Author Archives: Hannah

30 Days Wild 2019 – Day 13

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The fox turned up again this evening at exactly the same time, 5.31pm!  She is the same fox as there is a patch of black fur on the top section of her tail. 

I say she; I think she’s a girl but I haven’t had a clear look at her back end to find out!  She started off at the same bird feeder as yesterday but didn’t find much to eat.  I thought she had vanished behind the shed but she reappeared next to the porch and made her way in front of the door and over to the other feeder.  She found more food there as the seed the birds drop falls in between the paving slabs that I have not yet concreted in!  She stayed for a little while looking for food.  She must be really hungry to be back trying to lick up the food. 

I think she might be one of this years cubs as she seems quite small and looks very young.  Cubs of about her size have been seen out on the road – 5 of them with one of the parents!  Thankfully this one seems to be navigating the roads okay.  I don’t know if she is having issues catching food or if there just isn’t enough food about for her to catch; I have left some dog food out so she can have a little meal tonight 🙂         

 

30 Days Wild 2019 – Day 12

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Over the past few weeks there has been a fox seen in the patch garden.  It has either been finishing off the cat food next to the front door or been spooked when it has been in the back garden.  No one has got a good look at it other than to say it was a fox! 

This evening I happened to look out of the window and saw it under the bird feeders. 

I quickly ran upstairs with a camera to get a photo out of one of the windows.  Thankfully I didn’t spook her by opening the window.  She looked but didn’t run. 

The birds had cleared the feeder earlier in the day so all she had to eat was scraps she could find in the grass.  I guess she must be hungry to be picking at the meagre left overs. 

She kept looking up at the feeder like she knew there was food there, but she couldn’t get at it.

 

30 Days Wild 2019 – Day 10

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Today it has been raining, a lot!  As I haven’t been able to get outside to do anything ‘wild’ I have been sat at my computer planning on how to help the wild.  There isn’t a water butt in the patch garden, so this evening I have ordered one!  The house is a little odd in that all of the down pipes are in really awkward locations; the water is going to have to be collected off of the garage roof so the water butt can be located away from major walkways.  This however means I need to repair part of the guttering and clean the rest of it out.  I was looking at it the other day and there is grass growing in it, so I don’t think it is going to be the easiest of tasks.  I want to get it sorted though so I can make the most of collecting rain water and using it in the garden.  Every little bit helps 🙂

30 Days Wild 2019 – Day 09

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I didn’t have any plans for today’s ‘wild’ activity, it was meant to rain and that hampered my thoughts of what I could do.  I decided to play it safe and just spend some time in the garden.  I know at some point I want to take part in the spittlebug survey so I went to have a look at the lavender to see if there was any about, strangely I didn’t find any but did come across a rosemary beetle. 

There was a lot of buzzing coming from a neighbours garden so I popped round to see if I could find out where it was coming from.  They have a plant on the fence that adjoins our garden which was covered in bees.  There must have been approx. 30-40 bees on the bush at anyone time.  Unfortunately we have no idea what plant it is but it would be great for any garden that wants to attract bees!  

As far as I could tell there were four species of bee; Buff-tailed bumblebee (Bombus terrestris) which seemed to be the majority, honey bees which I saw two of, Early bumblebee (Bombus pratorum) and then Tree bumblebee (Bombus hypnorum).

Once I was back in my own garden I noticed I had a harlequin ladybird larvae on me, I knew there was blackfly and greenfly on the runner beans so I thought that would be a good place to relocate him.  I didn’t expect him to start eating them straight away.  I have never seen them feeding before 🙂

30 Days Wild 2019 – Day 08

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This afternoon I searched for ladybirds in the garden.  Last weekend I spotted a couple of ladybird larvae in my Mum’s garden; she has been gardening for years but had never seen them before!  This weekend I decided to see how many she had hiding in the flowers.  After a little searching I found two 7-spots (Coccinella septempunctata) sunning themselves on some leaves…

…and then two 7-spot larvae.  Sadly one of them had passed away but the other was hunting for food.  

As I was watching I noticed some yellow in amongst the leaves, it was a 22-spot ladybird (Psyllobora vigintiduopunctata).  

Ladybirds or ladybugs (if you are American) are common in our gardens and  can be found throughout the UK. There are 46 species in the UK and the 7-spot is one of the most common.  They feed on a variety of aphid species and can usually be found where there is an influx of their food source; they can consume approx. 5500 in their lifetime! and why ladybirds are called a gardeners friend. The 22-spot on the other hand doesn’t eat aphids it feeds on mildew on a variety of plants, usually umbellifers and low-growing shrubs.

