Honeysuckle and beetles - summer nature feature

Lush woodbine - Beautiful scent to attract pollinators

One of the most widespread climbing plants in woods, hedgerows and scrub in Devon is the honeysuckle, or woodbine, Lonicera periclymenum. It flowers from June to September and may climb to 20 feet (six metres). The unmistakeable scent of honeysuckle is best at night, probably to attract night-flying moths to pollinate it - they can detect the scent up to a quarter of a mile away. As with some other plants, when the flowers of honeysuckle are ready to exchange pollen, they change colour to white, which is easily seen by moths. Once they have been pollinated, the flowers turn yellow and wither.

Honeysuckle is the foodplant for the larvae of at least 40 of the larger moths, including the Beautiful Golden Y, Copper Underwing, Early Grey and Green Arches; I have seen Elephant Hawkmoths, Hummingbird Hawkmoths and Silver Y moths visiting the flowers on our honeysuckle. The larvae of the White Admiral butterfly, as well as about a dozen leaf-mining moths and flies, also feed on honeysuckle, the latter living inside its leaves. Some birds – such as thrushes, bullfinches and warblers – feed on the berries, though these are slightly toxic to humans. The plant is much favoured by nectar-feeding bumblebees, especially those with long tongues such as the garden bumblebee Bombus hortorum.

Older more dense clumps of honeysuckle are used by birds for nesting. If you find a honeysuckle with some of the bark removed, it may be that dormice are responsible; they shred the bark and use it to weave their summer nests, usually in a tree hole or old bird’s nest. It has also been used to make beautiful walking sticks, created as the plant twines around the branches, causing the branches to become twisted. In Shakespeare’s ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’, he mentions honeysuckle twice: Oberon’s bank ‘Quite over-canopied with lush woodbine’, and when Titania says to Bottom: ‘ . . . so doth the woodbine, the sweet honeysuckle, gently entwist . . .’.

Beetles

Have you ever looked at the beetles in your garden? There are over 4,000 species of beetles in Britain, some of which are very common. They are mostly found in ground vegetation, leaf litter, in the compost heap or under logs and stones. The Wildlife Trusts and Royal Horticultural Society have recently appealed to gardeners to report beetle sightings via the iNaturalist phone app, to help get a better sense of beetle numbers after a cold April and wet May.

Numbers of ladybirds seem very low, due to aphids being killed by cold weather. In particular, sightings of soldier beetles, click beetles and longhorn beetles are requested. Just like bees, beetles have been badly affected by habitat loss, pesticide use and unpredictable weather. Gardeners are encouraged to leave a small area (about three feet long) of raised earth or a pile of dead wood for beetles in the garden.

It also helps if you can leave cutting back your flower beds until late winter; the dead plant stems will be used by overwintering beetles and spiders. You can find out more about beetles at www.wildaboutgardens.org.uk

By Anthony John