Wildlife Corner

[Wendyf]

Tripps, do I see some of our old favourite, smooth sow thistle? My new favourite weed is garlic mustard, it's everywhere!

[Stanley]

I had a couple of Sow Thistles this year but nowhere near the size of the one I had in the back yard!

[Tripps]

Tripps, do I see some of our old favourite, smooth sow thistle

I think so - and a taste test shows the 'sage' plant isn't sage. That's a pity. I like sage.

Interesting to see how tenacious nature is at filling every scrap of bare ground with something that grows.


PS - and how it has no chance - after the spray I've just given it.

[MickBrett]

Here's another frequent visitor to us after heavy rain. Crawdads!
I call them our "Garden Lobsters" and think they are really cute.

Yes, you can eat them but I prefer to let them get on with their lives. The amount of flesh on them is hardly worth the bother
In the first image you can clearly see the eggs she is carrying under her body.
In the second image she is clearly showing her distaste for having her picture taken...

[Stanley]

Never seen them before..... You live and learn!

[Tizer]

We have a shallow bowl of water in the garden for the birds and had to move it closer to the house due to pigeons wanting to sit in it (and also s*it in it!). The move seems to have deterred them but the small birds still use it. I was standing next to it yesterday and a robin came down, had a drink then jumped in and had a really good splash around in the water. It totally ignored me standing a couple of feet away.

This is the reason we want to deter pigeons: `Trichomonosis in Garden Birds' BTO
`An epidemic of finch trichomonosis occurred throughout much of Great Britain in 2006 and 2007, and the disease has continued to cause large-scale mortality of finches in subsequent years.'

[Stanley]

My mate Robert Aram got a very bad lung complaint from the dust off pigeon muck in one of the mills he bought.
I think it was Hypersensitive Pneumonitis (HP) or Bird Fancier's Lung. I think he still suffers from the after effects.

[PanBiker]

Sally saw a yet unidentified flying insect it was pollen gathering like the dozens of bees in the front garden. It's body was about 1.5" long and it had white patches. Cant find it in our bee, wasp and hornet reference sheet and a Google search for flying insects has not yielded an identification.

[MickBrett]

We had a huge downpour the other night, borderline "biblical"

This brought out another frequent and welcome batch of visitors. Toads.
We love them and they are great at gobbling up insects.
All our toads are called "froggy" and they often bury themselves in some of the plant pots on the patio after they have eaten their fill.
The cats know to leave them alone, toads "aint good eatin'"

[Stanley]

I never understood the difference between frogs and toads.....

[Cathy]

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Wasn’t sure if this was for real, but it’s a Lichen Katydid. This one is from Sth. America and lives on Usnea lichen. The net says that they have found Katydid fossils that are 50million years old.
Some info says it is a cricket, some a grasshopper.

[Stanley]

A strange survivor Cathy!

[PanBiker]

Our Jack has got his Genus hive of bees. Last Saturday I think while we were away.

Safely installed in his hive on the side of the moor. He is establishing the hive during the "June Gap". This is the time of year when the pollen sources that the bees rely on are depleted they pick up again from the middle of July when second flushes of growth take place. Care has to be taken that the hive doesn't starve. To this end he has fitted a feeder to the hive and provided them with around 1.5K of sucrose feed. This should tide them over until the pollen sources pick up again.

I have asked him for a close up photograph of his bees so that I can recognise the team colours. I might find them working in our garden or back yard.

[MickBrett]

[Stanley]

"
I have asked him for a close up photograph of his bees so that I can recognise the team colours."
I like that....

[Tripps]

It's a sunny afternoon and the buddleia is rampant and has lots of flowers so I went to take a photo of the butterflies. I did it a long time ago and remember it got lots of views. Sadly no butterflies at all - well just one camera shy cabbage white who flew away. No orange ones at all. Most unusual.

Buddleia.JPG

[Wendyf]

There are hardly any butterflies around here at the moment.

[Stanley]

They've got more sense than come out before it's warm!

[Tizer]

Even when it's warm here we aren't seeing more than a few. We get the odd tortoiseshell, painted lady, red admiral, cabbage white, orange tip, holly blue etc. A good variety but few individuals of each. Back in the 1980s our Buddleias were covered in butterflies during the day and then moths would visit at night. Not now.

[MickBrett]

We have a Buddleia plant at the front of the house. In early Spring I chop it back to around 12 inches tall and by Summer it grows to well over 6 feet.
It attracts lots of butterflies and the humming birds adore it.

[Cathy]

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A Rainbow Lorikeet putting on a display

[Tizer]

Cathy, do people keep them as pets like we used to do with budgerigars? I can imagine rich people wanting one to show off to their friends!

Mick, we don't have humming birds but at least we have hummingbird hawk moths. We've had one as a regular visitor during the last week. LINK

[Cathy]

Yes I’m sure that some people do keep the Rainbow Lorikeets as pets. They can be bought for $200 up to thousands of $’s , depending on their colour markings. Personally I wouldn’t want to contain something so beautiful.

Hummingbird Babies being fed in the nest, can you see them? Aaw isn’t nature wonderful

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[Tizer]

The young are probably the same size as the hummingbird hawk moths!

[Stanley]

Amazing, how come the human finger?