A Few Years In the Life Of....A May Fly. Carpe Diem et al.

Getting pictures of small aphids and insects is never easy but last weekend I was walking along the hedgerow near Piddle Brook when  I spotted a small insect with large wings on a piece of grass. Stalking it as if it were a big cat I got to within a few metres with my ridiculously large lens with a fast speed and high ISO in case it fled and took some pictures, thinking that at any moment it would fly away. It didn't move. I got closer and closer...it didn't take long for me to realise why.  It was dead...

May Fly

A day in the life of a May Fly...thanks to Bug Life for this..what an amazing story...

The common name ‘Mayfly’ is quite misleading because this group of insects can appear throughout the year. In fact, at one point they were called dayflies due to some of the species having an adult life of a single day. The common name comes from the habit of one species, Ephemera danica, which emerge as adults when the Mayflower or Hawthorn is in bloom.

Mayflies start life as an egg on the bed of the river, before hatching into a nymph. The nymphs feed on algae and other vegetable matter on the bed for up to two years in some species, before emerging from the surface of the water as an adult.

Mayflies are unique as insects in having two winged adult stages. After emerging from the water they fly to the bank where they shelter on the underside of leaves or in the grass. They then moult again, leaving behind their drab ‘dun’ skin to reveal their shiny ‘spinner’ skin. Following this moult they fly back to the water and form mating swarms dancing above the surface.

Marvellous mayflies
Mayflies were one of the first winged insects, with fossils dating back over 300 million years – long before the dinosaurs! There are 51 species of mayfly known from the British Isles today and they range in size from less than 5mm to over 20mm.

Mayfly larvae, and the mayfly adults emerging from the water, are a vital source of food for many other freshwater creatures, especially fish such as trout and salmon. Mayflies, and other riverflies, help ensure that our rivers, lakes and streams are home to a rich variety of wildlife.

Populations of mayflies and other riverflies are declining in the UK. As a member of the Riverfly Partnership Buglife is working with other organisations to try and understand the cause of these declines. Once the causes are known action can be taken to reverse the declines and protect beautiful mayflies. For more information on riverflies and their decline please click here.

So, this May Fly was probably in Piddle Brook as a nymph for two whole years and had just emerged for one day. Talk about Carpe Diem. 

A few days later my husband was walking alongside the Meadows and spotted the same insect. He thought at first that it was a juvenile version of a Banded Demoiselle which are quite common around Piddle Brook meadows but realised it was a May Fly when he researched it a bit further.

He also has a stunning picture of a Banded Demoiselle from Piddle Brook Meadows.

Banded Demoiselle

Don't miss the small stuff..it tells us a lot about the big stuff.