Nature in My Garden - April 2024

Dear Gentle Reader, 

Well knock me down with a feather.... I've just found out that in one of my wildlife ponds I have damselfly larvae... Now starts the waiting game because these beauties will take 3 years to transform into a damselfly. I'll be watching my pond now like a hawk, and with a little luck I'll be able to witness the hatching. 

These are 2 of the many in my tank.... I had a hunch when I saw they might be either dragonfly or damselfly larvae...so after asking the experts in one of the fb groups I'm member of.... I've found out what they were. Yayyyyyyyyy........😁🥳

Bugs, butterflies, polinators are all out today to enjoy the sun and with that a bit of....love. L'Amour leaf cutter bee style. Comma, Holy Blue, Tortoiseshell and a gorgeous Peacock butterfly were kind enough to pose for me under the supervision of Mr Robin. 

As I was exploring my garden further, I've found a childhood favourite....the Click Beetle. I use to torment as a child these poor creatures with my cousins to see which beetle jumps higher. A healthy nettle patch is growing as a nursery for the caterpillars of some of the butterflies I mentioned above. I also found wasp Queens and hover flies on the ivy basking in the sun. 

That's all for now, 

All the best

Sincerely yours

Annamaria 

Nature in My Garden - March 2024

Dear Gentle Reader, 

My peach tree slowly started blooming and like a magnet draw in this little fly. That's all it needs, a pollinator to do it's job while feeding. Also saw my first bumblebee. And birds are singing their hearts out. Was very nice outside warm and sunny. Didn't want to come in.

Wildlife slowly awakens in my garden, feasting on the pollen and nectar of the early flowering spring flowers. My fishtank is full of wildlife too, well snails mostly, which are procreating like crazy, my oxigenator plants are laden with egg capsules. Most won't reach adulthood as my fish will thin out the population. Also the odd pigeon started to come for a drink and bath early in the morning. 

A few days of warmth and my garden is buzzing. 

Tortoiseshell and comma butterflies, hover flies, bumble bees, almost every creature is buzzing around and enjoying the warm weather and plants.

Until next time

Sincerely yours

Anna 

Nature in My Garden - October

Sparrows and chiffs and most of the migratory birds are gone by now, Robins, tits, and other wintering, resident birds started singing, claiming territory. I shall set up feeding stations as I do every year. I stop feeding them after fledglings are gone and during summer. Nature and my garden will be their pantry during that time. Buzzing, fluttering wildlife still very active in my garden against the coldness in the mornings and evenings. I guess they have a last drink of goodness that my garden can offer before the big frost or big sleep.

The 1st frost that we had left some pleasant changes in my garden as every creature small or big is looking for a hiding place to survive winter. 

Nature In My Garden 2023

SEPTEMBER

I was weeding and planting some spring flowers in pots when these 2 grasshoppers  jump on my garden shoes and decided to have some fun. Sheeeesh 😜😁😊

In July's post I've written about the Mason Wasp that found home in my greenhouse under a tray, so today I've checked under the tray, well not really under, because the tray is transparent (was chicken breast in it before, and now it's a tray for my pots) it showed the 2 Mason Wasp cells, where the larvae is feeding on caterpillars, growing big and strong. 

The top pics show the Mason Wasp cells, the other pics are just visiting other wildlife (hover flies, a very drunk on nectar bee, tortoiseshell butterfly). 

This is Charlotte, as I named her, she's a garden orb spider. Very useful little thing to have in one's garden. I spotted today a grey and a brown one. 

My Garden 2023

August

Well, this month started sunny and bright, but ended up gloomy and overcast, and it's raining as I'm writing this post. Yet I managed to get a small harvest of runner beans and tomatoes and 1 looooong cucumber. Beans topped and tailed in the freezer. Toms, chilies and cuc in the fridge, chilling until they are eaten. 

It's raining again today but thats OK, nothing unusual there. At least when I use up all my rainwater, I just blink and voila the rain water container is full again. However with all those showers I've managed to get some toms, cucs and chilies in for the kitchen and freezer. 

As you can see my toms gone pear shaped.... Literally pear shaped 😜🍐🍅And more to come.....

