What's been happening this week in Leeds?

We’ve reached the end of the second week into this year’s field season having tried to make the most of the few hours of sunshine we’ve managed to snatch so far - unfortunately most of them coincided with it being windy too. At the moment our catch has been a little disappointing… but we’re keeping our hopes up for next week!

On the plus side we have managed to see one or two things about as we’ve been going from place to place.



This pond in Springfield Mill Park in Morley was absolutely teeming with (we assume) frogs getting into the spirit of spring!...



... And it had some lovely bright marsh marigolds (Caltha palustris) at its edge too.

We spotted this buff-tailed (Bombus terrestris) clinging onto the grass of a sports pitch in Morley.

 

A bit further round we then came across these two small tortoiseshell butterflies (Aglais urticae) that had been flitting around in the sunshine where it was more sheltered.

A little wren (Troglodytes troglodytes) came to sing to us whilst we were surveying some allotments in the same region.

After sampling a verge this afternoon in Chapel Allerton (which had no flowers, so no pollinators!) we came across a flowering currant shrub teeming with bees.  In total we saw 4 different species: 1 honeybee, 2 queen tree bumblebees, 1 queen red-tailed bumblebee and 1 queen early bumblebee.  The most we've seen all week!

Early bumblebee (Bombus pratorum) on flowering currant (Ribes sanguineum).

So even though it may seem like spring is holding back, there are things out and about for us to look out for :)