That’s such fantastic news. It is amazing how nature can correct these little imbalances if it is only given a little helping hand. It sounds like your garden has become a very dangerous place for slugs and snails this summer!
As for the cabbage whites, there are plenty of predators which love to eat the adults. All the usual suspects like dragon and damsel flies, spiders, flycatchers etc, like to eat a nice juicy butterfly and the pond will also attract them. Yay!!
Sadly there is a missing piece in this jigsaw puzzle because the caterpillars are hairy and only have one predator which is on the decline. That is the cuckoo. Cuckoos have special stomach linings which are in effect disposable, and this enables them to eat the irritating hairy larvae of many of the most problematic butterflies and moths, including those awful processionary moth caterpillars.
However, cuckoo conservation is largely out of UK hands as they are shot in huge numbers crossing the Moroccan desert and also in Spain and Portugal as they pass through these countries on their annual migration. So gutting because the only reason people have for doing this is “it’s traditional.” Here in the UK we have given up an enormous number of “traditions” because they are harmful or inconsiderate, but in the end we can only control our own little patch.
Still, I’d love to see some pictures of your baby newts to see how they are getting on!
I will try to get some photos of the newt babies this evening, they tend to come out more later on We do have cuckoos who visit us every spring, I was even lucky enough to spot a female on our fence one year Hopefully they’ll continue to cross the Moroccan dessert safely Hopefully all the people who are trying to convince the Moroccan people not to shoot them any more will eventually succeed. Until then, like you say we’ll just have to keep looking after our own little patch
@JoSara your little toads are very cute, I imagine they are fun to watch too
Donna x
The toadlets are great. And they’re everywhere Newt babies sound brilliant too. At my old house there was a newt that lived between the walls of ours and next door’s garages. It was there for years. I used to see it nearly every evening in the summer crossing over the patio by the back door.
You are so Lucky @RedDragonDesigns! I have only ever heard a cuckoo once when I was a child and never seen one except on TV. They are that rare in the South of England.
Love the toadlets @JoSara! Dad has obviously been busy
I couldn’t believe it when I saw her, I ran to get a camera but she flew away
We really are lucky here in shropshire, there is just so many amazing wild animals. I think oh’s family think I’m a bit crazy because I get so exited about it
Is the OH/ OH’s family ever greeted with ‘look what I found’ followed by handing him a tub with gauze over the top and vegetation + interesting beetle/ caterpillar/ amphibian inside it to be carefully released somewhere appropriate once you have shown him? If not why not and you’re perfectly normal either way. My OH considers it a good thing me spotting stuff here as I’m keeping my eye in for when we go on safari etc and I have to spot wild things that might be out to kill us.
Quite unusual - an extended family of Jays, could be two nests nearby.
This picture I have grabbed from a video-clip we took but this set-up can’t take AVI files, so regretfully it is a bit blurred. There’s seven Jays in the shot but we have counted a total of ten - hence two families. They are a bit shy but the younger ones aren’t too fearful. We have a large garden area and we are fairly remote so the birds can feed with ease with plenty of space around them, too!
J.
Very unusual to see so many jays together! There are quite a few in my area as Sussex has a lot of oak woodland, but it is highly unusual to see more than one at a time. I usually see them during acorn season following the squirrels about.
Thanks for the pic @AilsaArts-one of my favourite birds
Thanks,
…one of our favourites too. We have quite a few Oaks around, indeed we live on the edge of a forest of mixed wood but mainly Spruce and Silver Birch. Yes, we also see quite a few Red Squirrels and put plenty of feed out for them and all the others, too!
Our nearest neighbours are about a mile and a half away to it very peaceful here for the wildlife.
J.
Lol Sasha @SashaGarrett fortunately OH loves the great outdoors too, even if he doesn’t appreciate insects quite as much as I do. He quite often has photos emailed to him in work titled “look what I just found”
His family are confined townies though
I tried taking a photo of some of my newts, they are really hard to capture properly though. Here’s a quickly taken with my phone, I will try to get a proper one with my camera when I have some time
The farmer sometimes grazes his sheep in this field, along with Holly who is a ‘retired’ highland pony. She appears to act as matriarch to the flock who may well think she is just a very large sheep, too! When the ewes have their lambs with them, Holly is also very good at keeping an eye on the little ones.
But, she will always pay us a visit if there is a fresh cut carrot involved.
J
I’m so excited about my new visitor.
Se’s called Tiggy and is the smallest of three hedgehogs that have shown up this month
I’ve never seen hedgehogs in the garden before so she’s very special!
I had a stoat run past me in our garden yesterday. I didn’t have the camera and it didn’t hang around but I got a good look at it and it was about a foot away. Closest I’ve ever come to one so I was very excited.
Reginald the baby robin turned up as a little ball of feathers in our garden two weeks ago (on the left), and he’s now looking quite grown up and his smart red breast is coming through nicely
We do have cuckoos who visit us every spring, I was even lucky enough to spot a female on our fence one year 
