appearances can be deceptive

...woke up to torrential rain, which continued into the afternoon and, at one point, I thought it was in for the day but, no, at 3pm it stopped and by 4pm it had been replaced by a beautiful sunny blue sky.

We thought we would take advantage by going over to Arne to capture some of the dragons that we saw last Saturday. There were several about, including a gorgeous Moorland Hawker, but, alas, it was windy and they would not settle.

Returning home with nothing of real interest, I went back to our local reserve at Townsend Quarry, which is a great place for flies!

This hairy hoverfly is a Drone Fly Eristalis tenax, so called because of its similarity to some male honeybees. It is a good pollinator and its larvae do a wonderful job of recycling some of the less desirable of nature's organic waste.

The plant that it is feeding on is Wild Parsnip Pastanica sativa. Like many plants in the Apiaceae family, it produces furanocoumarins. In the case of the parsnip, this toxin has a photosensitive effect that can cause nasty blisters if the sap gets onto your skin on a sunny day.

So, it is not the fly you need to be wary of but the flower...