I am still keeping my eyes open in the garden and on Day 14 of this little series of blog posts I have had something both new for the series and new for me.
One thing that has been surprising is that on Day 1 I spotted several species of butterfly in the garden but since then there seems to have been very few. On Day 14 we did have a Comma butterfly settle for a while – see the header image, but nothing like the numbers of Day 1.
I also spotted this Moth fly up from the grass and settle on the fence. Don’t ask me what variety of Moth it is, I have looked but I have noticed that I am not very good at identifying new varieties even in areas that I like to think I know a little bit.
During the day I also spotted a couple of things flying higher in the sky. This Robinson R44 Raven II helicopter operated by Heli Air. And a Buzzard soaring on thermals. Can they see there prey from up there or do they use the thermals as an effortless way to get to a new area where they then start hunting?
Getting down to earth and grubbing about I came across this rather plump grub. I have no idea as to ID.
And then just above ground level I noticed a dark spot on our Sage plant and had a closer look. They were the size and shape of largish Harlequins/Ladybirds but a colour I had never seen before. A quick look on t’internet showed that it is a Rosemary Beetle (Chrysolina americana). I put the details into the RHS survey.
As the Sun was sinking lower, so that the back garden was going into shade, a Great Tit started hopping about the edges. This is one of the birds that I have been waiting to get a photo of during this series. I had been hearing them calling “teacher, teacher” loudly for a few days but had not noticed any in the garden. I knew they were around in the same way that I know Bullfinches are around, hopefully I will get a photo of them too.
I have posted a similar photo to this Goldfinch before, another Goldfinch was on a nearby branch watching, and as soon as this one had enough grass the two of them flew off, presumably to build their nest together. I wonder why the grass in the vegetable plot is more attractive than the grass in what we like to call the lawn?
The ground was in the shade of the house but the trees were still in the Sun and this Robin was going along the tops of the trees singing its heart out.
This is the index to the Days in our garden series.
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