Wildlife in the garden

Fancy a Cuppa
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Hi Chris

I think this photo was taken a year or two back. We are a bit short of sunflowers this year, but as you say, they do love the comfrey. We also have some kale flowers which they seem to love. :slight_smile:

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I bought my Mum a web cam to go in one of her nesting boxes a year last Christmas, nothing used it at first then a male blue tit took up residence all winter using it to roost at night. A few weeks ago he brought a female to view the box, after she had cleaned up after him she started building a nest and has now hatched out 6 little blue tits. As I live next door to my Mum I have been able to watch the proceedings from the start and saw the first ones hatch! It has been lovely to watch and has been enjoyed by everyone from my Mum who is 87 down to her youngest great-grandchild.
Rosalind x

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That is so lovely!

Jacqueline x

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I posted this on my Joysofglass facebook page today and it’s had more views than most of my glass.
My Elephant Hawk Moth has become quite famous !
487 views and 59 likes !

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Well, I did think it was a bit early for sunflowers, but they’ve got potted ones at Tesco so, with our crazy weather, who knows? :wink:

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Wow! Nature gets away with the most outrageous colour schemes!! Looks very exotic, doesn’t it? :smile:

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I was so inspired I made a bright pink butterfly with a few lime green bits - proved a good inspiration as someone hust bought it. :smile: (and to make it even better it’s been sitting on the Folksy front page marked as Sold for last 15 minutes as obviously nobody has sold anything else since :slight_smile: ) [quote=“0122chrisg, post:87, topic:157”]
Nature gets away with the most outrageous colour schemes!
[/quote]

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Yay! :smiley:

I found an elephant hawk moth caterpillar in the garden once, I moved it off the path where its brilliant green colouring was extremely obvious! It was a biggy, as long and fat as my forefinger if a bird had got it it would have been completely stuffed for the day!

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I didnt realise moths could look so pretty!

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On the subject of moths take a look at this!

I didn’t take this photo, but I had one of these in my garden today. It’s a cinnabar moth. Yes, it’s a moth, not a butterfly. Gorgeous, isn’t it? :smiley:

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What a beautiful moth.

I think I may have a photo of the caterpillars taken at Eskdalemuir, SW Scotland. They are on ragwort flowers :-

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Yes, that’s definitely them! Funnily enough, I’ve seen the caterpillars in my garden before, but didn’t know what they’d turn into… until I Googled to find out what the moth was and discovered the caterpillars too!

The bright colours are a warning. The caterpillars absorb unpleasant tasting alkaloids from the ragwort, which makes them thoroughly unpleasant for any predators. Nyuck!

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Ooo, that’s interesting!

I had heard that ragwort was poisonous to stock animals. Quite an effective defence mechanism.

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You’re right! It can be quite a problem in fields as it is toxic even after it’s died and doesn’t seem to taste unpleasant to grazing animals who will carry on eating it until they become ill and even die!! :frowning:

Horse lovers beware!