Morning moths
We had a really good morning in the garden, opening up Guy's overnight moth trap. We think we had about 19 new species, not recorded in the past two years. We will send the records into local databases. The largest and most spectacular moths are the hawkmoths but the smaller ones are very beautiful too.
We had such a successful trap, Guy offered to return later in the year (scheduled for Sunday 8 October during the Funpalace) to see what we have living in the garden then. We will post the dates and times on the QECF website.
Bats in the garden
We had a lovely evening talking about the pond, adding some more plants, sticklebacks and a dragonfly larva, setting up an overnight moth trap and bat watching and detecting. We saw and heard four species of bat this year:
- Noctule, which is the largest we have, first to fly, high above the garden - rather like a swift - it feeds on the Light arches moths we caught in the trap.
- Common pipestrelles - much smaller and later and lower flying (as it is getting dark) - a couple flew circuits low over the pond catching flies above our heads.
- Serotine pair - larger than the pips and much rarer - Guy thinks there is a maternity roost in a building nearby.
- Soprano pipestrelle - a new species for us in the garden and park.
Swimming around on the pond
On Wednesday, we spotted twelve baby ducklings and their mother swimming on the pond. But we shouldn't be surprised if they dwindle in number over the next few days and weeks.
According to our pond advisor: they should be eating insects (and not sliced bread) so please don't be tempted to feed them. Although they are very cute, we'd like them to fly (or waddle) away fairly soon or our pond will just become a muddy duck pond and we won't have good pond dipping opportunities.
Sometimes, you have to be cruel to be kind...
In fact, on Thursday, a similar sized group were spotted in a garden across the road from the park so maybe they are hunting for the safest place to be with the tastiest food (or had been reading this webpage).
Update 2 July: four ducklings spotted with their mother - and a visiting cat eyeing them up... hope they survived the encounter!
Update: August - all four ducklings grew to adult size and were seen often in the garden, especially at night. We have seen them since mid-August and assume they have now moved on.
Cambridge Wild in the garden
We have chosen dates and are starting to plan activities. See the Cambridge Wild page for more information (poster).
If you can help us on the day or beforehand, it would be very welcome. We don't have a budget for this so what we offer is quite simple...
Cubs in the garden
As part of our RHS Greening Grey Britain project, we welcomed the Tuesday group of the 28th cubs along last evening. We:
- Hunted for strawberries of several types;
- Tasted some ripe blackcurrants;
- Harvested a few baby carrots - and kept the tops for Emma's guinea pigs;
- Pulled a straw bale to pieces and used it to mulch the strawberry and onion beds;
- Planted some young lavender plants - with RHS gloves and tools;
- Looked at the moth mullein caterpillars, which are munching the mullein plants - but didn't vomit at us.
- Toasted some marshmallows and drank hot chocolate;
- And perfected making giant bubbles, using RHS garden tubs.
It was really good to welcome back the cubs and their adult helpers on a warm Summer evening - the last time they came in November 2016 to plant crocus bulbs the weather was about as bad as it could be.
Big Walkers in the garden
On Weds 7 June, we welcomed a party of Big Walkers to the garden for a(n impromptu) Little Get-Together. These were people from the Eden Project/Jo Cox Foundation on their way from Batley to London for the Great Get-Together weekend.
We 'bring and shared' snacks from around the world and then tasted some delicious vegetarian Sri Lankan curries and rice. It was very chilled, the weather was good, and a good way to meet new people and make new friends.
We had invited garden volunteers, social walkers and local people interested in community projects especially those to do with loneliness and health. We also welcomed anyone who happened to be in the garden that evening...
- A mention on Cambridge 105 radio (about 6 mins in).
Going up
We have been having fun making vertical structures again - this time to grow runner beans and climbing French beans. But they also look good on the very flat ex-bowling green.
Cedric the centipede
With it being half-term holiday, we have lots of families in the garden - and we were also turning the compost heap - to find this minibeast. Some discussion about whether it was a centipede or a millipede and if s/he would make a good take-away pet (page about both). We didn't like to say s/he was 'common'.
Hanging habitat and plants on the move
We finally got around to using and fixing two of the hanging baskets (and brackets) we were donated some time ago, now filled with pine cones, dried leaves and straw.
We also made a start on our scented mini garden around a bench. The soil was dug over by the Community Payback team and we enriched it with well-rotted horse manure.
Our salad bed is looking amazing - the curly and flat-leaved parsley and chard had germinated really well so we had lots of plants to thin out - some we potted them on to give away and made more rows in the bed too.