Tag Archives: #30DaysWild

30 Days Wild 2019 – Day 20

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Again I spent my evening in the garden planting out some more of the seedlings.  I was predominantly working in the raised beds trying to fit in more of the wildflowers I have to put out.  I noticed a few 7-spot ladybird larvae on a rose bush and then a small bug on a daisy type plant (I have no idea what the plant actually is as it just turned up in the garden!).  The small bug was a common froghopper; but of a different colouring to what I have been used to seeing.  It was black of the body and beige/yellow of its head.  It sat quite happily to have its photo taken 🙂

   

30 Days Wild 2019 – Day 19

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For Day 19 I was taking advantage of the good weather and planted out some of my seedlings. I was hoping I would discover something interesting in the garden for 30 Days Wild.  What I wasn’t expecting to find was a tiny fungi attached to one of the newspaper pots containing a zinnia! 

I had no idea what the fungi was but put it on Twitter as my interesting find for the day.  I wasn’t expecting so many people to like it! Thank you everyone 🙂 Pete (@dnannerbetep) replied to say he thinks it is a Little Japanese Umbrella, Parasola plicatillis.  I still have a lot to learn when it comes to fungi.

30 Days Wild 2019 – Day 18

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On June 18th I put three eggs in the garden to see if the fox was still about.  I placed them near the entrance / exit route I think they use and put the trailcam out to see what happened. 

I was expecting the young fox from the other day but a different fox turned up first and took the eggs!  

To me this looks like an older fox and maybe even a family member of the young fox.  She took them all in a 8 minute window. 

As you can see the last segment of the video shows a younger fox, though I can’t be 100% certain if it’s the same one who was eating the bird food earlier in the week.  I need to gain more footage to work out who is who, but it is exciting to know there is more than fox using the garden 🙂 

30 Days Wild 2019 – Day 14

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I got home late this evening so didn’t get into the garden until the light was starting to fade.  I wasn’t sure what I would find, after a little searching I found what I think is a garden spider (Araneus diadematus), it was in the lavender where it had built its web.  It is tiny; only a little bigger than the aphid it was eating. 

Garden spiders are seen between June and November. 

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 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 🙂