Feeding the Foxes

I hadn't been home in London for ten minutes last month when one of the local foxes came to visit. I'd gone out to see how the garden was and we came face to face as I turned around the hebe bush. He ran off about twenty yards to the compost heap, and then looked back over his shoulder with a look that quite clearly said What are YOU doing in MY garden? before disappearing into the park behind the house.

He looked a bit scraggy, and so for the ten days that I was there I put some dog food out each evening at about the same time.

I've blogged before about whether it's a good idea to feed urban foxes, and I think if I was there permanently my answer would be no. Not regularly anyway. However, when I'm visiting I admit that I can't resist the temptation of watching them every evening.

Not that it's that easy to feed foxes. In fact, you have to be prepared for quite a challenge. The first bit's easy - you just wait till evening, plonk the food down and go inside to wait at the bedroom window, where you can see but not be seen, camera at the ready. And then the fun starts...

First you have to chase off all the neighbourhood cats and convince them that they really don't want to eat your scraps, or dog food, or whatever it is you've put out that evening, and that there's bound to be something much nicer waiting for them at home. By the time you've done that, you've run downstairs to the garden at least five times. But getting rid of them just means the coast is now clear for the heavy mob to move in...

And before long word has got round the whole neighbourhood that there's a party on. Gatecrashers arrive from all directions...

However, finally, the dog fox arrives. He eats precisely half of what's there and then leaves, peeing on your roses as he goes (gee thanks). Sainsbury's dog food not good enough for him?


No - he's just left half for the vixen, who arrives ten minutes later. How do I know it's not just the dog fox just come back? Look at the tails. And how do I know which is the dog fox and which the vixen? I told you - the dog fox pees on the roses...

And who's this? One of the young maybe? Seems in considerably better form than his father - look at that nice glossy coat. Though, in fact, all of them look much healthier than in previous years. Perhaps I'm not the only one in the neighbourhood who invests in Sainsbury's dog food when they haven't got a dog ...

It's been a long, hot summer...

It's been a long summer. July was unbearably hot and humid - well, unbearable for me anyway. I have naturally low blood pressure, and in the summer here it nose-dives to somewhere around my ankles. I just wilt. My husband, who has the opposite problem, suddenly perks up. Ah well, you can't please all of the people all of the time...

I finally managed to escape to England for a fortnight, hoping for a cooler climate and expecting to find the garden overgrown again.



But no. The heat they'd had there too meant that the grass had hardly grown and the weeds were nothing like when I'd gone back in April. There was still plenty to do - it took me a day's work to trim the hedge, and there's still borage to fight against - but even there I think I'm winning. Almost all of it seemed to be this year's growth, and relatively easy to pull up. Still the odd plant growing off long, thick taproots, but after two years fighting, I'm gradually getting somewhere. I've managed to stop it going to seed this year too, which will help - though I have few illusions. There must be enough seeds scattered around from past years to last for eternity. But all in all it wasn't bad. It's not going to make garden of the year, but neither does it look totally neglected any more. The hebe was wonderful - and, I'm pleased to say, full of butterflies - and the hydrangeas were as wonderful as ever.

Some of the things I'd planted last year and this spring were in bloom too - the lavender is doing really well, some of the nasturtium seeds I'd scattered had come up, and there were marigolds and petunias blooming their heads off all over the place. I even managed to harvest a handful of runner beans to bring back. Not bad for a garden left almost entirely to its own devices.

Back on the balcony in Milan though, its been a different story. Hardly anything seems to have done well this year, no matter how much tender loving care it's received. The pelargoniums ar fine - there's still been no sign of the Geranium Bronze Butterfly this year - and the plumbago has been pretty, but there have been years when we've had far more flowers and much larger blooms ....


And as for the rest... Even the Four o'clocks (Mirabilis Jalapa) have been sick and weedy, and they're usually a stalwart. I noticed something was wrong quite early on. I'd planted a lot of seeds, but very few came up - unusual for a plant which tends to be invasive. And those which did looked thin and weedy. And then, a couple of weeks ago I noticed that they'd been attacked by red spider mite - unheard of. If there's a plant which I've always said didn't succumb to pests, is was the Four o'clocks - the main reason I grow them is because they're still there when everything else has been killed off. They're currently still hanging on, but by now they should be in flower, and there's not so much as a bud.


