GROWN-UP THINGS

BUGLE

Ajuga reptans aka bugle, blue bugle, bugleweed, bugleherb, common bugle, St. Lawrence plant or carpet bugleweed

STINKING IRIS

BE THE BEST YOU CAN BE FOR THE BEES

Cheap and cheery Bee Bath on my patio

I'm always on the look-out for simple ways to be a better friend to wildlife.

This year, a couple of very simple, inexpensive additions to my garden are going down a storm with wild visitors!

One is this Bee Bath I made in five minutes out of:

-an old plant pot as a base, weighted with stones to discourage it from toppling over when landed on by over-enthusiastic birds! 

-a surplus plant saucer 

 

-some pebbles I had lying around.

The water in this bath needs to be kept fairly shallow, with the pebbles protruding above the surface, so the bees can drink without drowning. Nearby, in the hot days of summer, I also intend to put a bee-sized serving of sugary water in a very small container, to revive tired workers we sometimes see struggling after a busy day making honey and pollinating the precious planet.

In past years, it's been a privilege to see a sluggish, dying bee instantly rejuvenated and flying off like a new buzzer when I've offered it a bit of sugar water. This year I'd like to make that offer a bit more permanent and accessible to all.

In my neck of the woods in South Yorkshire,  I'm fortunate to meet a variety of bees from the 250 species still found in the UK: some of my regulars are

the Buff-tailed Bumblebee (Bombus terrestris)

Buff-tailed Bumblebee

the White-tailed Bumblebee (Bombus lucorum)

White-tailed Bumblebee

Red-tailed Bumblebee (Bombus lapidarius)

Red-tailed Bumblebee

and many more!

I hope by making our gardens a happy health spa for these amazing insect friends, so hard-working, beautiful and sadly now under threat from pesticides and other changes worldwide, we'll be welcome hosts to our guests. Maybe by these simple gestures, we can see their numbers growing again, and the crops they pollinate so faithfully may not fail in the future we all share. 

Have a Happy Bee-Cherishing Spring and Summer!

BIRDBATH ETIQUETTE

House Sparrow: *drums toes*

Blackbird: Splish, splash, I was taking a bath!

House Sparrow: *tries to look away as if he's not that bothered*

Blackbird: I'm forever blowing bubbles...

House Sparrow: Mate! Have a little word with yourself! You're holding up the bathroom queue!

Blackbird: You all right over there, Spadge?

House Sparrow: Wash under your armpits, then scarper, won't you?

Blackbird: Hang on! I've lost the soap!

House Sparrow: Whatever! I'll try the next garden!

Hedgehogs - why can't they share the hedge?

The title here is stolen from a groan-worthy funny that was doing the rounds of the social networks recently.


Today my own family of hedgehogs was doing its own spot of social networking!


I regularly see a pair of adult hedgehogs, a male ('boar') and a slightly smaller female ('sow'), snorting and snuffling and chasing one another round the garden in the late spring evenings.


Today I saw the little product of all that frantic noisy courting.


The young hedgehog here is hardly a baby. Baby hedgehogs have soft, flexible spines. But it is certainly a youngster, much smaller than the adults. Adult males sometimes kill their male offspring, so either this one is a lady, or a very lucky little lad!

It was wandering around the garden at 1pm, early this afternoon. It sniffed at bird food, clambering  through the leaves and stems. Now its found its way along this particular hedgehog friendly ramble, I hope I see much more of the family in the summer days to come! 

Can't wait!

These cute little critters can hog my hedge just as much as they like!

The young hedgehog (Erinaceus europaeus, the European or Common Hedgehog) exploring my garden

On the dullest days - a splash of colour

 Golden Gerbera from a friend

Poppies smiling through the rain showers

Heads heavy, hearts light

Petunias starting to radiate joy

Wild Geranium having a purple patch

♪♫♪♫"See my baby Chive" ! ♪♫♪♫

A petunia that thinks its name's Scarlet O'Hara!

Hedgehog Hot Love

Last night in the twilight at about 9.20pm, two hedgehogs, a boar and a sow, were under the arch of berberis and Jacob's figleaf in my back garden, snuffling and snorting for England! The sow, slightly the larger and darker of the two and certainly the noisier last night, was rebuffing the male's sexual approaches.


