Yesterday, The Land gave me a Gift. It came by way of a Lesson.
I went to a Purple Emperor Wood in another county and I saw four, chasing each other high up among the boughs.
It should have made me happy, but it didn't.
I went out into the garden when I got home and I sat down and I asked him why?
And the garden smiled, and showed me a flower.
On the flower was a beetle, a type of Soldier Beetle quietly nectaring away, peaceful and serene in the middle of the bloom.
It was one I hadn't seen before. I worked out who he was and added him to my garden list. It made me feel happy to think that he is new to the garden, that he has chosen to come and make his home here, where all wild things are welcome.
Then the garden showed me a perfect small white butterfly, resting for a moment on a leaf.
I have been trying to photograph this small white butterfly for weeks, but the photograph just wouldn't come.
Next, he showed me the way the hollyhocks had come into bloom that morning while I had been away.
And I looked and saw the swing beside them, and I remembered how our boys used to love it, the hours they spent swinging on it beneath the apple tree. How we used to help them up onto it when they were too little to reach it by themselves. And in my mind's eye I relived a memory long-forgotten and saw again the way they hooked one knee up on to the bench beneath the swing and levered themselves up with an arm hooked over the swing and around the rope, impatient with assistance as they grew older and became more determined to attain the independence that needed reaching for. And I smiled at the memory and considered how time has passed in this place where I tend to think few years have moved.
Then the garden showed me how eight Oak Sawfly children are nibbling through a fresh, young oak leaf.
And I remembered finding the acorn and planting it in the Good Brown Earth in a pot last winter, and saying a blessing over it and labelling the pot acorn sleeping, please do not tip out his soil. And I remembered too the smile that it gave me when I saw the first leaves breaking the surface this spring.
Then the garden showed me two more soldier beetles who had found each other among the blooms in the wildflower turf and were enjoying what L would call when he was little a lovely mate.
And I remembered M giving me the turf for my birthday this Spring and how it was the best present ever.
Then the garden showed me how the corn marigolds that also grow there look close up.
And the way the light shines through the poppies and makes them look like crepe paper.
And I remembered how that area of the garden was an overgrown tangle of stalks last year and how I agonised about what the right thing was to do for it for months and months. I remembered the many conversations we had about it, the garden and I, tossing ideas back and forth, starting on false starts and retracing my steps. Fundamental to these conversations was the need to care for all the small wild things that are so often over-looked. And I thought: how rich and colourful it is now, how much shelter there is and food sources and places to breed and raise new life and sleep the winter through safely. And how much I enjoy spending time in that part of the garden, wandering among the flowers and taking pictures of the insects, and how visitors to the house have to walk past it on their way to the front door and remark on how beautiful it is.
Next the garden showed me the sunlight sparkling behind the clematis that climbs over the pergola.
And I remembered M and his father building that pergola years ago from timber that came from the woods on the farm where M grew up. The farm that his parents nurtured for fifty years, farming it organically long before it was fashionable to do so, from an ability to put an ear to the soil and hear how it wanted to be. The farm they left three years ago when old age crept close and they decided it was time to move on.
Next the garden showed me how the Bergamot flower had come into bloom while I was away chasing Emperors on someone else's land.
And I marvelled at the exotic nature of the blooms and remembered sowing the seeds carefully with a whispered prayer for their germination two spring's ago, and the disappointment I felt when nothing came up last summer.
Then he showed me deep red roses clustered in a pot on the patio.
And I remembered the person who gave them to me, how special she is to me, how long we have known one another and the things we have been through and shared that have brought us to now. And I remembered how sad and withered and small the blooms were last summer, because the rose had been overlooked in a too-small pot for too long. And how I moved them to a larger pot over the winter to give them space to grow and bloom.
Next he showed me simple sunlight through the wisteria leaves.
And I thought about the pigeons who are nesting deep within its protective arms, and the Children they had last year and those they will have this year, too.
And then he showed me another hollyhock, a different colour to the first but also newly out that day.
And I thought about how different all the colours are in nature, how simple, how beautiful, how perfect.
And then, finally, he showed me the tip of a Squirrel's tail investigating the grasses over the fence by the lake.
And that made me smile, because it reminded me of Teddy, who, whenever he sees a squirrel, becomes suddenly, utterly, completely and inexplicably convinced that he too can climb trees. It is a Sight To See, an Instant Cure For Melancholy.
And I realised that I am where I am meant to be and there is no need to go off chasing Other Things through Other Lands.
CT.
The first sightings of the Purple Emperor (Apatura iris) have come in from Hampshire, Surrey, Sussex and Oxfordshire this week turning everyone slightly loopy. I have written about Emperors before, but for those of you who don't know, this butterfly is the one above all others that calls to people. And it has done so for centuries. I
have met folks who travel miles every July to faithfully scour Emperor woods all over Southern England for this most elusive and noble of winged insects with no certainty of actually seeing one, and others who have devoted lifetimes to searching and never found them.