The seeds I'd planted were some that I'd collected last summer. They came from vigorous, healthy plants and I was expecting a great display. It was a lemony-yellow variety which I'd never seen before, and very attractive - much more so that the pinky ones I've grown in the past. I didn't plant any of those this year, and now regret it - because the only plant I do have in flower is one which self-seeded from last year's plants. And yes, he's doing well - but looking a bit sad all on his own in his pot. Four o'clocks really need to be planted in clumps to be really impressive.

After the first week or so, August cooled down and most days we now have pleasantly warm temperatures in the mid-twenties, going up to twenty nine or thirty occasionally, but never over. Like the balcony, I'm slowly feeling less wilted and getting back to real life. And to work, and to blogging. I've just not had the energy for the last couple of months. I have gone on taking photos though, and if I can claw back enough enthusiasm to get them written, posts should be appearing regularly from now on. Fingers crossed ....

Bees

I said in my last post that there didn't seem to be many butterflies around this year, either here in Milan or in my garden in London. Well, for bees Milan is just the same - I've not seen any this year. The hard winter again, or more problems of colony collapse disorder?

But when I was in London I was pleased to see that they were absolutely everywhere - and snapped away like crazy taking photos.

There were some honeybees (at least I think that's what this one is)...



But the vast majority were bumblebees. Which made me realise that I didn't really know very much about bees at all. How many types were there? What were the differences ? I knew that honeybees lived in colonies but that there were also solitary bees. What was the difference? How did you recognise them? And where do the bumblebees fit in? Were they social or solitary? And was CCD affecting all types of bees or just the honeybees?

So I did some research - and found some excellent websites, which are listed below. I'm not going to regurgitate it all, but I was surprised to find out that in the UK alone there are some 300 different species of bee - about 270 of which are solitary.

Solitary bees make a nest by burrowing into soil, soft brick or whatever. The female then gathers pollen and nectar, forms it into a patty, pops it into the far end of the burrow, lays a single egg on top and then seals that section of the burrow up before doing the same in the next bit - and so on up to the end. The very last egg is always male (bees have this strange ability to decide the sex of their children). The eggs hatch, and the larvae consume the food left for them and then pupate. The pupae all hatch at the same moment but the male, being closest to the exit, is the first to burrow his way out. He then waits for his sisters, mates with them, and the whle thing starts all over again. All a bit incestuous, but there you are.

So how do you identify a solitary bee? Well, by Googling them, obviously. I think this may be one ...

... and possibly this one too. Or is it just some sort of fly desperately trying to pretend he's terribly fierce?

Bombus bumblebees, on the other hand, are social and live in colonies. Unlike the honeybees, however, they don't store large quantities of food and all but the young already fertilised queens will die off in the winter. The queens hibernate and then in the spring secrete beeswax to form little cups which they fill with nectar and pollen, laying an egg in each one. As the new workers reach maturity, they start to collect food for the later-hatched larvae. But having only one season in which to form, the colonies remain quite small - whilst a honeybee colony may contain up to 70,000 individuals, bumblebee colonies rarely exceed about 300 and are often smaller.

But what I didn't realise was that there are nine species of Bombus bumblebee in the UK, some very common others quite rare. What were mine? To me, they all looked quite different. This one seemed to fit the description of the most common British type - the Buff-tailed Bumble bee. But the others? The colouring and stripes didn't sem to match. So I sent a few photos off to the Bumblebee Conservation trust (see below) for identification. Would I find that my garden was a home to rare bees?

Nah... the answer came back after a couple of days. All common as muck Buff Tailers.

Except for one. So far there has been no answer for the little one below who I found happily feeding off my borage. Could the delay be because I've discovered something rare? Doubt it. More likely that you just can't see enough from the photo to tell. My own suspicion is that this is not a Bombus bumblebee but a Psithyrus or cuckoo bumblebee - there are six species but don't ask me which this is. These are sneaky. They lay their eggs in the nests of the Bombus bumblebees and let them do all the work. You can tell the difference between the Bombus and Psithyrus bumblebees by looking at their legs. The cuckoos don't need to store food for their larvae and so don't have pollen sacs on their legs - sacs which you can see clearly in the photos of some of the Buff Tailers in the other photos, but which don't seem to be present here.



Will I be right? We'll see. If I get an answer I'll add it in the comment box below. But in case they don't get back to me - any bumblebee experts out there?

