5 little speckled frogs

I can't believe I forgot the frogs in my last post!

I'm not sure how many visit us, but I've seen at least 5 together & on a hot sunny day they like to sit on the rocks under the waterfall (which incidentally I don't put on for fear of filtering out a large part of my little eco system) where there is a dark cool pool of water for them to have a dip in as and when they feel like it. 

And this year I was ridiculously excited when I found our first ever batch of frogspawn! Unfortunately, so were the newts I think, because I saw few tadpoles this spring and zero froglets & a tadpole is a protein packed snack for a hungry newt.

Apparently frogs can't see you unless you are moving, but I think my frogs know when I'm there. Peering into the gap between the waterfall and the rocks is a daily event for me & they always seem to be staring straight at me when I eventually spot them in the gloom.

A pocket of perfection

Our little rill - the very first day...

Our little rill - a year on...

...but just look at it now!

Blooming with colour, not just from the flowers on the fence & the submerged plants within the water, but from the beautiful damselflies who choose it as a prime spot to meet their mates, lay their eggs & live out their nymph stage within the water. 

On a sunny day we are honoured to be visited by up to 13 individuals at any one time! The Large Reds & Common Blues take centre stage & it is fascinating to watch them dart about & to watch the female being clasped by her mate & laying her eggs in the pond weed.

Not to mention our Hoverfly, who seems to think it is ALL his territory!

And the beautiful bees - one day I'll work out which species they all are.

And when you start to explore the water you find a little self sustained eco-system (or maybe even a few) - we have seen so many species from pond snails to dragonfly nymphs, damselfly nymphs to newts, newtlets to freshwater shrimps, bloodworms to Pond Skaters. 

And the most amazing thing of all is, they chose OUR little rill to live in, reproduce & die. They've chosen to spend all their precious days in our little rill. I feel very honoured. 

Beautiful Bee-Fly!

I had a call from my sister Tracey, who, knowing my obsession with insects, thought I might be able to enlighten her and identify a flying insect she'd seen in her garden. It hovered like a little Hummingbird and I guessed that it could be a Hummingbird Hawkmoth. I've never seen one, so was suitably jealous when she told me about it!

However, she sent me a photo and as I opened the text message I was delighted to see this little chap - a Bee-Fly, and what a beautiful photo!

They look just like bees with their furry little bodies, but a closer look reveals yellowy-brown hair on the body, long spindly legs and a rather menacing (but completely harmless) long, straight proboscis. 

How I'd love to have seen one in the flesh - well, as it happens, I didn't have to wait too long.

A week or so later I was with the family at Mum and Dad's house for a lazy afternoon eating gorgeous home-cooked food and catching up with everyone, when Bethany came running in from the garden to tell me that she'd seen one hovering by the flowers! I couldn't believe my luck & was thrilled to be able to watch a beautiful Bee-Fly hovering around the Grape Hyacinths along the garden wall.

It chose a flower, hovered ever more closely and inserted it's proboscis in the flower opening, hovering just like a tiny furry Hummingbird, oblivious to my presence.

Needless to say Bethany got extra ice-cream and cuddles after dinner! What a thrill!  

Blue-Tailed Damselfly Action

My finger has just been privileged to have been chosen to be a Blue-Tailed Damselfly's perch for over half an hour! Bethany found it on the floor. It's been a pretty dull day with a few bouts of sunshine - one of which was convincing enough for the Damselfly to believe it was going to be ideal flying time. I guess it must have been cold and needed to increase it's body heat before taking to the air again, because it was walking along the floor looking very sorry for itself. I held out my finger in front of it and it climbed on board and there it stayed. Fortunately for me the skies stayed pretty miserable and grey so it just sat and waited, with it's front feet clasped round the end of my fingernail.

Straight on it looked as though it was staring me out! It was truly stunning. A beautiful specimen, with a shimmery bronze and black abdomen ending in a bright blue patch at the end. The stripes along the thorax were a gorgeous bright green and it's perfection just blew me away.

In need of another Bug-Fix

The other day, as my children ate their breakfast at the dining room table and I stood at the window looking out onto a snow covered garden, I said out loud "oh I can't wait for Spring - I'm missing the bugs".

I spoke too soon... that morning as I combed through Holly's hair I found... a nit egg... and then we had a tummy bug. That was really not what I meant.

However, since then I have seen - a caterpillar and a Lacewing - that's more like it! I reckon the caterpillar came into the house courtesy of my gardener husband's work clothes. I first noticed it at around 9:30am, crawling across the ceiling from the corner of the room. I wasn't sure what to do. I couldn't put it outside - that was just a death sentence in the middle of winter, so I let it crawl aimlessly and it caught my eye every time I walked under it.

At around 5pm we sat down to eat dinner and I looked up and saw that it was heading straight for the smoke alarm. By the time we'd finished eating, it had disappeared, presumably into the smoke alarm! Not sure if that's a good thing or not...

Lacewings are beautiful creatures, like little fairies - their wings are so delicate, just like lace or net. The females have a very nifty way of protecting their eggs from being predated by crawling insects, such as ants. An egg laid directly on a leaf is asking for trouble, so a female lacewing produces a drop of silk which then hardens as it is stretched to make a long thin stalk. Then an individual egg is laid on the end, suspended in mid air, safely away from predators! Genius.

Roll on Summer!

Winter Bug Sports!

I was getting withdrawal symptoms - there are few bugs about in the depths of winter, but my daughters found a Snail Racing printout whilst we were having a January clear out, so we made it and had our very own Snail Race!

I really didn't think they'd manage to find any snails, but they came back into the house with no less than 32 little "snailets" (my children are well trained in bug hunting)!

Spikey (Orange), Sticky (purple) and Smelly (green) raced to the finish... and the winner was... Smelly!!!

You'll be pleased to hear that no snails were harmed during the making of this race and we released them all back into the wild, exactly where we found them!

Happy Days!

Lovely (?) Lily Beetles

The Lily Beetle is a bit of a love-hate-love critter for me. Beautiful and fascinating it's hard to dislike them until you try to grow your own Lilies...

This one here, along with all her posse has managed to all but destroy my beautiful white lily plant. Three years after receiving it as a gift from hubby for our Wedding Anniversary, it's a shadow of it's former self.

However, as insects go, they are pretty cool. Firstly, that scarlet red colour is very exotic and I love the way they drop from the leaves onto their backs the moment you touch them, skillfully disguising their bright colour and pretending to be dead. Apparently they squeak too, if you try to handle them, but I have surprised myself by not attempting to try it yet.

Their larvae are brilliant in that they disguise themselves as dollops of bird mess by covering themselves in their own poo!! Utterly gross, but wow, it'd put anything off!

I may have to try that squeaking thing... gently of course.