Garden battles & Covid 19

Uh oh ! I would normally be visiting the patch during the week to sample the delights therein, but there's a problem. A close relative, who is an NHS key worker, has been sent home with a temperature and a tummy bug. We may have been exposed to the virus through another relative, so we are self-isolating pending the government's "world-beating" testing regime clunking its way to a diagnosis.

So its back to lockdown and garden wars until we know for certain.

Its bloody hot. Last night a couple of moths made it through the bathroom window. One was a pretty one, a Common Emerald, the other was a tiny one, the migrant Diamond-back Moth. Needless to say, the one which escaped my camera this morning was the Common Emerald. It also narrowly avoided the beak of a juvenile Dunnock which darted at it as it jinked its way across the patio.

Meanwhile the tiny one was as good as gold.

Diamond-back Moth

I have to confess to a rather inconsistent moral approach to garden wildlife. I take sides. Obviously Domestic Cats are public enemy number one (sorry cat-lovers). They attempt to catch my precious birds and leave smelly droppings on the lawn. My deterrence takes the form of rushing noisily at them, and I recently took to pelting them with June-drop apples. They always come back.

I'm also not keen on Grey Squirrels. One in particular finds the bird feeders irresistible, and gets the same treatment as the cats. I even scored a direct hit today. It looked mildly annoyed, and will certainly be back.

Obviously I am on the side of the birds, they can do no wrong. Except when it comes to moths. I feed the birds on seeds and fat-balls, not moths. The birds cannot seem to grasp this, and my only option is to be up at dawn (or earlier) to make my presence felt, like a doorman or a bouncer. Keep off my moths.

So I like moths. But do they like me? I suspect not. Unlike bird feeders which provide a symbiotic relationship for me and the birds, the moths don't get much benefit from being stuck in a box all night, cowering beneath egg boxes to avoid the glare of the light which attracted them there in the first place. All for the benefit of science?

The least I can do is try to keep them alive until the following evening, when I get a little lump in my throat to see them flying off. No birds can catch them. There's bats of course (or at least there should be) but that's nature.

So I garden for wildlife. No insects are sprayed, no slug pellets are laid down, and insects turn up.

Large White

Inside the house its a different story. But in a way its the same story. Blowflies, wasps, bees are all ushered out into the garden. Spiders are tolerated although they do give me the creeps.

Occasionally an insect lands on me. I don't splat it, oh no. I take its picture. Like this one today.

Isn't that pretty. I carefully released it into the garden and set about working out what it was. It was a Variegated Carpet Beetle, Anthena verbasci. The Internet was full of references to them and how to destroy them! It turns out that their grubs are known as Wooly Bears, and will make short work of your carpet, your sofa, and your clothes.

But I won't be calling in the exterminators because they have a right to live, like everything else. Except Black Ants. These little buggers come in through the skirting board every summer, and I'm sorry to say they get powdered. I take sides. In the garden I'm on their side, in the house I'm their sworn enemy. No consistency.

Its a jungle out there, and hopefully we'll soon get the all clear and I'll be back on the patch again.

In the meantime the moth trap goes out tonight.