I noticed far more bugs ranging from spiders, millipedes, slugs and woodlice. all enjoying the Underground experience.


I've never seen so many hoarding around the bottom of the Oxlow entrance shaft.


There were also quite a few bits of Wildlife in Hillocks on Saturday. A frog was spotted in the puddles in Bottle passage, a rodent (shrew or ground vole) at the bottom of Hillocks engine shaft and many other assorted bugs in whalf climbing shaft. With quite a few hungry spiders eagerly waiting at the bottom.


Is this normal? Do I have my eyes shut on most trips? or has the Burning weather got something to do with these critters entering the Twilight/dark zone.

It's not so much the heat as the lack of moisture. We only see butterflies in the caves at very dry times.

Mike

Couple of us were digging a nice little outward-drafting hole last night. Apart from the usual spiders and an interesting parasitic wasp, the cloud of midges and horseflies preferred to feast on external cavers and avoided entering the cave completely.

I found a short drainage level in a mine last week that was just below surface (slabbed roof over a blasted bedrock trench essentially) and had to crawl though a literal forest of spiders' webs - some of them (the spiders) were huge. Luckily I like spiders. However, there were also hundreds of flies, moths and other insects all hanging around the same spot - many caught in webs but many seemingly oblivious to the danger. Of course it may be that they know how to avoid the webs. But I definitely got the impression that it was the cool and the damp that appealed as we saw virtually no insects on surface at all. The drainage level itself was superb, by the way, though a bit tight!

Not sure about bugs but sheep are.  Rescued two and retrieved two bodies on Newby Moss in the last two week.  I guess the grass is poor in nutrient at the moment and those other plants on the edge just too tempting.

Forget the bugs, I've grabbed a handhold near the entrance twice in the last week to find a slug squashed between my fingers  :yucky: