At the same moment I could also see a 7-spot and a Harlequin close by, and I tried to get a comparison shot of the three of them, but it proved too difficult if I'd managed it you would have been able to see that the 2-spot is only about 5mm in length, whereas the 7-spot is around 8mm long, and the Harlequin larger still. But today I caught sight of a tiny red blob on the foliage of my clematis tangutica, and when I trained the macro on it, it turned out to be Adalia bipunctata, the 2-spot ladybird. This year seems to be a very good one for ladybirds - certainly my garden is full of them, and mostly they're our native 7-spots, rather than the bigger immigrant Harlequins. I'm posting an extra today, and it's the smallest thing I photographed this Tiny Tuesday. (When I first bought a book on hoverflies and started trying to learn about them, I misread this as 'plumrose' - which I think might have been a brand of chopped, pressed, tinned meat back in my childhood, and probably indicates that I'm now entering my dotage.) If you look at this full-screen (which I'd really like you to, because I'm quite pleased with the focus) you'll see one of the other characteristic features of this genus, which is that their aristae - the little prongle sections of the antennae - are plumose, or feathered, which I think is rather attractive. pellucens here, commonly called the Great Pied or Pellucid Hoverfly, simply doesn't look like any other kind of fly. inflata is shiny and globular, and does indeed look as though someone has attached a pump to it and blown it up. bombylans looks like a big, scruffy, grumpy bumblebee. inanis both look superficially like hornets - which doesn't necessarily serve them well among people who think that hornets are dangerous and should be exterminated. They belong to the family Syrphidae, their most characteristic features is the presence of a longitudinal false vein in the wing. Why, I have no idea - it's a feature that doesn't seem to have any practical purpose, but it makes the species instantly identifiable.Īll of the Volucella species are quite easily spotted, if only because they're all so large. Hoverflies are true flies in the order Diptera. But if this Volucella pellucens had spread her wings you'd be able to see that the white band at the top of her abdomen is indeed translucent.

It means transparent or translucent, which at first sight doesn't seem to have much application to this rather dark hoverfly, which I photographed on the hedgerow in the darkest corner of Tilly's field, on a dark and dreary afternoon. I like the word pellucid, though I can't say I get the opportunity to use it much in general conversation.

Pellucid hoverfly