All the wildlife bits of our garden are presented here Hence the title!
The hollowed out log
near the Mahonia
Catherine's new triangular
up in the Robinia
The well used Garden Room Box
in a rose bush for protection!
The much protected box!
in the peach tree (40 peaches last year!)
It's a Speckled Wood butterfly basking in the sun on the potatoes in May.
The garden... a labour of love. And much love was declared by Catherine and Daddy at the sad burial
of Freddie Frog the headstone on the right (the one on the left is Betty Blackbird who passed away a few weeks back).
Freddie had been floating for a couple of days in the pond, and the mould had set in, so time for a trip in Catherines wheelbarrow
to his final resting place..... A prayer was said for both Freddie and Betty as Catherine tipped the wheelbarrows slimey
contents into the hole. Freddie's final words were said to have been 'ribbet ribbet', which is appropriate as moments
later he 'croaked'!
A new visitor to the Garden Room
We've been trying to work out what type of Dragonfly this is, initially deciding it was a 'Golden
ringed' Cordulegaster boltoni which is found normally May to July, so what it was doing in our house in October is anyones
guess!! However with a little help from our new found friends Roy and Marie who run a lovely nature website called Moorhen, they suggest actually that it is a Common Aeshna' Aeshna juncea which fly June
to October . If you find yourself in the same identification predicament as us, you could try dragonfly expert
George Mahoney's website to help. But our 'visitor' was stunning measuring around 80mm, green in colour, and a wingspan of around 10cm. It reminds
me of the amazing life cycle of these wonderful creatures. I've sworn about them when they have 'denuded 'the pond of tadpoles
when they are in their larval stage. They develop for one to four years, misbehaving underwater ,before they crawl out early
one morning, and a couple of hours later new wings unfurled and hardened off they go, flying through the air at up to 15 metres
a second (that's fast!!) Sadly their time in flight is very short, just long enough to f'ind a mate and do the business!
By the start of March, the garden birds are turning their attention to preparations
for that naughty activity, and we’ve notice many checking out the various bird boxes around the garden. Nice.. until
you realise that I hadn’t put up my special box, the one equipped with a camera and microphone to capture one of those
joys of spring, nest building. I have been a little over cautious with the budget, and have been searching around for the
camera I need. But I found it, and on Saturday the three of us went off to a remote industrial estate, and purchased said
kit.
I
hope that I will be able to put a video stream from it up on the site, but the technical process to achieve this is very complicated
(well it is to me!!) But we’ll give it a go. At the very least we will put up regular stills from the box, that is of
course entirely dependant on if it is chosen as some little dickie bird’s ‘new home’!
On other ‘spring like’ matters, we await the thaw of the ice in the pond before the frogs
get moving again. The pond liner developed a leak at the end of last year, and repairs couldn’t be completed before
winter. It’s going to take quite a bit of care to find the leak and patch it up without disturbing the frogs, but I
guess they will have ‘other things’ on their mind, so I might be lucky and complete the job!
I am filming our birdbox 24 hours a day, and will try to post some video when, and if,
any little dickie birds decide to nest. I can report a few 'viewers' popping their heads inside the box to investigate. See
below.
End of March 2006, and the peace of the garden was shattered
by more noise, one of the most welcome noises of spring in fact... croaking! Catherine came running into the house...
'the frogs! the frogs are back!' Yes, the pond 'washing machine' has started again. Once they get started they really stir
that water up!
Another froggie foto courtesy of moorhen.demon.co.uk
Thanks to moorhen.demon.co.uk for the picture
I
heard Catherine scream the other day.. I knew something big and ugly was afoot! (No jokes please!) We discovered that the
stag beetles that we had last year are still in the old fallen pear tree. The grubs are enourmous and very very ugly (I said
no jokes!) But the Stag Beetle is Britain's largest beetle, growing to 7cm. The males fight for their territory with
their large mandibles that look like the antlers of a deer, hence 'Stag' beetle. They are big enough to nip,
but in reality they are not at all dangerous.. try telling Catherine!
Our dear old Pear tree...
The Stag Beetles live underneath
We left the fallen pear tree specifically for Stag Beetles as when it was felled
we found the less than attractive larvae living below the rotting trunk. Stag beetles are now extinct in some
countries, such as Denmark, and is considered to be globally threatened. Listed as a priority species in the UK Biodiversity
Action Plan, it is a protected species, and it's in our garden, we are obviously protecting it well!
Any one seen my mate?
He's about 7cm long and as 'hard as nails!!'
The 3mm eggs, laid in damp earth hatch the awful looking grubs that feed
for up to five years on the rotting wood . After pupating in the autumn, they emerge the following spring,and typical
of most wildlife, they get on with the 'dirty business' in June and July, and the females are ready again to lay their
eggs in the autumn. Amazing! And very very welcome in our garden! Perhaps not by Catherine!!
August and this poor old Stag bettle was having real problems taking off... mind you he might have just
been nibbling our onions!! Sorry the snaps are out of focus.. thought they were worth including though...
long live the Stag beetle!!
A moth with no name...I couldn't find it in my Observer book of Insects! Any ideas? But here he was on the seat outside
our lounge.
These two haven't got names eithe,r captured having a brief rest in the pond (when aren't they!) Frogious Lazibonesius
.
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