Saturday 23 May 2009

Flowers, Bathing, New Hoggy Cam

Regulars may recall that near the beginning of the month I had a wild flower growing in the edge of the lawn. Greenfingers and ShySongbird identified it for me as Cardamine pratense - Lady's Smock.

IMG_2622c

Greenfingers told me how to propagate it as I wanted to grow it in a more suitable place. Detach a leaf or two and lay them on damp potting compost and cover with a plastic bag. This I did and now, 20 days later, there are new shoots which I hope will give me some plants to plant out when they are big enough.

New Growth


One of my favourite flowers in the garden is a succulent, unknown, which is very drought tolerant. You have only to look at the fleshy leaves to see why. In wet weather they swell and then gradually shrink as the plants uses up the moisture. They can go months without watering. It is at its best in a container where, given time, it will tumble over the sides and grow longer and longer. Just now it is coming in to flower with a mass of bright yellow blooms each about three quarters of an inch across.

Addendum: I finally found out this plant is Delosperma nubigenum (Ice Plant)

Yellow Flowers

While I was photographing this plant I could hear a lot of splashing behind me. I turned round to see a Blackbird having a good bath in the pond waterfall. First it looked at me and then decided to carry on only stopping for a brief moment each time the mirror clattered in the camera.

Splash it all over:
Splash it all Over

Have a good wash all over and then a decent scratch:
Blackbird Bathing 21

Make sure the ears are nice and clean - Bottoms Up!
Bottoms Up

Yesterday I received and installed a brand new video camera for Hoggy.
Over the past few days I have been thinking I need to name the Hedgehogs as I can't keep calling them smaller and larger. After some thought, assuming the larger one is the male, I came up with:
Henry for the bigger one - means ruler of home and estate, because he seems a bossy boots.
Honey for the smaller one - means sweet one.

Night time viewing - one Hedgehog:


Day time vewing - a Magpie: what a long tail they have.


Sorry - this turned out longer than I intended when I started.

6 comments:

  1. The clarity on hogcam is excellent John. You must be very pleased with the results; well worth all your effort.
    Love those shots of the Blackbird. They always look as though they're laughing when they bathe, with their beaks open.

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  2. Well done with the Lady's Smock John, let us know how they go on. Beautiful captures of the Blackbird, he was really enjoying his bath!

    Great videos, I do enjoy hearing about your latest toy, sorry, equipment!! :) and it will be interesting to see how Henry and Honey progress.

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  3. Hope you don't mind, just having a bit of fun now that you've named the hedgehogs!!

    When Henry met Honey at night,
    They thought they were hidden from sight!
    What they didn’t know:
    They were stars in a show,
    Entertaining us all with delight!

    Now Maggie is seen clear and bright
    With colour cam set up just right,
    But her basic hue
    Is not red or blue ~
    The fact is she’s just black and white!

    ......................
    You captured a very thorough washing by that blackbird ~ great action shots!

    Your yellow plant is beautiful ~ could it be some kind of sedum? Someone may know ~

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  4. Thank you Keith. I am well satisfied now. Just wish I'd bought a couple more of those cameras. They were discontinued stock at 1/5 the original price but they have all gone now.
    The Blackbirds really go for it when they bathe, always fascinating to watch.

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  5. Thank you Jan. Some plants seem so easy to propagate and others so bally difficult. Nice to have an easy one for a change :)

    Definitely big boys' toys Jan. Sometimes I think I was born with a soldering iron in my hand. I've tinkered with things electronic since my mid teens.

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  6. Oh Glo, you're a darlin'. I love your poem. Thank you so much for writing it.

    The yellow flower - After your suggestion I had a look at pictures of the Sedums but they didn't look right. Then I Googled for 'yellow flower succulent' and there it was - Delosperma nubigenum (Ice Plant).

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Thank you for visiting. Hope you enjoyed the pictures. Any comment, or correction to any information or identification I get wrong, is most welcome. John

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