The variety of insects is amazing, as are their numbers.
About a million species of insects have been described and named, and there are certainly millions more to be discovered and cataloged.
A banded male dragonfly
Insects have six legs as adults, but that’s where the similarities end because there are so many variations on the basic insect body plan. There are a lot of fascinating insects around this month, many of them attracted to gardens, especially those with brightly colored flowers.
Tragically, the number of insects has decreased by around 75 percent in the last 50 years, mainly due to the constant loss of their habitats such as forests, heaths, meadows and swamps, as well as pesticide poisoning and pollution of rivers and lakes.
Such a decline in insect numbers has also affected populations of insectivorous birds such as cuckoos, swallows, nightingales and spotted flycatchers – the latter, for example, has declined by more than 90 percent since the late 1960s.
In the UK, the Butterfly Monitoring Scheme has uncovered alarming losses over many years, with common species such as peacock and meadow brown having declined by nearly 50 percent in 40 years, and rarer species such as locks of hair and pied butterflies by nearly 80 percent since the mid-1970s. There are about 17,500 species of butterflies worldwide and we have 59 here in the UK, about 20 of which could show up in gardens.
Peacock butterfly
While a very small proportion of the insect species damage humans and their crops, the vast majority are useful and even essential for the healthy functioning of natural and near-natural ecosystems.
Without them, grazed fields would be covered with dung, wild and garden flowers and crops would remain unpollinated, and pests would thrive unhindered by their natural predators.
Add to this the fact that countless species of birds, mammals, fish, and amphibians include insects in their diet, and you can see how much depends on a healthy and diverse insect population.
This Nature Note shows a selection of beautiful photographs by local naturalist Jonathan Heath, some of which were taken in his own garden in Cambridge.
The banks of the River Cam, where the vegetation abounds, are the habitat of one of our most beautiful virginities, the banded demoiselle.
The female is green with cream-colored wings, but the male is light blue with large bruises on the wings. Dragonflies are more powerful fliers, and some pop up in gardens from time to time to hunt for smaller flying insects.
Southern male street vendor
The southern hawker is a large common dragonfly that is often spotted in gardens and glides along hedges and bushes.
Another dragonfly that is common and appears to be increasing in southern England is the blacktail skimmer, named for the black tip of the male’s tail.
Blacktail skimmer
The female is yellow with black stripes along the belly. There are 11 types of damselfly and 23 types of dragonflies in the UK.
Hover flies are a fascinating group of insects that, like dragonflies, are very agile in flight.
As the name suggests, they often float completely still in the air before suddenly flying away. Of the 6,000 species worldwide, we have around 280.
Wasp hover fly
Many hoverflies have boldly striped bodies that mimic that of poisonous bees or wasps, deceiving predators to avoid them.
Certain moths have also developed this strategy, notably the formidable hornet moth, which resembles a real hornet enough to deter predators. This is a day-flying moth that belongs to a group known as the clearwings.
Hornet moth
- Martin Walters is a Cambridge-based writer and naturalist.
Visit the Martin Walters author page for more articles like this one
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