Findings of June 2nd-Ginger lures and Stag Beetles.

The day brought a thunderstorm and heavy rains at 5pm. With the evening being a humid one. By 6:30pm the wind was near still, it was 19°C and humidity was at 89%. I was pretty sure i would see Stag Beetles in flight that evening. I decided this was a good time to set up my usual sugaring lure, but this time i also added ginger. I had read a report last year on a study done by Dr Deborah Harvey that suggested that ginger is an effective lure for stag beetles, (for more information you can find it here ) i had previously been reluctant to use ginger lures as i was slightly skeptical of these findings. I put ground ginger on 2 of 3 usual luring areas on my allotment, one on some partially submerged logs, one in an insect hotel, and another at eye height on an Oak tree. The allotment is in an area i have seen many Stag Beetles over the years, and is 350m from a broadleaf woodlands, i feel the allotment acts as a woodland-edge habitat. The area is also an ex-orchard. More about this in another post.

Bait area 1, partially submerged Sycamore (Acer pseudoplatanus) and Evergreen Oak (Quercus ilex), ginger and homemade moth lure spread on the tops of these stumps 6:30pm.

The Area in which i frequently set up lures. The allotments are in the yellow area, the red circles are moth lures, green circles are ginger lures and the blue circle is a Stag Beetle recording. All moth lures in this picture will now have ginger added to them.

After setting the traps, i came out to check the traps at 9:00pm (Weather was the same as at 6:30pm), which was also the beginning of my observations for that evening, i was to spend the evening monitoring the traps until after dark. I have also been working on a sweep net, which will be covered soon, last night was the trail run for it, it worked pretty well. Anyway, there was no activity on the traps when i checked them. Curiously also, at that time of the evening, there are many cockchafers (Melolontha) but that evening none were seen, usually that amount of time i spent by the traps would result in seeing many cockchafer flying around, but not a single one was recorded that night.

I spent an hour monitoring the traps, while also mastering the art of the sweep net, until it broke. At 10:15pm my patience was rewarded, i decided to check the lures and Bait area 1 proved a successes, here was a female right on top of the ginger. What a great result and observation. The behavior of the Beetle was a little strange, it was almost rolling in the ginger, i would have like to spend more time observing the beetle but when i returned 10 minutes later she had left. Another curious observation.

2nd female of the year, 10:15pm on bait area 1.

I'm still not sold on the ginger yet, but last nights observations were definitely interesting. I'll spend the next week or so using ginger lures in areas i know Stag Beetles frequent, please look forward to my final report in a week or so. It's also worth noting, still no beetles have been seen in flight this season.

Bait area 2, moth bait spread at eye level on an Oak tree, no ginger was put here. (Quercus robur). 6:30pm.

Bait area 2 at 10:30pm, at least it's popular with somebody.