By now, you should have received a copy of Malcolm Evans’ work on the “Hoverflies of the Fylde” which was sent out last week. The society still intends to publish a book on the Hoverflies of Lancashire & Cheshire in the coming years, but we need more records, especially away from the well recorded areas of Sefton, Fylde, Saddleworth and Silverdale. There are several other hotspots that have a good number of records such as Brockholes, Longridge Fell, Leyland and Blackburn but as noted with the bee publication a few years back, some common species are just not recorded in many tetrads.
So have a look through the book and you’ll start to see what the commoner (and identifiable) species are. Hoverflies tend to be rather photogenic a lot of the time, resting of a favoured leaf or such like, so it is relatively easy to get identifiable images; they are common visitor to gardens! Then, just go onto iRecord or the Hoverflies Facebook group to record them (response times are very good).
With the weather so dry and sunny, it’s been a good start to the year – poor summers have had a detrimental effect on our invertebrates so have a go whilst the sun shines!
The Bird Report process for 2024 is well underway and the authors are getting stuck into writing their sections. As usual, if you have any images for consideration for inclusion, please send them to Steve White (stevewhite102@btinternet.com). Similarly, if you have any short articles worthy of publication, forward them to Steve.