The harvest continues with more tomatoes and cucumbers and other vegetables that we enjoy eating in various dishes. 

Finally good weather 20 C today. It has been warm the last few days with scattered showers. Went out to see what else can I harvest and saw this... 

Also came in with 3 big heads of cauliflower, forgot to take pics in my excitement, but I'll show you the cauli cheese I'll make for dinner tomorrow. Beans are awaiting to be harvested tomorrow as well. 

E voilà cauliflower cheese from my own caulis...and this is one the moment where I feel it was worth it, because here growing cauliflowers is like hit and miss. 

The wonders of August doesn't finish here, just look at this bounty. The corn is in the fridge waiting to be boiled and served with butter, the melon tasted like honey. The amount of beans harvested again was huge. I'm running out of space in the freezer.

It's not much, nor show case products, but I grew them, they don't come fresher and more organic than this. They are fed chicken manure pellets, my own home made confrey liquid fertilizer. The trick is if you have greenhouses like I do, to choose plants that are suitable for where one intends to grow them. Simple is that 😜

These yumm looking pointy cabbages will be eaten for lunch today. 

17th of August

After the fiasco with my watering hose I've managed to cut the grass, harvest some veg and fruit and snip some pics. 

Here are some pics.... 

This little pretty flower is the orange cosmos, it adds such a cheery splish splash of color to the border. Aubergines are ready to be harvested for a curry, chillies are getting red and hottttttt, not scorcio hot, just enough to make a statement. Melon nr 2 in the fridge chilling, and a bowl of tomatoes. Very yummy and sweet and juicy addition to breakfast and tea. 

The flower parade continues with yellow cosmos, white mallow, impatiens balsamina, and white straw flower. These straw flowers I collect while they are still small and barely open. Whilst they dry in a box, they will open  but not much, just enough to create a display of color. These plants are part of the flowers, grasses that can be dried for different dried flower arrangements or other crafts. These strawflowers come in many colors and shades. They are sooo pretty dried. It's another way to sneak some summer into the bleak winter days. 

I just love the way my sunflowers come out this year, they were full of butterflies and bees. Among other flowers I have a lonely gladioli that survived winter. A lovely nice impatiens balsamina showing proudly it's very pale, almost white baby pink. 2 more strawflower: a magenta and a red one. 

White and red scabiosa, then borage with its lovely baby blue flowers, occasionally they develop pink and even white flowers. These are edible flowers and taste like cucumbers. The next picture made me smile because I saw this very sleepy bumbles on one of my sunflowers. Another dark red strawflower adding it's flowers to the collection. The 2 last ones are yarrow flowers one is called Pearl, the other one is the wildflower version of it. 

19th of August 

The corn was harvested a few days ago and kept in the fridge until today when it got boiled and eaten with a splash of butter. Only gardeners who grow stuff know the feeling of satisfaction your own crops give you. Not mentioning the utter feel of happiness and joy when you got to it them. 

Also harvested some aubergines and a green chilli, and one of my onions I harvested a month earlier. These veg were the base of the curry I cooked for dinner today 😁😜😋

25th of August

In spite of occasional dry and warm weather, there are still a few heavy or light showers in sight. However this won't stop any plant frow growing and doing what it does best. 

To my utter surprise while I was clipping the grape vines I've found something that made me giggle and go "wowwww". I'd never expected to see at this stage fruit on my luffa, but there it is and with a bit of luck I just might get one fruit out of all those tiny ones. The beef stake tomatoes are amazing this year too, I kid you not. 

The sunflowers are still pouring out flowers to the delight of many visitors like bees, which get drunk on the nectar and fall asleep on the flowers. Not only bees but other polinators and butterflies find these coming up flowers and every day bufe. 

These are  tagetes that I planted among brassicas to keep the cabbage butterflies away and help the plants grow and to mask their scent from the cabbage white butterflies (which absolutely works). 

This is a tortoiseshell butterfly feeding/pollinating  my tall tagetes, so I can have seeds for next year. And those are the cabbage white adult caterpillars on my brussel sprouts. 

These sprouts were outside the cage, planted among tagetes just to see how effective the plant is, and it works. Of course there are a few nibbles on the plant, but as I said before, nothing major, and it won't effect the development of sprouts for  Christmas. 