The Emperor (known to enthusiasts as His or Her Imperial Majesty) is our biggest butterfly and arguably the most beautiful. The females are brown with white markings and orange eyes on their wings, but the boys shine an iridiescent purple/blue when the light catches them right. They are only out during July and spend most of their short lives at the top of the canopy around their favourite oak tree. Last summer, a female Empress visited me at home (see this blog post). An event that was greeted by stunned disbelief among my butterfly friends and slightly stunned disbelief by me too :o)
This year, I could feel myself getting twitchy as July approached. This is because last summer's appearance of the Empress brought with it the hint that we might have a colony living here. We have the right habitat on our doorstep- old Oaks and plenty of Sallow- and the Emperor Recorder told me he thought it highly likely, so I am currently in a state of High Alert :o)
I've never seen a male Purple Emperor before. I've been watching the oaks and the willows and the ground around them like an obsessed woman over the last few days, and keep catching myself whispering prayers to iris.
On Tuesday I thought I saw one, high up in the trees at the top of the lane. That evening I thought there was one sunning himself at the bottom of our drive, but it flew off before I could be sure. Then on Wednesday I met L off the school bus and as we walked down the lane towards home a butterfly flew past us at head height. It had purple/ dark blue wings with white markings......
....except... I've just seen something very like it in the same place that could have been a White Admiral, and now I'm doubting the certainty I had on Wednesday.
This is what that butterfly does to you: it gets inside your head and turns you ever-so-slightly loopy. I even dreamt of flutters last night.
I'm going to have to stake out the hedge, which means explaining myself to neighbours who are new to the lane, and Lord Knows what they'll make of that.
I can just see it:
Me: Are you interested in butterflies, at all?
Them: No.
Me: Urm, well I think we might have a rare one living here, but I'll need to stake out your hedge, just to be sure. Would that be OK?
Them: No. Go Away and Never Come Back, you Very Strange Person.
Luckily, I had Better Luck with the neighbours on the other side who turned out to be flutter fanatics and invited me in to see their collection of pinned tropical specimens. He used to breed Swallowtails. It's not really my cup of tea, as you know I prefer my wild things to be wild, but we chatted about Darwin (who once did some work in our gardens- how cool is that?) and he said he'd knock on the door if any large purple flutters turned up. They also told me all about the grass snakes and 12 types of ladybird they have in the garden, so if all else fails I could probably stake out the hedge from their garden side :o)
It's sooooo tantalisingly close and I just need to SEE it properly to be sure.....
Today, to calm my fevered soul (or perhaps not), I headed off to Bentley Woods with the Butterfly Whisperer for a morning's iris spotting.
Just to underline how hard these things are to spot- we were out for three hours in Prime Emperor Country in Perfect Emperor Weather at Bang On Emperor Time with several other Emperor Hunters all in the woods together at the same time and no-one saw a thing. Not a hint of a Purple Wing. Nothing.
We weren't entirely bereft, for Mother Nature provided some beautiful things by way of consolation.
Top of the list were three White Admirals, also pretty elusive and therefore a total joy to see (and looking at these photos I don't think it was an Admiral up the lane, but it could have been)..
Ringlets..
Silver Washed Frits...
Meadow Browns...
Teeny Tiny Froglets...
A Common Lizard...
Large Red Damsels...
Robin's Pincushion Galls...
Mallow..
Large Skippers (note the light/ dark patterning on the wing which distinguishes them from the Small Skipper)....
Small Skippers...
Somewhat late in the season so it was a treat to see her, we also found this rather ancient Small Pearl-Bordered Fritillary sunning herself on some leaves....
And I spotted this magnificent Longhorn Beetle Rutpela maculata, the Black-And-Yellow Longhorn beetle...
Thank you Bentley, you did us proud (even without sight of His Majesty)
M and I have a week off next week, and he rather foolishly said if there's any wildlife stuff you'd like to do I'd like to come too, so I will be dragging him round all the local woods Seeking Iris. Finger's crossed. I'm also leaving the dog poo out on the lawn as they like the salts in it and The Butterfly Whisperer suggested I add some fish paste to it, as that is another of their delicacies. I am glad, on the whole, that I am not a Purple Emperor :o)
I'll leave you with the hounds. Pop and I watched the brilliant Dustin Brown beat Rafa yesterday. We watched the entire match curled up together on the sofa (Poppy somewhat illegally as she's not meant to be there) until I leapt up screaming when he won and she disappeared beneath the table with her tail tucked between her legs. Later on she got in to trouble for finding a way through the hedge and escaping next door. Which explains the expression on her face in the pic below. Devil May Care, I think we'll call it :o)
Luckily for her, I got distracted by this Tawny Wol pellet I found next to the house (this seems to happen every now and then, leading me to believe that the Wols must come and sit right next to the house some nights)...
I showed it to Teddy, but he was too busy snoozing Fiercely Keeping Guard over the house to pay much attention...
Hope all are well. Keep your fingers crossed I get to the bottom of the Butterfly Mystery before it drives me mad, eh?
CT.
Last night was the hottest night of the year here, and with high temperatures and high humidity forecast it was always going to be a Bumper Moth Night. The temperature only dropped to 18 celcius (briefly, at about 2.30am, otherwise it was hovering around 20), and humidity was 82% at its highest. Moths do love a hot sticky night (unlike people, who in this house at least didn't sleep well, despite the removal of the duvet and its replacement with a light summer quilt I made last year, and the opening of every window in the house).
