Defamation of Character!

As you probably realised I have been away for a few days, gathering botanical specimens for the benefit of our understanding and not what Fizz said, that is just her impish sense of fun.

I was not lying in a ditch, I was in the pink.

Starting with pinks, I have got Primroses.
Not pins or thrums or even yellow ones, I have got pink Primroses.

This is the real thing, not a hybrid or garden escapee, this is the pink form of Primula vulgaris subspecies vulgaris a pink wild Primrose. They are not that rare but I didn’t have pictures and now I do 🙂

Now put pink out of your mind or the colours might clash.

This next one was a wonderful find.

I have been walking miles to get photographs of the various stages of Coltsfoot. A couple of days ago I was walking back from just such an expedition when we came to the gate.

This is where Fizz likes to play “The Gate Game.”
This particular gate is by the side of a track we regularly walk and it is very close to home.

The rules of the game are simple. She runs under the gate with the ball and sits there looking at me, she won’t budge. If I climb over the gate she runs back under, to the other side and we play again. She can play this game for a long time. It is so funny. (Her impish sense of fun, again)

This time when I climbed over, I forgot all about her and didn’t bother coming back.

Coltsfoot on my doorstep.
I have shown you the flower, it is a beautiful flower but that’s not it.

We had been out for about three hours in bright sunshine and we hadn’t seen an insect, not even a Butterfly. The Coltsfoot was swarming with them.

I need these photographs again for Easy Wildflowers. It is okay to say, “Provides a valuable source of nectar and pollen early in the year” but it is much better to have photographs.

Honey Bees.
When I photograph insects I really want to get the eyes and it can get very frustrating trying to capture Bees on Thistles or Dandelions because they bury their faces in the flower. Coltsfoot is lovely and flat and it doesn’t give them anywhere to hide.

Moving on…There were lot’s of Butterflies but all of them Small Tortoiseshells and some of them were quite badly torn so today I will move past them quite quickly. (We will have lots of Butterflies later)

(Butterfly nectaring on Coltsfoot)

I just want to show you one more insect today. This next one is a Hover Fly, called a Drone Fly it is a Bee mimic.

This is Eristalis tenex.

You can tell it is a Hover Fly and not a Bee because it only has two wings and it has a thick waist.

It has huge eyes that would meet in the middle if it were a male, this one is female and it has stubby little antennae.

It is not quite so easy to get it to species, they can vary in colour a lot.

This is Eristalis tenex because it has a banana shaped back leg (curved rear tibia).

The hairs on it’s back legs are longer in the centre of each section and that is indicative of species.

If you look closely there are two lines of fine hair running down it’s eyes. That is probably not very clear unless you are looking for it.

Oh dear. Am I boring you?

Just one more little flower today.

I have been fretting over this one. It is already in flower and I haven’t put it on EW yet. There are two subspecies and I wanted the pictures to show the difference. This is the flower in question.

The Ivy-leaved Speedwell.

You have to look closely

Really closely.

There it is.

A British pond coin is about the same size as a wedding ring and an Ivy-leaved Speedwell is the same size as the “G” in “REG.”Inside the flower there are even tinier bits (smaller than Fizz) and what I have been looking for is a picture of the anthers just before they open to produce pollen. There is a fairly small window of opportunity.

If the anthers are bright blue, before they get covered with white pollen and all the other bits add up then it is Veronica hederifolia subspecies hederifolia and that is what I think that I have got here.

Does it really matter? Will anybody ever look?

What do you think Fizz?

Fizz thinks that we should play ball.

How Brave I Am

Well, it is not every day that you walk into the middle of a swarm of African Killer Bees. Actually, these may have been Honey Bees, in fact I am pretty sure that these were Honey Bees.

So anyway I was walking past the front garden when I heard a sound that I thought must be machinery. It was very loud and coming from the garden but I couldn’t place it, it wasn’t the sound that a lawnmower makes.

I was standing in the middle of this swarm overwhelmed by their presence and fascinated.

