30 Days Wild 2022 - Day 3 - In The Night Garden

 

 Yes, it's the third day in a row in the garden but this time it's a bit different. No, it doesn't involve Igglepiggle or the Ninky Nonk but it does involve Bats, Moths and Hedgehogs 😊🦇🦋🦔

 With the weather staying drier and less breezy but still a bit on the chilly side for this time of year, I decided to put out the Moth light in the garden.

 

 Whilst awaiting the arrival of our Lepidoptera I switched on the Bat detector to see if the Moth's nemesis were also out and about.

 Throughout the 90 minutes I had the detector on, it picked up 4 fly-bys of our flying mammals. With the detector set at 45kHz and due to the area our garden is in, the most likely culprit of the clicking signal picked up is the Common Pipistrelle.

I caught some of it on video for you to hear.

 We hardly ever cut our grass at the back and leave it as long as possible to grow with whatever wildflowers arise so if in the garden after dark we have to tread carefully to avoid these 2 which are regulars. They are usually snuffling around in the long grass for the food we have put out and intermittently huffing at each other.

 The main reason to spend the night in the garden is to see what Moths have our garden on their flightpath. With us now at the start of June I did hope to see a few Hawkmoths about but no such luck last night. There were still 64 moths though of 27 species identified. Below are some photos of a few of last night's visitors.

                                             Lesser Swallow Prominent

                                                        Buff Ermine

                                                      Peppered Moth

                                                      Small Magpie

                                                          Brimstone

                                                Common White Wave

                                                         Treble Lines

                                                           Cinnabar

                                                               Snout

                                                    Brown Silver-lines

                                                          Purple Bar

 It's amazing what wildlife frequents our urban gardens throughout the nights. There will probably be more moths in the weeks to come.

Thank you again to all who have taken the time to have a quick browse through my wildlife blog, it is very much appreciated and I hope you all have a great day surrounded by our wonderful Natural world.

Stay safe.

Kindest regards

Stuart

#30dayswild #wildlifetrust #leidoptera #moths #bats #hedgehogs #gardenfornature #britishwildlife  #connectwithnature #lovenature #lovelife  

 

30 Days Wild 2017 - Days 4-6

  Okay so another triple header of days as I haven't been able to catch up til now.So will try and do Days 4-6 while trying to stay awake, so they will probably be very short posts ;)

  Day 4   Fundraising For Wildlife

  So Day 4 was a Sunday and my day off so I had the chance to get up at 4.45am to get to a reserve somewhere :)   Well no, that didn't happen, I did get up at 4.45am but instead the plan was to do 2 carboot sales.One started at around 6am-Noon and the other from 12.30pm so we went straight from one to the other.
  I have been doing them with my partner for a while and we have always tried to give money from the sales to a Wildlife charity or project.I think we are now at around £3500 given to Wildlife projects for Birds Of Prey, Hedgehogs, Tigers, Polar Bears etc in the last 2-3 years.
  We have never explained to anyone before this year that the money was going to help our wildlife so before this carboot season started I paid to get a banner done so people knew that if they bought anything from us, they would also be helping wildlife around the planet. :)
                    

  I also have been able (thanks to a local cafe) to sell my wildlife photographs to raise further funds for the local Hedgehog Hospital.
                                    
 
  So if you have some junk (I mean good stuff to sell) why not get out and do a carboot and give the money from it to your favourite wildlife charity :)


Day 5   A Quick Orchid Hunt

  Monday began by needing to take my Mum across the Humber bridge to Hull hospital and so "Wild" plans went out the door.Coming back though I thought of a cunning plan to take a slight detour (with my Mum in the car) to an area which I hoped may have a few orchids like the previous year.
  We arrived and I could see straight away the small fenced off areas that meant orchids were indeed present.They are Bee Orchids.

  This beautiful flower is in decline across the UK and until I started writing this section and reading a bit about them I didn't realise it can take 5-8 years of growth before the plant flowers and that in Britain they are able to self-pollinate and so do not actually need the mimicry of looking like a visiting Bee or the scent of the female that they give off.
  It was a very wet and blustery day but my Mum even got out of the car to walk over with us and it is the very first time she has ever seen Bee Orchids in her 65+years.


Day 6   Hedgehog DIY

  Today was another very wet and windy day in Lincolnshire and so any hopes of walking anywhere were pretty much gone.Instead I decided to head to the garage and do a bit of DIY on a plastic tub.
  So armed with a hacksaw, file and a tape measure I set to work.

  As I find with a lot of things, doing this was hard work when you can hardly use your left hand to hold anything due to my Arthritis so it took a little longer than expected.In the end though the idea was to create a covered feeding area for the Hedgehog that comes into our garden and leaves presents for us ;)
  The hole was around 4-4.5" so hopefully is small enough to prevent the local cats from taking the food instead.The Hedgehog in the photograph is my letter rack lol

  I will hopefully get this out before the weekend with meaty cat food and my trail cam to hopefully find out if it is just the one Hedgehog that explores our garden.
  Please make your garden as Hedgehog friendly as possible with easy access and leave out water and meaty(not fish) cat food if possible.They need all the help we can give them.

http://www.britishhedgehogs.org.uk/

  Thanks again for taking the time to read through my blogposts :) There should be more interesting days to come back and read about with trips to Ireland and the Farne Isles planned before the end of June :)

Happy Wildlife watching :)
Stuart