reckon my backside has more species than this square metre

Despite this nonsense, Canvey Wick does have a number of interesting species and I have wanted to visit for some time. The site is more heavily scrubbed than I expected and with less disturbed ground. It will be interesting to see how Buglife and RSPB manage to retain the interest of the site, much of which will be dependent upon large-scale disturbance. As expected, there were large amounts of invasive non-native plants. Some, such as Goat's-rue Galega officinalis are a problem and need dealing with before they get totally out of control but others are things that I don't see very often. Narrow-leaved Ragwort Senecio inaequidens is a species that I have only previously seen on the Isle of Sheppey but it was abundant here. Surprisingly it did not seem to be very attractive to insects as a nectar source.

Narrow-leaved Ragwort

Both Rose Campion Silene coronaria and Rock Stonecrop Sedum forsterianum are species that I have only seen occasionally before.

Rock Stonecrop

I spent an interesting few hours on the site but I wasn't blown away as I expected to be. Maybe the marketing hype had got to me after all and I was expecting too much, maybe it is better for groups that I don't focus on, maybe the weather was reducing activity. Hopefully there will be some more interesting species amongst the material that I have brought back for identification but in the mean time here are a couple of the more notable species that I did find.

Adonis' Ladybirds Hippodamia variegata clearly enjoying the site.

The 'Tumbling Flower Beetle' Variimorda villosa

I don't bother much with spiders (remember, six legs good, eight legs bad) but this one was quite funky so I took a photo and a friend has kindly named it for me.

Neoscona adianta

When I returned to my car a Buglife staff member was starting a guided walk and I was pleased to hear her say that participants were welcome to collect specimens as long as they sent records in afterwards. So I didn't need to hide my net after all!