Poplar Hawkmoths Laothoe populi

Wonderful surprise when opened the moth trap on Monday morning, two beautiful Poplar Hawkmoths.

Another 5am start as put the moth trap out overnight. It was cool and quite breezy so wasn't expecting much and didn't really get much but what we had was lovely. The Buff Tip looked like the tip of a twig on the ground near the light trap, I poked it on the off chance it was a moth and it moved.

Flame Shoulder

Green Arches

Pale Shouldered Brocade

Square Spot Rustic (?)

Buff Tip

Campion moth

Buff Ermine

May Moths

Up at 5am to bring the moth trap in before the pheasants arrived and the swallows got up. It had already attracted a  blackbird and Stumpy our tailess and friendly Robin who was attempting aerobatics  to catch any I disturbed and scolded me when I took the trap in. Please note I am not an expert and have identified these moths as best I can, if you know I've got any wrong, please tell me!

Brimstone Moth

Coxcomb Prominent

Early Thorn

Flame Carpet

Lesser Swallow Prominent

Lunar Thorn

Peppered Moth

Pine Beauty

Scalloped Hazel

White Ermine

It was a bit of a cliche but when a blonde pheasant with none of the usual brown markings arrived in the garden , all the males went nuts and it was a total free for all. Our resident females were not happy and pecked her on the head and chased her. The swallows arrived back mid April and we have at least three nests in the barn and the pied wagtails are nesting in a pipe in the back wall. Its light at 4am and it can be hard getting back to sleep, the dawn chorus is really loud and the robin sings from a bush just below the window. The blackbirds must have young as they rush around with beakfuls of worms. We still have a family of rabbits in the garden, two adults and two juvenile and they see off the other rabbits.

Male pheasant displaying

Blackbird breakfast

Old Scarface

The fields are full of lambs right now and the cowslips I grew from seed are flowering.

And where is baby Oleg? My pet ferret Bramble lost her toy teddy and we hoped baby Oleg would arrive and keep her company but he seems to have gone awol.

Here she is with teddy just after an operation to remove a cancer from the tip of her tail, she's also had a stomach ulcer and got a cataract. She knows none of these things of course and just wants her walks and plays like a maniac as usual.

Got some new Colour Soft pencils and thought I would have a go at drawing a Sexton Beetle that came to my moth trap last summer. I love Sexton beetles they are the undertakers of the animal world, big and robust looking (for a beetle) with a striking orange and black waistcoat. They are also usually covered in tiny orange phoretic mites that hitch a lift to the next corpse and which don't seem to affect their host particularly. I like to hold a Sexton beetle on an outstretched finger and watch it unfurl its wings - at this point all the mites usually hunker down and hold on ready for take off! Before you have a go I should also mention that Sexton Beetles smell appalling whether this is down to their activities or secretions to put off predators I don't know. When the beetles find a suitable corpse, like a mouse or rat they excavate the soil beneath it until it is completely underground then lay their eggs on it and feed their young on the decomposing flesh. The phoretic mites  feed on fly eggs and maggots so ensuring the flies do not compete with the beetles for food. The picture was done in coloursoft pencils and a dip pen with indian ink, using several photos for reference.

Sexton Beetle ( Nicrophorus investigator ) with two mites near head.

The unseasonably mild weather of the last two weeks has really brought the garden on. However all the lovely primrose flowers and fresh new growth of my herbs has been a huge draw for all the local rabbits and pheasants who spend the day pecking and nibbling a little bit of this and that  and add insult to injure by then burrowing beneath the roots or dustbathing and piling soil up all over the paths. The Curlews arrived back here March 2nd, we had the first Bumble Bee and Small Tortoiseshell on the 10th and the first bat of the year on 11th which we listened to with a bat detector as it flew round the house. We were late putting bird boxes up, last weekend for most of them but already there has been plenty of interest. The Nuthatches in particular  are hammering away at entrance holes and one even removed nest material taken in by Blue Tits. A lot  of trees came down round here in the winter storms and we wondered if there is now a lack of suitable nest sites.

Rabbit climbing garden plants to get at new growth

Hopefully this box will get used