Reptile rockery

Each month Springwatch have a Wildlife SOS (Save Our Species), which encourages everybody to do something specific to help our wildlife. This month it was to build a reptile rockery. When Little Brother had to do a project on 'habitats' for his homework, we decided building a reptile rockery in our wildlife garden would be perfect.

As reptiles are cold-blooded, they need somewhere sunny to bask and warm up, as well as somewhere shady to hide when it's too hot or when there are predators nearby. We raided Nanny Moth's garden and found a mixture of flat stones, broken pots and pieces of concrete (all flattish and warm in the sunshine), which we arranged with plenty of gaps as hidey holes. Then we planted some herbs around the edge, to provide extra shade and to attract insects for our reptiles to eat.

The reptile rockery is in a sunny spot near our new pond, so it will also be a great place for frogs and toads to hide. No sign of any basking reptiles yet, so we helped with a few from the toy box!

And the furry anaconda needed wrestling!

Homework done and Wildlife SOS done!

He wrote up a little bit about reptiles and the habitat they need for his homework

I'm not sure we have any reptiles in our garden yet, but maybe this will help some to live there. Wouldn't it be great to have a resident slow worm or grass snake one day!

Branching out!

Big news ... the first of the back garden baby kites has left the nest and is out on a nearby branch.

Mum on the right and the larger of the two chicks on the left

It hasn't gone far. The nest is on the left of the photograph below and Mum and the chick are out on the branch on the right.

The second chick is about a week behind the first and is sitting tight in the nest, just watching what's going on. This one still has fluffy grey feathers on its head.

 

The chick is a bit wobbly still and fell forward before regaining its balance after a bit of flapping. Mum is staying very close by and keeping a watchful eye on it.

 

A bit of a wobble

Balance regained

Both parents have been doing a great job of looking after the chicks and it looks like all their hard work paid off. They're looking a bit shabby now though and are moulting their feathers, which means there are always lots of great feathers around the garden.

Looking a bit ruffled!

A tickle of red kite feathers collected from the garden

 The collective noun for a group of feathers is a tickle, which always makes me laugh!

Chalkhill blues and silver washed fritillaries

I walked around Grangelands this morning and was delighted to see the first chalkhill blues of the year out, fluttering low over the short grass on their favourite slope. They'd settle very briefly for the occasional quick photograph, but never seemed to sit still for long!

They're such a beautiful pale blue and a real sign that summer is here. One even sat on my finger for a while!

I mostly saw the blue males (as their bright colour makes them so much easier to spot than the brown females), but I did see one pair mating.

In another week or two this slope will look like it's shimmering in the sunshine as there will be so many chalkhill blues flying over the grass.  They're fussy butterflies and like short grass on a sunny slope, particularly this slope. Walk around to the other side of the reserve and you won't see any at all.

There seemed to be butterflies everywhere, including meadow browns, gatekeepers, small tortoiseshells, small heaths, ringlets and marbled whites. Many of the marbled whites had bright red dots on their bodies, which are tiny parasitic mites called trombidium breei.

Marbled white with red mites

This meadow brown also had mites on it

 The thistles were full of soldier beetles, which always seem to be having a party!

Watching me, watching the soldier beetles!

 As I walked back through the dappled shade of the trees, two silver washed fritillaries were feeding on bramble flowers. They're beautiful, big butterflies and a real treat to see.

 

What a beautiful morning full of wonderful butterflies!

Baby kites and beautiful moths

It feels strange not to be tagging everything with #30DaysWild, but that's all finished now, so we're back to just being wild again!  Today we visited my parents and checked in on the red kites nest in their back garden. The chicks are really big now and you can see a big difference between the two of them (there's possibly a third one in there, but we can't be sure!)

The one on the left has lost all the grey fluff from it's head and is starting to really resemble the adults. The one on the right looks about a week behind its sibling and is still sporting the wild grey fluffy look.

The parents don't stray far from the nest, but one of them was really enjoying a bit of sunbathing, sat in the Christmas tree at the end of the garden.

 

We had the moth trap out last night and caught another big haul of hawkmoths, with 2 privet hawkmoths and 5 elephant hawkmoths. They're fabulous moths and the kids love to hold them before we let them go. A privet hawkmoth on the nose is a big treat in our house!

We lined them all up along Bug Mad Girl's arm and watched as one by one the elephant hawkmoths flew away. The privet hawkmoths seemed quite happy to stay sat there, so we put them on the hollyhocks and they can leave when they're ready.

 

 

A few of the other nice moths from the trap included a scarlet tiger (on the grass next to it), a white satin moth, 2 sycamores and an old lady. The white satin moth and sycamore are both considered local species (so not rare, but not common either). The old lady is a big moth and reminds me of the time one flew into the house and we all thought a bat was flying around indoors!

 

Sycamore

 

White satin moth

 

#30DaysWild - The best bits

Well, we've done it! 30 days wild, 30 blog posts and lots of fun and fond memories. Here's a short video with all of our favourite wild moments from the last 30 days.

In case you can't view it, or don't want to, here's a shorter traditional version...

It all started with an interview on BBC Breakfast about 30 Days Wild. It was totally terrifying, but a fantastic opportunity and we got to meet lovely Carol Kirkwood!

We then set about 'wilding' our back garden, by digging a pond and putting our tadpoles in it. We planted loads of bee and butterfly friendly plants, left a patch of our garden unmown and made a toad and frog house. We were thrilled that damselflies found the pond and were laying eggs in it within a week of it being dug.

We watched (and videoed) our caterpillars pupating and watched them again, 10 days later, as they emerged and flew away.

We found all sorts of weird and wonderful wildlife during the 30 days, including beetles, roman snails, slowworms, spiders and butterflies. We even found a rare sawfly and had a night-time adventure to look for glow worms.

 

We saw some wonderful plants and took part in the Great British Wildflower Count.

We were thrilled when the back garden red kites had babies and loved watching them as they grew.

We caught lots of wonderful hawkmoths in the moth trap...

... and had a lot of fun!

But most of all we just got stuck in and had a brilliant 30 days Wild!

Thank you 30 Days Wild and The Wildlife Trust!