Chucky's Nature Notes

Mummy has gone to visit her parents so I can now get to the computer to type up my blog. She has been hogging it! So recently we had a very lovely sunset that we got a photograph of from Gav's work carpark: We also have some lovely autumn colour on the balcony now too: AND we had this little guy playing on the lavender - he is a sheild bug, and we cannot figure out why he has come all the way up here as there are certainly no friends round here! We have some lovely flowers at the moment (yup the sweet peas are a little late at the moment), so mummy took some cuttings for in the living room: The sunflower has also finally flowered!!! It is a very sall flower on a very tall stalk, but there are a couple more buds on there yet! This does mean I might get the seed head from it, whoop! And today mummy did get some lovely pictures of a seagull and some starlings out in Blackpool - no she didn't take me with her! I have been abandoned :( It i...

We have been over by the duck pond again, and this time we were looking at the flora instead of the fauna. We want to try and bring you something different, but wild, for each day, and today we have some ivy flowers for you. These are sitting quite low as the ivy is growing over a tall tree and draping nicely. The flowers have such great structure: It is so geometric and masculine compared to the normal frills and bright colours of flowers! Obviously this is just the buds and they will open out into little flowers that can then be polinated, but they provide such great structure through Autumn. Another very Autumnal fruit, yup instead of flower this time, is fungi. These caps are the fruiting body, which allow the fungal spores to collonate further afield and intermingle, in the same way that pollen works for flowers. You do not usually see much from fungi until the high humidity of Autumn llows them to fruit, and this is how we imagine them to look all the time! There are so man...

Well it has certainly gotten cold now. Mummy is starting to look for an indoor hutch for Piggy, as he is getting old and mummy doesn't think he will be able to cope with the extremes of temperature. However, she hasn't done a good job of finding one so far - I don't think she is commited enough yet! If he had made friends with Henry he could have had a body to cuddle with to keep warm in my opinion. Anyway, yesterday mummy was nearly late for work due to trying to photograph another micro-moth inside the house, this time in the kitchen. We are not sure if this is the same species as the previous one, or a different species from the same family. And today there was lots to see out by the duck pond - besides all the greedy ducks that is lol. Firstly there was ratty: Poor little guy is terrified of the ducks, as they are likely to just stand on him without even realising he was there! Then we noticed that one of the very tall trees that we always stand und...

Well yesterday was rather awful as we got a storm hit, and the wind and rain didn't stop. However the blue tits were still coming into the garden (not when mummy was around of course, they have gotten very good at hiding from her) and they do amuse the little birdies. Florance especially likes to sit in the corner of her cage watching them. The crows do still come in occasionally too, although they are getting much more independant now. The wild thing that we wanted to note from yesterday was this flower that is growing next to Doris's run, and it is about to flower. It has sticky leaves too! We have tried to ID this plant, but no luck as yet, so any help appreciated! I wish mummy had taken me out in the car with her this morning. She saw a family of Magpies playing around on the rooftops this morning. Initially it looked like the typical corvid terretorial spat, but then they started sliding on the roof and then flying back up to throw the next one down the roof. There w...

Well another two days worth of wildness to share with you. It was rather wet yesterday morning and mummy got this lovely picture of the spider web (she even managed not to destroy it until she came home after work and walked right through the middle of it before she even remembered it was there - the sun had come out at this point). It is connected to the rabbit run at this side, and mummy was stood in the run with Doris wondering what the heck she was doing. Then today this little guy was on the door of the hutch: Not sure what it is as yet (obviously a spider but of an unknown species at the moment). Other things to note are that our very late sunflowers appear to be getting ready to flower - I am not sure they are going to have time to set seed now though, and that it what I am after! Also the conkers are starting to ripen on the trees - there are lots of husks around the bottom of the trees now where people have been collecting, but these were still hanging nice...

