Midge larvae

A few days ago I discovered what appeared to be eggs in a mass of jelly about 2cm long in a tray of water in our garden.

The eggs appeared to be arranged spirally within the jelly.

On examination under the microscope, we could see small creatures inside the eggs.

Three days later, these had hatched out as small larvae.

These appear to be the larvae of Chironomids, or non-biting midges. We'll watch to see how they develop.

Addition to previous blog entry:

Last Saturday I found more star jelly, high up on a Scottish mountain.

Lake of Menteith

Today I had the opportunity for a botanical excursion to the Lake of Menteith - the only "lake" in Scotland (all the others being referred to as lochs).

Inch Tulla (on the left) is a very small island with a castle, and Inchmahome (on the right) has a ruined priory.

As we had the use of a boat, we had a great opportunity to look at aquatic plants.

Of the three water-lilies that we saw, the least common is the Least Water-Lily (Nuphar pumila). Unfortunately the flowers were already over. The edge of the top of the ovary is scalloped.

Yellow Water-lily (Nuphar lutea) was also present. It is much larger, and the edge of the top of the ovary is smooth and not scalloped.

Its conspicuous flask-shaped fruits are responsible for its alternative name of "Brandy-bottle."

The commonest is the White Water-lily (Nymphaea alba).

There is one other species of Water-lily which is not found on the Lake of Menteith, though it is found nearby. This is the Fringed Water-lily (Nymphoides peltata). It is not related to the other water-lilies. Below is a picture of it which I took on 31st August 2003.

Fungi are now appearing everywhere and we saw some conspicuous ones.

The Lake of Menteith is also a good place for birds.

We saw large numbers of Great Crested Grebes,

...a pair of Mute Swans,

and several Herons.

Resin and amber 2

Yesterday we re-visited the tree where we found resin last autumn (see Resin and amber).

This time we decided to take a small piece of resin home with us so we could look more closely to see what small creatures had become trapped in it.

The body of this ichneumon fly measured 4mm.

A small mite, measuring about 1.2mm. There were large numbers of these.

Another mite or small spider with a body length of about 1mm.

A small fly

After many millions of years, resin such as this, containing a microcosm of life from our time, would solidify and become amber.

For more information about amber and the creatures found in it, see

"Jewel of the earth," which includes a complete transcript of the David Attenborough programme and many images.

Thanks to those who helped identify the insects in our blog post of 8th August. They were the hoverfly, Volucella bombylans, and a male Heather Fly, Bibio pomonae.