Bruce Spanwing Moth A couple of days ago we saw a pale moth flying across the garden - late November, snow on the ground, temperatures around zero or below - and shrugged as it flew away. This morning we got a closer look at it, or a relative. I am reasonably confident that [...]
Japanese Beetles in the Ascendency Recently we wrote about the welcome appearance this summer of the eggs of parasitic Tachnid flies on the bodies of Japanese Beetles in the garden and we have been looking forward to a decline in beetle numbers as a consequence. No such luck. For the past four years, [...]
The Golden Rod was alive with insects Tuesday morning in the warm sun - here are four that posed for their portraits. There were also a number of Hover Flies which never paused long enough to be immortalised. Clearly a Bumble Bee and I think most likely Bombus impatiens (Common Eastern Bumble Bee) [...]
A Garden Month (to 24 Aug 2019) Pictures follow Even back in late July some end-of-summery things were already being noticed such as a small group of Waxwings taking berries from the Dogwood bushes on a hot and windy day … the sort of day on which it is perfect for Japanese Beetles [...]
Garden Creatures The sun at just the right angle illuminated a horizontal band of white "fluff" in a Pagoda Dogwood tree and it warranted a better look. At first appearances one thinks of Tent Moth caterpillars but this is the wrong sort of tree. Closer inspection found that most of the affected area [...]
This and That Coming back from a walk we found a Banded Hairstreak butterfly (Satyrium calanus) on the "other" sort of milkweed (Asclepia tuberosum). They only open their wings to fly away but the upper surface isn't much more colourful than this. ** Not bad photo for one taken with an iPhone, albeit it [...]
Very Tiny Bees A very trending topic, as they say, at the moment is how to encourage pollinator species not to go extinct die to habitat loss, insecticidal sprays and climate change. This something we are hastily in favour of. Trouble is, when we think about pollinators we usually think [...]
Text here Painted Lady Vanessa carduis Starting to appear in the garden now the June heat is beginning to build up Text here Canadian Tiger Swallowtail Papillio canadensis Another garden visitor - also seen today, but not photographed, a Black Swallowtail (Papillio polyxenes) [...]
Polygonia comma - Eastern Comma Butterfly Appeared in the wildlife garden late afternoon and spent some time flying around the pool, settling here and there as it took the fancy. Several times alighted on the bark of a maple tree - see comment below about sap feeeding. Generally uncommon, the Eastern Comma is rarely [...]
Time for a short update to the wildlife garden notes … some recent observations: Firstly, after 20 years in the garden we have finally recorded the visit of a chipmunk that was, what else, investigating the ground under the bird feeders. Interestingly, a recent discussion on a town residents' Facebook group was about recent [...]