Oops I forgot yesterday about posting - me and mummy were having a look at my new toys that arrived on Saturday! I love getting new toys, but they only last a few days and mummy never buys enough of them. So yesterdays wild experiences were both of the 8-legged kind. The first is this giant boy: Yup he is a giant house spider and has a leg span of 84mm! That is one extra large boy right there. He certainly scares me - he moves too fast for me to keep my beady black eye on him. Thankfully he lives in GavGavs garage, so nowhere near me or my little blue bird friends - they certainly wouldn't like him, he could probably eat them! These guys are out and about this time of year searching for a female to mate with. He probably will not survive the winter (if he even survives an engagement with a lady). This little lady is living out on the plant pots and is a lovely colour: She was just perfecting her web as I took this photo, and she is a standard garden spider. She has a ...

Ok so some days mummy is very busy and doesn't really get a chance to pop outside whilst it is still light! Yesterday was one of those days as she needed to go shopping once she got home from work and then there was a visitor coming round later on. It is much more fun when she doesn't go shopping and spends all the time with me instead - surely wildness is much more important? However, upon going up to her bedroom (after putting me to bed) she saw the moon out of the bedroom window, and it was so pretty in the black sky. We tend to take the moon for granted unless it is a large and full moon, so mummy decided to take this picture. She explained to me that the reason it was taken through the window was that when she moved to get a clearer shot, it disappeared behind the house opposite! Hmm, ok so not a brilliant picture, but on the theme of nighttime there is a little bat that is currently visiting the garden in the evenings. Well, I say little - it is in comparison to mys...

Wow some visitors to share with you this time! They were just hanging out in the utility room. They did not appear to be attracted to the light though as one stayed on the wall by the back door and the second was flying round in the darkened hallway and kept landing on the floor also. Very strange. We did manage to get a couple of photos! We have no idea what this is - so any ideas welcomed!! There are not so many moths around at this time of year, so not sure if it is a later emergance due to the hot summer, or one that naturally flies early September. However, it has been getting rather cold at night - mummy is worried that maybe she should have let them stay in overnight - but if they fly at night that would have restricted them. She only just popped them outside the backdoor on the vegetation. It is getting dark quite early now - I don't like staying up when it gets dark, so I am going to get mummy to put me to bed now.

Well todays nature note/#30dayswild is the fact that this little Rose has got another new bloom! You can see the new rose at the back, nice and bright. The early flowers were decimated by some form of tiny green caterpillar, but mummy is so soft hearted once she had found what was destroying the plants (one at each side of the door - the other is not blooming) she then put it back and let it carry on! So it si quite marvellous that this particular plant is STILL throwing out new buds - especially as Roses are supposed to be stopping flowering now I think? And such a stunning flower too - you can see the front flowers have had their petals nibbled, but we think that is probably slugs - they are reappearing now it is not quite so dry. Right bedtime for me now apparently - mummy just wants to do her learning welsh, so puts me to bed :(

Ok so 10th and 11th. So this little jumping spider came to say hello to us yesterday - he didn't really like the camera though. That is why he has his bum to us instead of his head! Now GavGavs Regal jumping spiders are much more interactive with the camera - they are not camera shy at all! Look at thatgreen sheen on the pedipalps! And todays picture is this little Nasturtium (pretending it is a Frittilary hehe) It has hardly any leaves, but has managed to create this pretty little flower. Here are some of the flowers of the rather large plant - trying to look pretty under the Acer: Mummy is not sure why they are so late flowering this year, but the plants have grown quite large, even with the caterpillars, so maybe the weather was just perfect for that! I think mummy should let me eat some of the flowers - apparently they are very tasty with a peppery tang. Right got to go and try and get my own way now - will let you know next post if I got to eat any!

So I didn't post anything yesterday - I kinda forgot - silly me. Here is the photo for day 8 in September - a caterpillar that was on a neetle stem in the garden. It looks like it is about to pupate. Mummy is trying to find out what caterpillar it is but at the moment no luck. We do have a second photo too And then for today (day 9) we saw this funky tree whilst we were out on a walk. (We did get a few funny looks - people seem to think only dogs should go on walks!) Mummy says she is not sure why the tree has a whole load of new leaves, but I think it may have something to do with the long dry summer! Oh - mummy also took some photos of me :) I am definitely wild, especially in this cage - I can get so close to everybody hehehe (I do try and eat the dashboard, hence the green thing in front of me). Aren't I just far too cute?