There were 56 different species in the box this morning (more probably because I am not recording micros- unless they are obvious- this year).
Among the jewels were two of my all-time favourite moths: the spectacular Large Emerald and the diminutive Rosy Footman.
The Large Emerald is a moth who doesn't appear for me all that often- I've only seen it once before, two summer's ago. So I have been grinning all over my face all day today, having spotted it fluttering about first thing. It was a few hours later that I emptied the box and the Emerald had disappeared :o( There were two Common Emeralds also in there and for a moment I wondered if I'd mistaken one of them for the Large, but then I discovered her sleeping on an Emma Bridgewater special edition Jug that a friend gave me when I got married (who knew moths had such good taste, eh?)....
Is that not one of the most beautiful moths ever? They look like green butterflies.
The Common Emerald is another very pretty moth, although a good degree smaller than the Large...
There are only a handful of green moths, and the Emeralds are the freshest green of them all. There is also only one green butterfly, so I always appreciate seeing them. The Large Emerald really signifies hot summer weather for me as I only ever see them when the temperature and humidity rocket.
My other favourite is the Rosy Footman. These moths remind me of L, because they flock to him. I have very dear memories of him sitting on the floor chatting to me one summer's afternoon a couple of years ago with various Rosy Footmen fast asleep on him (including one on his foot, which made us both giggle). They are very characterful moths and I smile whenever I see them. Small and feisty, they are :o) This will be the first of many.
You know by now that I love all moths, but even so there were a couple of other special ones in the box- special because I don't see them often. The first was this lovely Privet Hawkmoth who is currently snoozing on the puller for the blind by the window. I am worried because he is in the sun but I expect he will move into shelter at some point if the heat bothers him...
Another I don't see all that often is this beautiful Scarlet Tiger moth. He's elderly, because his wing tips are raggedy.
They like wet places and do fly by day so keep your eyes peeled on beaches, at wetlands and by rivers as they're on the wing from now until the end of July. The larvae need comfrey and hemp agrimony, but will also feed on nettle, bramble, sallow, honeysuckle and meadowsweet, which is doubtless why we get them here from time to time. Always a pleasure to see a Tiger Moth as there is concern that their numbers are now declining.
Another treasure not often seen but present this morning was this beautiful female Ghost Moth. Most moths have sticky feet, but the Ghost Moth is soft. They belong to the Swift Moth family, very primitive moths who do not feed as adults and over winter twice as pupae. The males display at dusk, swaying over one spot, often in numbers, as if attached to a pendulum. They release a goat-like scent which attracts the females. The display is called lekking and the larvae feed on grass roots, burdocks, nettles, docks and wild strawberries. They are common across the UK.
Yet another rarity for me is this Barred Straw. This one is a boy. You can tell that from the way he holds his tail up when he is resting. These moths are common across the UK and the larvae feeds on cleavers and bedstraws, with the moth overwintering as an egg.
Then there was a Phoenix. We get Small Phoenix here quite regularly, but not the Big Chaps, so that was a nice surprise and it took me a while to ID him as a result. The larvae need currants, and I'm wondering if he's turned up because we put in a Ribes last year.
Beautiful Hooktips have started to arrive (another sign of mid-summer for me). The larvae of these moths feed on lichens.
And I know you've all seen this moth before, but I haven't had as many White Ermines this year as in previous, and I do think they are beautiful, so here is a White Ermine for Good Measure...
I'll leave you with a snapshot of what life is like in our house. When I came down for breakfast this morning I found this sign M had left as a reminder the night before...
The explanation is that he'd discovered a poor dead mole on the drive and I'd left it in the garden last night for any passing owl, but we decided not to leave it there today because Poppy would have picked it up, brought it indoors and sucked it. Yuk.
Poor Old Mole. We don't see them here at all and I do love them so.
The temperature has now risen to 31, higher than a few mins ago when I took this pic..
So the dogs and I are spending the afternoon indoors. They are both passed out in their beds and I may just sit down and watch the tennis players sweating it out at Wimbledon, it being far too hot to do anything useful outdoors.
I had a strange experience while out walking the hounds first thing (it was already hot at 26 degrees even then). I found myself counting the two dogs and looking around distractedly for the third, before I remembered we don't have three dogs. It was a whippet I looking for. The last time something like this happened Poppy arrived a few weeks later :o) I'd better not mention this to M, who considers we are well served in the dog department already....
The heat wave is set to continue for a few more days and L's school has finally given them permission to leave their blazers at home. I sent him off with a bottle of frozen drink this morning so it can defrost as the day goes on but still give him something icy cool to keep hydrated with. We used to do that when I was a kid and it always brings back memories of boiling hot summer days at school for me. It must be so hard for them to concentrate when the weather's like this. I do hope the teachers have taken that into account and are letting them chill out a bit.
Purple Emperor Hunting on Fri (the Emperor blog is full of sightings since the start of the week, so finger's crossed).
Hope you're all well and keeping cool if it's hot with you too,
CT :o)
