Friday's results

Good morning,
Another glorious day yesterday had me out in the garden and from the early hours until dusk. Got loads done and saw plenty. Also very pleased to have had some great photos sent in along with sightings.
First off, a Common toad sent in by Liz from Little Hadham. These creatures will now be making their way to a pond to breed having spent the winter hibernating in leaf litter, holes in the ground as well as sheds and under wooden structures in the garden.

Common toad

Janine sent in a photo of a gloriously colourful Peacock butterfly.

Peacock butterfly enjoying the warmth

Gerry from Much Hadham area runs a trail camera in his back garden. Along with foxes and muntjacs he got this great image the night before last. I wonder what wanders through our garden at night, unknown and unseen.

Badger

Me, I didn't get anything so exotic. Bird wise the highlight was two overhead red kites circling with a common buzzard. Another interesting sight was 3 mallards flying around looking for a roost site at about 5.45pm Butterfly, just a comma but plenty of bees and more bee flies.

Mining bee nectaring

Other creatures were also sent in. Here a dock bug climbing up a bin and a great photo taken by Richard in his Stortford garden of a colourful Jay.

Dock bug

Jay

Finally, a mothing friend in Stevenage set up a pheromone trap to attract a particularly spectacular moth, The Emperor. Short video of its release here.

Keep the photos and reports coming. My stats page for these posts show that there are plenty of people looking at them. I shall post another activity later so do take a look. This one is about growing vegetables without needing to go an buy expensive packets of seeds. Great activity for children. Tomorrow I shall take a break and be back Monday with more ideas that you may wish to try. Oh, and also check my next post on how to make a really good and easy sweep net to catch insects in long grass and hedges.
Have a lovely day.