Comings and Goings

With every walk there are now new wild flowers popping up everywhere. It is becoming hard to walk in the pony field as there are so many Orchids coming up, including a group of the very attractive Bee Orchids. They are growing quite close to the water trough so I wonder how long it will be before eight big hooves manage to squash them. We have tried to protect them by covering them with a tripod made of sticks but Tavey seemed to think we had put it there for him to scratch himself on:-)

Another of the 'comings' are the butterflies and moths. Now when we walk through the long grass and wild flowers in the field behind us, masses of Cinnabar Moths, Small Skippers, Blues and some others that I have yet to identify, fly up chasing each other around. Magical. There seem to be far more than in previous years which is surprising when we had such a long cold winter.

Something that worryingly seems to have gone though, are the Bees. We had loads in the early spring when all the Crocuses were 'a buzz' with them but I haven't seen any for several weeks.

Lastly and very sadly another thing that has gone is our lovely old cat, Lizzy, who had to be put to sleep yesterday. She was rather a 'one person cat' and I was that person. Right from being a kitten she would follow me around and sit with me so I will miss her such a lot. However, she was nearly twenty and, apart from losing her tail when a car ran over it, she has had had a really good long life and was loved very much, which is great considering she was born to a young stray and spent her first few weeks of life living under a bush in an old ladies garden. Now she is at rest with her brother and sister in our back garden where she loved to watch the world go by whilst basking in the sunshine.

Sunny Sunday

At this time of the year I just want to be constantly walking around the countryside, as everyday seems to bring something new, especially when the weather is warm and sunny.

In the SSSI land grazed by the ponies, over the last few days, I have seen three slow worms and a cute common lizard that was sun bathing on a choice piece of fairly fresh horse's dung..mmm..lovely and warm:-) Unfortunately I didn't have my camera with me.

Today, as the weather was so warm, I decided to forget the usual Sunday gardening torture and go for a long walk, checking out some of the fields around us. There were masses of moths and butterflies. I rather liked this White Ermine moth and thought it looked quite trendy sporting its musical notes on its back...

Another butterfly that caught my eye was this beautiful Green Hairstreak. The photo doesn't do it justice as the emerald green of its wings shone amazingly as it flew around. It's the first time I have seen one of these around here.

In the area of SSSI land nearest to us, that has been rather mashed up by heavy machinery clearing the scrub, I was pleased to see some Birdsfoot-trefoil making an appearance again as the whole area used to be covered in it. It shows things are beginning to recover so hopefully there will be more Orchids this year (still no sign of the lizards though).

Another flower that I rather like that is growing in lots of places on the ground disturbed by the heavy machinery is the Scarlet Pimpernel, although very common I think it is so pretty.

Besides my long enjoyable walk, I have managed to fit in some other useful things today. I have cleaned the filters on the fish ponds and thinned out the pond weed, all the while being watched by the beady eyes of several frogs. I have also put together a rose arch which is currently on the living room floor waiting for a strong man to help me lift it outside. There were too many red ants wanting a nibble of my ankles to build it outside. I think we are gradually being taken over by red ants but I don't like killing them so I just try to avoid them, although, every time I go out, they seem to come running over to me as fast as their little legs will carry them...I can almost hear them shouting, "Hooray it's dinner!" :-)