Then I saw the Farmer and told him about them, he kept telling me to get back, they might go for me and I was just saying, “No, why would they do that?” Apparently Bees can be quite dangerous as I learned when the bee keeper turned up.

He told me that no two swarms were alike, some were very aggressive and some were docile. Well, I didn’t know that, anyway this was a docile (ish) bunch.

They formed a ball in the Magnolia and we sent for a bee keeper.

By the time that he got here they had pretty much settled in the tree, he was going to unsettle them.

He was a very nice fellow. Sadly he told me that he had lung cancer and was a bit short of breath but he wasn’t afraid to go up a tree and get the bees. I carried stuff for him.

His technique was pretty simple, “Aren’t you going to calm them with smoke or anything?” I asked, “Nah, it’ll probably be all right.” he told me.

He just went up a ladder and cut away a few branches and then cut the one the bees were on and dropped them into a box.

I did ask for his permission to photograph him at work and he was happy to let me do that.

At this point he has got the bees in his box, most of them and notice that although he is wearing a veil he has not bothered with gloves.

How cool is that?

My antics as I tried to film the proceedings caused the farmer and his friends some amusement. I flinched a bit and dodged, they were getting caught in my hair. I may even have run away a couple of times.

I made a movie to try and capture the ambiance.

This was just one little extra adventure that I was granted yesterday. I get lucky, I get lucky a lot with nature and I am very grateful. This was a wonderful experience. (A bit scary too) Very cool.

Naked Men and Meles meles

The puppy and I have been Badger watching in a manner of speaking… On a hot afternoon.

I am sorry for inserting this first video but I make me laugh so much.

The way that I see it a naturalist is just somebody who would take their clothes off, if Al wasn’t there.

Sorry about that. Meles meles:

The quality of these videos isn’t great, I have got the lights turned down to minimum because I was getting a lot of glare back in my previous location and I forgot to reset them.

The action is good and it is enough to tell me that I am in a good location and to try again. The very first video that I got wasn’t until 10:30. I want the lazy animals out much earlier than that.

This is work in progress.

There were a lot of beautiful flowers about as we made our way up to the sett.

I can’t really show you Honeysuckle again as we have only just done that but the Nettles were in flower.

Get out of my bag!

The same goes for the Dog Rose, that’s been done to death. Here is a Honey Bee instead.

I saw a lot of bees today. No you don’t understand, I saw a LOT of bees today. Watch out for a post that may be called “How Brave I Am”

Animal Magic

“Just like that”

It’s your destiny

The Swallows have fledged, or at least they are fledging. They are still in the nest today but they have been out and they can fly.

It has taken me a few days watching and all that you get are a couple of short video’s but for me, my understanding and the pleasure that I got from watching them makes a few days just a drop in the ocean. It was time well spent.

Anyway you should be glad that you don’t have to watch the whole twenty hours of video, that I now have to sort and delete from my machine to free up space.

Here are the best bits.

Yesterday morning there were five birds on the nest, there were five birds on the nest and then there were four birds on the nest. I had missed the very first flight and only realised when number five returned to the nest.

This first video starts with the mother calling for them to leave the nest, there is a little comic interlude of the way that they follow flies, their little heads bobbing in unison and in the last bit the second bird to approach the nest is the returning chick. Does he bring food back or do the others just think that he has?

This next video shows them leaving the nest and returning. They spent most of the day fluttering around inside the little alley way that has become their home and by the end of the day they were all settled back on the nest but this is fledging. Today I think that they have ventured outside and seen the blue sky but they still return to the nest.

These birds have made me think a lot about nature as a whole thing and about life and death in the wild. The caterpillars that I am trying to raise are falling to the parasitoid flies that these Swallows depend on for food and survival. The parents have done a really good job of raising them given the wet weather we have been having. I have often looked out in the pouring rain and wondered how they are managing to raise a brood and now this, flight.

I am so in in love and in awe of them and so damned jealous.

I am jealous because they get to eat those delicious crunchy flies, or perhaps because they can raise offspring in a matter of weeks and not the 26 years it usually takes us. Maybe I am jealous of something else altogether…..