Read some more

Bumblebee Conservation Trust Bumblebee Identification
Natural History Museum Bumblebee Identification Guide
The British Bee Keepers Association : bees4kids - The Importance of Bees
Watanabe, M. Colony Collapse Disorder : Many Suspects, No Smoking Gun

Spiders

If you are an arachnophobe - that is, if you suffer from fear of spiders - DON'T SCROLL DOWN. There are photos that you might not like.

But then, I guess that the average gardener can't be too worried. You can't move a leaf without seeing them, especially at certain times of the year.

I have to say I love them. OK, place one of the really poisonous types on my hand and I might freeze. But for the danger, not because it's a spider. In our house, the yell,of "Call Mum - there's a spider in the bath" occurs frequently.

All right - you've been warned, and I hope there's enough text for the photos not to appear above the fold, so that anyone who hates them will have disappeared by now. But just in case we'll start with the least spidery.

What, I wondered when I was at home in England, were these little yellow balls sitting in my front garden hedge. To the naked eye they just looked like blobs. It wasn't difficult to guess though, and when I blew the photo up - baby spiders!

Whose babies, I wondered. I didn't notice any adult golden-black striped spiders in the garden, but I looked them up and Araneus diadematus seems to match. According to my book on British wildlife, it's supposed to be the most common British garden spider, so I'll go for that.

Not sure about this slightly out of focus but hugely pregnant lady. I know how she feels - I was once hugely pregnant in the June heat too. But haven't been able to identify her so far - ??



By far the most common type of spider in the garden seemed to be a small one with a green abdomen and dark legs. Possibly Araniella cucurbitina ?? But the legs seemed darker. They never stuck around long enough for me to take a photo. How many spiders are there in Britain, I wonder? Or in Italy ? I rarely seem to see them here in the city. And in the whole world?

The last type I saw was, potentially, much more scary. This is what my mother used to call a cob - though what the difference between cobs and spiders is (if there is any), I don't know. And I've not found a really similar picture. But she just sat there at the base of the compost heap while I rushed in to get my camera. So I doubt if she had any really evil intentions ...

Before and after - but mainly after

Oh, when you stop blogging for a while, how difficult it is to get started again. I had a good excuse in the beginning - I was too busy gardening. At the beginning of June I went back to London for a fortnight. I had a couple of days work to do there, but the rest of the time was dedicated to sorting the garden out. I had my laptop with me, but the long evenings were too tempting - it seemed better to be doing it than blogging about it.

But then I came back. Must get a post up. But somehow it didn't happen the first weekend, and then the following week got taken up with work. And the same the week after.

So there we are - four weeks without a post. Will I ever be able to hold my head up on the internet again without shame? Will I find myself drummed out of the ranks of garden bloggers? Maybe - but not having time to blog has also meant I've not had time to catch up with other people. And if it redeems me just a tiny bit, I have to say I've missed you all ...

One of the reasons I didn't blog in the early days I was in London was that I couldn't face another what-a-mess-my-garden-is post. It was, of course. The borage was thriving, the grass on the lawn was knee-high and goose grass was smothering everything. The roses had blackspot and if London snails were edible, I would have been able to open a restaurant.


But amongst all the weeds and chaos, there were also bright spots ...

I curse the pyracantha hedge every time I have to cut it. But I have to admit it's glorious at this time of year. It must be at least twenty years since I've been in London in June, and I'd forgotten ...


The front lawn had daisies - and do I mean daisies ... Shastas, I think.

The pansies which I'd planted last year were hanging on in there ...

The roses were trying hard ...


And there were several little geraniums scattered around...

The weigela was past its best but still splendid ...

And when I finally got the weeds out ...



...I found that three of the runner beans which I'd thrown in in April, had made it. I imagine the rest succumbed to the unusually severe temperatures which England suffered in early May. Will they survive the current exceptionally high temperatures (it's 31°C today, a friend tells me) with no-one there to water them?



That goes for all the other stuff I put in while I was there. It's not fair - England is just not supposed to have drought conditions in June ...



But maybe the stuff which has had time to get established will be OK. When I was there last year, I carefully replanted all the Michaelmas Daisies, Golden Rod and other self-seeded stuff in clumps. And in April I threw in a few seeds - such as the nasturtiums Briana sent me when Bilbo cam to stay. Once I'd got the weeds out, they seemed to be doing well.




