Glow-worms at Swinbrook 2023

Ten of us met near Swinbrook church in the evening of 12 July for a walk in the area followed by a hunt for glow-worms after dark. 

The evening was warm but overcast and slightly damp. We didn’t see many flowers on the walk to Hit or Miss and back to Swinbrook via the road, but it was nice to find some Wild Liquorice; Handley Plain was disappointing florally – it can sometimes be quite good – because it had been grazed by sheep and very recently cut.

The Club has been visiting Swinbrook churchyard for many years, as it is easily accessible and a fairly reliable place to see glow-worms at the right time of year (mid-June to late July).  I don’t think we have ever failed to see any, but numbers do vary.  On our recce a few days earlier, John and I saw 17 glowing females, but we only found 8 with the Club this year. Female glow-worms stop glowing once they have mated, so quite a few of the ones we had seen a few days earlier had got lucky (or been eaten or trodden on) in the meantime.

As usual, John reported our sightings to the UK Glow-worm survey. We visited Swinbrook four times this year, never failing to find any, even on 11 August, which really is the end of their glowing season, when we found four in the long grass in the lane adjacent to the churchyard, but none in the churchyard, where the grass was short. We both thought that their glows were very dim and concluded that they had probably been glowing for a long time and had almost used up their reserves of energy (they don’t feed after pupation).

For the record, the first glowing females (5) we saw were on 9 June, and a larva at Worsham on 26 May.

Sue Morton August 2023