Hi all,

need the help of the learned entomologists if possible. Can anyone identify these? They were hatching en-masse yesterday. They were loitering around the boat, dozens of them. Thanks in advance.

Longhorn sedge is my tuppence worth.

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It is in truth not glory,nor riches, nor honours that we are fighting,but for freedom - for that alone, which no honest man gives up but with his life.(Declaration of Arbroath, 1320)

Cheers Graham. I've been reliably informed that they're Grouse Wing Sedge. (Mystacides longicornis)

Earlier in the season we had a hatch of some type of sedge on our club loch. So many of them it was difficult to take a breath as they swarmed next to you. Amazing.

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It is in truth not glory,nor riches, nor honours that we are fighting,but for freedom - for that alone, which no honest man gives up but with his life.(Declaration of Arbroath, 1320)

I was once on Sheelin in early June fishing the spent gnat as the light failed and there was a hatch of sedge that was so intense that everything in my boat was covered with them and I had to put my sunglasses back on to stop them getting in my eyes.

I don't know what species of sedge was involved but they were very similar to these. They also seemed to be ignored by the trout that carried on sipping down the gnat.

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“There is no more lovely country than Monmouthshire in early spring. Nowhere do the larks sing quite so passionately, as if somehow inspired by the Welsh themselves. There is a blackbird on every thorn and a cock chaffinch, a twink as they call him there, on every bush...... It moved me profoundly. I had been spared to see another spring, and I thank God for it.”

Oliver Kite
“A Spring Day on the Usk”
A Fisherman’s Diary