Big Butterfly Count and Garden Wildlife and Vegetables

 

Since 2010 Butterfly Conservation has organised a yearly nationwide survey where people can spend 15 minutes counting the number of butterflies they see in their garden or other location.  Butterflies are excellent biodiversity indicators and they react rapidly to environmental changes. Therefore declines in butterfly species can provide an early warning of potential losses in other species too.  Big Butterfly Count helps identify trends in species allowing plans to be made to protect those in decline and also to allow scientists to understand the effects of climate change.

I am sure some of you also take part and it is to be hoped that the results from this year's counts are a marked improvement on the awful year butterflies and other pollinators had last year.

D and I did our first butterfly count on the 21st July at Castle Bromwich Historic Parklands and saw the following butterflies:

Small White x 4

Speckled Wood x 5

Large White x 2

Holly Blue x 4

Gatekeeper x 6

plus an unidentified skipper (it was too far away to be sure)!

On 25th July we did a count in the garden at home and saw the following:

Large White x 4

Peacock x 1

Comma x 1

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Holly Blue x 1  (here nectaring on water mint flowers by the pond)

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Gatekeeper x 1

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Speckled Wood x 3

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Meadow Brown x 1

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Not seen during the count itself here is a photo of a Red Admiral we saw a bit later.

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D did a further garden count earlier this week and managed to spot a Red Admiral during the 15 minutes this time.

Red Admiral x 1

Comma x 1

Speckled Wood x 1

Gatekeeper x 2

Large White x 1

Other Garden Insects

Banded Demoiselle - I was really chuffed this was spotted as I am fairly sure it is a new garden "tick"

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Grasshopper

Mint Moth - you guessed it seen on mint! Pretty as these tiny moths are last year the caterpillars decimated all our mint!

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Sunflower with a Marmalade Hoverfly

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Garden Vegetables and Baking

These days D grows all the garden vegetables.

Here are the first red chilli peppers.

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We are picking courgettes galore

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Ripening pumpkin

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The first crop of beetroot has been harvested.

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Apple and Blackberry Crumble made with foraged blackberries from the garden.

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D made these Feta, Thyme and Courgette Scones with courgettes and thyme from the garden. Lovely served with onion chutney :)

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All photos taken by D with the Canon SX50 HS bridge camera. (I don't particularly rate my photos but if anyone wishes to use one of my son's or mine I would be grateful for an email first - thanks)

A Walk around a Local Nature Reserve

 

Recently D and I went a walk around a local nature reserve at Castle Bromwich Historic Parkland.  Historically the parkland was part of the Earl of Bradford's estate and is part of the Castle Bromwich Conservation Area.

The last resident of the Bradford family at Castle Bromwich Hall was Lady Ida Bradford (1848-1936) who was the widow of George Bridgeman, 4th Earl of Bradford.

The parkland is known locally as "Lady Bradford's".  Much restoration work has been carried out there recently under the "Love Your River Cole" project and access to the site and paths has been improved. Its a lovely area for a walk as you will see and you could be anywhere if it wasn't for the sound of traffic on the M6 not far away and planes taking off or landing at Birmingham airport!

Cow Parsley, Campion and Horse Chestnuts are flowering.

Pignut this is a good site for Chimney Sweeper moths in June and July and their caterpillars feed on Pignut. I really must try and go back then to look for them as I said to David we really had ought to try and visit this reserve at least once a month to see the changes through the seasons.

An area of acid grassland.

Then into the wetland and woodland area.

Hawthorn is still flowering well.

We then wandered over the grassland area.

Why do people dump rubbish?This makes me so angry.  They must have parked in a bus layby on a nearby A road then clambered over a fence and walked to dump this. There is a council tip about half a mile away!!!

Back into the woodland

Then the return route back through the acid grassland.

The highlight of the visit was a pair of Small Copper butterflies.

Back at home all eight of the Blue Tit chicks fledged on the 25th and 26th May. Rubbish photo of the three chicks which were last to leave the nest box.

First damselflies of the year in the garden. There were two pairs of Large Red Damselflies mating.

All photos taken by me with the Panasonic Lumix FZ330 bridge camera. I don't particularly rate my photos but if anyone wishes to use one I would be grateful for an email first - thanks.