All of my finds have been added to iRecord 🙂

30 Days Wild 2019 – Day 07

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We have a hazel tree in the garden and today I noticed it is starting to form this years fruit.  I like the hazel tree, it provides a lot of cover for the birds and occasionally in autumn a squirrel will come across the field and collect the nuts.  I don’t think there are a lot of hazel trees in the area, there aren’t any in the hedgerow as far as I know and the copse on the other side of the field doesn’t have any either which is a shame as it is one of our UK native trees.  Its leaves provide food for a number of moth caterpillar; I will have to have a closer look to see if there is anyone feeding on them.

The tree has got a little out of hand and probably needs to be coppiced this year to improve its health, I plan on keeping any branches to use in the garden next year 🙂 

30 Days Wild 2019 – Day 06

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This morning I left for work a little earlier as I wanted to get to the patch garden with enough time to watch the feeders for a while.  Over the last couple of days both rook and starling fledgling’s have been seen earlier in the morning; I wanted to try and see them.  The rooks still haven’t got used to people being in the garden with them so I positioned myself in an upstairs window and waited…

I didn’t see any of the rooks or starlings but I was treated to the house sparrows fledging.  I haven’t seen them in the garden before so I think they fledged this morning as the parents were still collecting food and heading up to the roof where they had nested yesterday.  There were 4 or 5 balls of fluffy feathers that were bumbling their way through the hazel and white beam tree calling for food. I kept losing them in the leaves as they were continually on the move.  It was good to see them using the trees as cover as the amount of corvids that visit the garden does seem to be steadily increasing now the rooks have fledged! 

As far as I know it is only the jackdaws that are now left to fledge.  I know they are still in the chimney as they can be heard calling from within the house.  The home owners will be glad when they have fledged – who needs an alarm clock when you have jackdaws!

In other fledgling news, while I was at work walking back to the office a small bird caught my eye very close to me in a pine tree.  I stopped and watched until I could see it clearly; a fledgling chaffinch! I continued watching and one of the parents came back to feed them; I wish I had a camera with me, they were only a few feet away!

When I was leaving the car park a male pheasant chased a female to mate with her and bowled over the chick she had next to her!  Thankfully it got back up on its feet and found Mum again and went back to feeding. I need to start taking my camera to work!

30 Days Wild 2019 – Day 05

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For a few weeks a family of brown rats have been visiting the garden.  They live in the field and pop under the fence to take food from the bird feeder.  I know most people don’t like rats and to be honest this family is expanding.  They haven’t been seen venturing any further than the bird feeding area so I think they are fairly contained on that side of the garden (for now at least). 

A few weeks ago they were quite shy and would hide in the field and peak through the gap under the fence.  

Now they are a little more bold!  I think they realise it is safe to come out when I am in the garden and I can actually get quite close without them running away.  They are weary of the cats who sit in the garden next to the ground feeder ready to pounce on them.  There haven’t been any ‘presents’ left so we don’t think the cats are very effective at catching them!  

I have spent this evening sat at garden table watching them dart about collecting little bits of food and hurrying back out into the field.  I think I have found their burrow entrance and am going to put the trailcam out to see if I can get any footage of them using it.  

Brown rats were introduced to the UK in 1700 and have spread widely due to their ability to adapt to their surroundings and breed at a rapid rate – a female can have approx 60 young a year!  I’m hoping the garden rats don’t have quite that many!   

 

30 Days Wild 2019 – Day 04

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After a long day at work it was nice to get out into the garden.  When I get to my patch I like to go out into the garden and check on all the plants to make sure they are all okay.  Today I discovered the cat had dug up my borage and used the pot as a toilet! I was not best pleased; there is field behind the fence why can’t he just use that! 

As I was walking around I noticed there were a lot of bees on the few remaining flowers of the aquilegia.  I started to follow one of the bees around the flowers as he flew from one to the next.  I think he is an Early bumblebee (Bombus pratorum) and believe he is male due to his facial hair :).  Early bumblebee’s have a reddish tail and yellow markings but their colours can vary and in workers their yellow abdominal strip can be reduced.  Why does there have to be so much variation in colour form bee to bee of the same species?! It makes it very difficult for people like me that are new bees! A lot of studying needs to be done to make me more confident in my identifications.   

Early bumblebees are one of the first to emerge and are active from March to June.  They have short tongues and I think that my photograph shows him nectar robbing.  This is when a bee chews a hole in the flower close to the nectar and steals it without touching the reproductive part of the flower, thus not helping pollination.  There were however other bees on the flowers that were taking nectar, providing the pollination that the early bumblebee was not.