The alyssum seeds which I'd scattered around had made it and were holding their own against the borage ...


And I found I was growing potatoes on the compost heap ...



And finally, my favourites - little clumps of campanula were bursting through everywhere .



I shall be back in a couple of weeks. Here's hoping that they all survive the heatwave ...

Bare Trees, Blue Sky

I have always been fascinated by the sight of bare branches against a blue sky. I took my first photo, of a silver birch, in Finland in the January of 1975. It had been a long dark winter up till then. And then suddenly, the snow came down, the sun came out, and there was light again.

Now I have a silver birch in my London garden and it's April. But the fascination remains. These photos were taken ten days ago - in my garden (the silver birch and the prunus) and across my neighbour's garden (the apple and pear trees) towards the park beyond (the poplars).

The prunus was in bud but not quite in flower. It probably is by now. I really hoped I'd see it blooming.

The silver birch towards the house ...

... and towards the park.

It's a long time since I took part in Skywatch Friday, but I think these photos probably qualify. But click here to see the others participating this week. Of those up when I posted my favourite are the superb bird photos of by Klaus in Florida. Check them out.

The garden of the colour blind

Imagine a world without colour. Imagine a garden without colour. Partial colour-blindness is fairly common - for example the red-green colour blindness that affects about one in twenty men. But what would it be like not to be able to see colour at all? Something, perhaps, like these photos.

The first day I was in England, I took photos of the garden intending to use them in a couple of posts. But I must have done something weird with the camera settings, because they came out in shades of grey with only the odd coloured tint.

The neurologist Oliver Sacks' (remember Robin Williams and Robert de Niro in the film Awakenings?) describes the experience of total colour-blindness in one of his books. He talks about a visit to an island in the South Pacific where the population is congenitally colour blind, as well as also mentioning the experience of one of his patients who had lost colour vision after a car accident which damaged part of his brain. He says that this patient , "... seemed to have lost the ability not only to see colour but also to imagine or remember it, even to dream of it... (He) complained of his world feeling impoverished, grotesque, abnormal - his art, his food, even his wife looked "leaden" to him."

Do these photos give some idea what it would be like? Knock out the suggestions of yellow and blue, and they are without doubt "leaden". Not black and white - just a grisly shade of grey.

The book is worth reading. Not only for the account of the colour blind island, but also for Sacks account of the cycads on the island of Guam.

Sacks had been a collector of Cycads since he was a child, and jumped at the chance to visit an island which was full of them, but also home to a neurological disorder called lytico-bodig - apparently caused by the poisonous effects of the plant. Cycads, in case you're not familiar with them, are plants which have been around for millions of years. They're the living dinosaurs of the plant world. Distantly related to palms and ferns, they grow in tropical and sub-tropical parts of the world where they are widely used as a food source, despite the fact that they are potent neuro-toxins, producing symptoms similar to those of Parkinson's disease. (If you've got any in your garden, don't be tempted to chomp on the plant as a snack.) Though all over the world people had apparently developed ways of detoxifying the plant, in Guam long-term effects seemed to remain. The rest is a detective story, told with Sacks usual humanity and compassion for the sufferers of the diseases he describes. It's a detective story with no solution, but well worth reading both for the botantical and the neurological details.

But back to colour blindness. What would it be like to garden, seeing only this? Sacks describes the reactions of Knut Nordby, a colour-blind scientist who accompanied him, and of James, one of the islanders :

Knut was fascinated by ... the richness of the vegetation, which he saw quite clearly, perhaps more clearly than the rest of us. For us, as colour-normals, it was was at first just a confusion of greens, whereas to Knut it was a polyphony of brightnesses, tonalities, shapes and textures, easily identified and distinguished from each other. He mentioned this to James who said it was the same for him and all the other achromatopes on the island - none of them had any difficulty distinguishing the plants on the island....

"But what about bananas..." Bob asked... " How can you tell when a banana is ripe ...?"

James' answer was to go to a banana tree and to come back with a carefully selected, bright green banana for Bob.

Bob peeled it; it peeled easily to his surprise. He took a small bite of it, gingerly; then devoured the rest.

"You see," said James, "We don't just go by colour. We look, we feel, we smell, we know - we take everything into consideration, and you just take colour!"

From : Oliver Sacks, The Island of the Colour-blind and Cycad Island Picador