And this is why companion planting is so essential, especially in the kitchen garden. Of course I had to net the brassicas while they were small but I uncovered them now, as they were pushing up the netting for more room. I find that the adult plants at this stage can face the cabbage white caterpillar attack with no major effect on the plants. 

These are my straw flowers, I mentioned about these above. Of course I won't collect the open ones, that I left on purpose to fully bloom and attract pollinators and then finally set seeds. I'm happy to see that my collection is happily growing and I'll have plenty for my resin projects. Can't wait to play with them and create lovely things. 

These are the things that make me happy among a few others.

27th of August

It's raining again, but I've managed to get in my last 2 heads if cabbage of this season. I'll chop them up and boil them for lunch with gammon and spuds and pineapple chunks. 

Only a gardener can understand the feeling of satisfaction and pride when I harvest abd serve up something I have grown. 



 
 

 

 

Nature In My Garden

Hello,

Since early spring wildlife have been visiting my garden. Now it's July and  birds, insects, butterflies, bees are still  enjoying what my garden can offer. They are so so essential and beneficial in the garden for pollinating fruit, feeding on pests. Even the pesky cabbage fly is welcomed in my garden because I know there's a parasitic wasp that will use its caterpillar to feed the growing wasp larvae.

This little chap is a solitary mason wasp, it took up residence under one of my trays. (hence the label) it feeds on small caterpillar that are paralized by its sting. It would lay an egg on top of a few caterpillars in the chamber that are made of clay. Then she seals it and starts building a new cell. The larvae would hatch and feed on the paralized caterpillars then pupate, then hatch into this very useful lil wasp. 

There's another little parasitic wasp that catches spiders to feed its brood. 

Another wonder of nature was when I eyewitnesed almost the whole transformation of a butterfly, just missing the last chapter. Was gutted, so I was😩😥

This peacock butterfly early spring visited my nettle patch and deposited its eggs on the back of the still young nettle leaves. Once they hatched, the tiny, dark, hairy caterpillars turned into eating machines and just ate and ate until they were ready to pupate. For the life of me I can't guess how did a caterpillar end up in my greenhouse, but I'm glad it did because I could see the most wonderful thing nature can offer. The pupae stayed like that for almost for 2 weeks. At that time I didn't know which butterfly would this caterpillar belong to, I could only guess as many use the nettle patch as nursery. So I turned to Google and found out that it belong to a peacock butterfly. Boy, oh boy, I was excited to see the butterfly emerge. Unfortunately I've missed it but I'm hoping next year I'll be luckier 😊🦋and see the whole process. 

Here are a few other residents and visitors : ladybug, red soldier beetle

Other butterflies like Tortoiseshell and Comma often fluttered by resting on a flower, feeding on another.

While I was harvesting my garlic, from the corner of my eye I saw on the wall of the house a butterfly, dropping  everything, grabbing my phone, tiptoeing closer only to discover it's a Comma butterfly. And if you look at the picture I've posted, you'll see too why it's called a Comma butterfly. Bumblebees loving my cosmos, ragwort flowers and sunflower, cinnebar butterfly caterpillars gorging themselves on the ragwort pollen. 

It's amazing how many insects a so hated wildflower like the ragwort can attract, I'm amazed to see that every day as I walk by the big tall flowers in my orchard. Ragwort that can't exist without cinnabar moth and vice versa. 

Honeybees, butterflies, hover flies, and other pollen loving insects depend on this wildflower. 

And of course all I sects in a way or another end up as food for other creatures just to complete the circle of life. 

August 27th

The visit of wildlife continues in my garden all through this month too. As flowers burst into bloom the fluttering, buzzing wildlife flock, pour into the garden. 

Not only beneficial insects but some feared pesky pests too, but that's ok because they are always food for other visitors like birds, parasitic insects and small mammals. 

Here is every gardeners nightmare pest, the small cabbage butterfly resting on a sacrificial plant. Here, a nasturtium that's planted to attract this pesky pest away from my brassicas. 😜😂. Of course even so some brassicas got nibbled but that's ok, my brassicas have survived the attack due to netting and other companion plants that hid the smell of brassicas from them.