Mrs GSW Still Visiting

One or both Great Spotted Woodpeckers could well be visiting the peanut feeder ever day. They stay for such a short while it is pure luck if I happen to see one. Yesterday it was the turn of the female to arrive while I was watching from the kitchen window:



This time I used the basic free version of the Mac app Photohive which puts the photos in cells like they were in a beehive. As you can gather I had a session downloading several free apps which produce different types of collages. It's nice to ring the changes from time to time.

Photos taken with the Canon 70D. ISO set to 5000 as it was still somewhat dull after a morning of heavy rain. Photos enhanced in iPhoto as contrast tends to be rather flat with high settings of ISO.

When is a Hopping Frog not a Hopping Frog?

When it's a Frog Hopper:



Remember that frothy Cuckoo Spit (also called frog or snake spit) on my Pinks? This is the creature which emerges when the nymphs hidden in the froth mature. Length about 6mm.

It was half way up the door frame of my conservatory and stayed long enough for one shot before it just vanished from view - hopped away! They are capable of leaping many times their height and length. Some can leap up to 70cm vertically and accellerate at 4,000 m/s2 over 2mm as they jump. Some can jump 100 times their length. All in all well named as Frog Hoppers.  Information from Wikipedia.

Photograph, cropped, taken with my Nikon Coolpix S9050
Picture produced using the Mac app PicCollage Lite.

Sparrowhawks 1 Starlings -1

I knew the cacophony the young Starlings kick up would eventually attract another visitor to the garden:



Collage produced using the Mac app CollageFactory Free.

Friday at the Flicks - Roosting Again + Bottoms Up + Panorama Experiment

After an absence of six nights the Wren spent another night sleeping in the roosting pocket.




Walking past a tub filled with Pinks in full bloom I noticed how deep the Bumble Bees had to go to get at the nectar. Good for the plant as it forces the hairy bee to brush against the pollen which will get carried to other plants to fertilise the embryonic seeds.



Some flowers are easier than others for a large Bumble Bee to gain entrance to the nectar.  Phil Gates in his blog Cabinet of Curiosities has just explained with beautiful close up photos how hard they have to work to get in the flowers of the Foxglove. See Bumblebees and the Foxglove Challenge.


Yet another experiment. The iMovie Mac app has a zoom facility called the Ken Burns effect which allows me to very easily fix a start point and size along with a finish point and size to give zoom and / or pan effects to movies or stills. This experiment started with one of my old panorama shots taken with the iPhone:



Pasted in iMovie and the Ken Burns crop / zoom effect applied to give a panned video view across the still picture:





I will have to take some more detailed panoramas around the area and see how they look as pseudo videos.

Have a great weekend observing the wildlife around you.

Meadow Brown ?? + Broad-bodied Chaser

Walking past a nettle patch on the edge of the cricket field I could see the usual Red Admirals and Small Tortoiseshell butterflies. Flitting among them was one lone large brown coloured flutter which led me a merry dance as I tried to photograph it for later identification. This was the best I could manage:



The best identification I could get from my Guide to Butterflies of Britain was the Meadow Brown. I hope it is as I don't remember seeing, let alone photographing, one before now.

A lovely surprise was a large flash of orange brown fluttering round my garden pond. A Broad-bodied Chaser Dragonfly. It's several years since I last saw one in the garden and those sightings were of males. This time it was a female which made several brief sorties over the pond. Only landing once to give a brief opportunity for a photo.



Unfortunately she wouldn't let me move round to get a better shot. At one time their distribution was listed as being Southern England and Wales but I think they have been spreading further North as average temperatures have risen. When I first saw this one she appeared to be flying up from water level. I do hope they start to breed in my pond as it would be great to have a local colony.

There are a few of the regular Blue Tailed Damselflies around the pond as they do breed there. I was fascinated watching one male chasing a Hoverfly. No matter how the Hoverfly twisted and turned the Damsel followed its flight exactly until it took refuge in some dense vegetation.

The Problem and the Solution

A couple of days ago I had noticed the odd wasp hanging around an air brick at the front of the property. Yesterday morning I could see a constant stream of the villains going in an out so there was obviously an active nest somewhere behind the brick.





As their activity was near the front door and any visitors had to pass within inches of the activity it was time to have it dealt with. A search on the net for a company brought up the web pages for EMS Pest Control.



Phoned about 8.30 a.m and Frank arrived soon after 12.30 p.m. to carry out the dastardly deed:





I watched from the safety of my bay window as there was soon a gathering of angry wasps returning and finding a strange substance on their route in.

 

Eventually the activity died down as more returning wasps carried the powder in to the nest. While we waited I had a very pleasant chat with Frank who told me that problem nest activity was starting later than usual this year.

We waited for some time watching to make sure there were no wasps exiting the nest as that would show that those entering had been killed. I will get that brick blocked in as it serves no purpose. It was part of the under floor draught system for an open fireplace but was sealed off indoors years ago when I changed from coal to a gas fire. The room floor is solid concrete so it serves no ventilation purpose.

Tuesday Twister - Guess What

Congratulations and virtual gold stars go to Frank, TexWisGirl and Adrian who identified the Hedgehog in last week's twisted photo.

      

For the new twister - What's That?



If you want to have a guess please put it in the comments.
No prizes, just for fun.
Just a virtual gold star for correct identification.

Any guesses in the comments, along with the answer, will be revealed next Tuesday.