I watched this hoverfly carefully checking and then laying an egg on the underside of a rhododendron leaf the other day. Then got a couple of shots after of it feeding on some sugar/honey syrup I'd painted on to some nearby camelia leaves before going back for some shots of the egg.
I think it's Syrphus torvus (the only Syrphus sp in the UK with hairy eyes).
I assume the egg is supposed to overwinter like that now.
MarkB1 wrote:
She is big. And is that how she lays, on a leaf?
Thanks Mark,
She was actually on the topside of the leaf and arched her abdomen to lay on the underside of the leaf. I assume it is normal for them to only lay one egg in each location which is often the underside of a leaf or bud - similar to their spring Summer egg- laying but unlike Spring/Summer laying there were no aphids nearby.