They were nose to nose, snuffling and thrusting; the sow occasionally backed away a few steps and the boar pretended to lose interest by studying the undergrowth. Not fooling anybody! He'd be lunging and wiffling again a few seconds later. The soundtrack to all this was like a gruff sneeze on an infinite loop.


Eventually, after twenty minutes of this noisy courtship, the female withdrew to the opposite border under the lilac tree and waited coquettishly by the strawberry patch. The boar had got the message by now, though, and soon trotted off at top speed down the length of the garden, through the lavatera arch and away beyond the garden shed along the far hedge where the ash tree whispered in the deepening darkness.


Left alone, reluctant Mrs Tiggywinkle shuffled off under the hedge into the neighbour's garden and into the night. Romeo and Juliet they aren't, but practice makes perfect.


Topped off a wonderful week of wildlife which has seen new broods of Long Tailed Tits, Great Tits, Coal Tits, Blue Tits, young Great Spotted Woodpeckers (male yesterday, female visited today), Wrens, Blackbirds and Dunnocks all swarming round the feeders like humming birds on a mission!

Photos: Top is from the London Wildlife site (c) Richard Burkmar and bottom photo is from the site www.erinaceinae.com with thanks!

A quick walk round my back garden

Well, I couldn't manage a quick walk round today, but wanted to share these moments with you as some of the most colourful blooms are having a field day...

Hanging basket on gate between my back garden and my lovely neighbour's, planted with fuschia, petunia "Surfinia" etc

Osteospermum (Cape Daisy) smiles from a border and better than any weather forecast with its opening and closing mirroring the degree of cloud cover

I have an old wheelbarrow planted with lavender (smells delicious on a summer's evening), petunias and sometimes verbena etc for a bit of colour in the middle.

This year I'm combining my clematis with a hanging basket next to it, planted with my favourite sweet peas. One year, the manse conservatory was overrun with dozens of pots of sweet peas I meant to plant out in the garden once frosts were no longer a threat. Energy failed me, along with best intentions, and folks marvelled at the astonishing indoor display from which I had endless armfuls of sweet peas to give away to friends and visitors! When I came to my current pied a terre, I tried sweet peas trained up a fence with trellis on some very rocky soil. They flowered but I didn't get full benefit of a view from the house windows. So this year I hope the sweet peas will soon be joining this clem close to the conservatory...watch this space!

Lavatera - beautiful and in best "cut and come again" tradition, like my hebes (not pictured here today), nothing can keep it down!


Persicaria. This reminds me of the wild persicaria I used to see on childhood walks. This one is a cultivated variety, always bursting with fluffy pink and red spikes. Useful as a loo brush if you have fairies to tea....

Some Phlox next to my huge fern (possibly Phlox "Alpha" unless you know different?) always adds a rich shade of pink to the borders near the pergola (and just far enough away not to be splattered with guano from the bird feeders there!) Too much information!

Blackbirds, Starlings (and squirrels!) enjoy digging up the compost in this white pot in the centre of the lawn. If they didn't, this would be a more impressive display of wallflowers (how I LOVE their scent!), impatiens (Bizzy Lizzies) and that lovely purple fluffy flower I've temporarily forgotten the name of. Note dead eucalyptus leaves from my huge, beautiful tree that makes summertime like one long South American autumn.

And now we're back at the gate, fancy coming in for a cuppa and a slice of something naughty with thick chocolate icing on, or a bowl of cookie dough ice cream?

Hedgepiggy

I knew there was a good excuse waiting  for having some corners of my garden left random and untidy...and here he is. Spot the hedgehog (Erinaceus europaeus) wiffling through the fallen eucalyptus leaves near a section of privet hedge.

He took no notice at all of human proximity and carried on his quiet snuffling exploration of his twilight kingdom.

I've seen him before, enjoying a little tipple from the birds' water basin under the lilac tree. They say that each hedgehog prefers to have the space of twelve gardens to roam through before it makes you its privileged host. So I feel very blessed.

You're nearer to God in a garden...

Down to wonderful Winthrop Park today for a spot of nature therapy in the sense-tingling garden. Heavenly! See yesterday's blog entry for why this garden is like no other.

http://www.winthroppark.co.uk/