Identity crisis

Foxglove and burdock – hide the top and spot the difference

In the early spring it would be possible for me to kid myself that the foxgloves we introduced to the garden had seeded themselves in all sorts of interesting places.

Sadly I know this isn’t the case. We’re in fact harbouring a powerful and (where it gets comfortable enough to grow a tap root) almost indestructible weed – burdock.

Until they declare themselves, foxglove and burdock plants look remarkably alike. The photo shows a foxglove growing and a burdock uprooted and set alongside it.

The main difference is that the central vein is reddish on foxglove leaves and starkly white on burdock leaves.

In our case there isn’t much danger of pulling up foxgloves by mistake. Basically if you don’t remember planting it there, it’s a burdock.

Paper wasp nest

Paper wasp nest with wasp (probably the queen)

We were sitting outside having lunch today when I noticed a small wasp flying up underneath a hollow block at the front of the barbecue.

I picked up the block and looked inside the hollow. Sure enough, there was a grey, papery, honeycomb-style nest with a couple of wasps crawling over it.

Paper wasps are smaller, more focussed and much less agressive than larger wasps, although if cornered they do sting.

I think it says it all, though, that I was able to turn the block upside down and take photos of it while the queen clung to the cells and none of her workers gave me any grief at all.

First ripe strawberry

The ripe strawberry

There’s a planter sitting on top of the barbecue with a strawberry plant in it.

Today I happened to wander round the back, and hanging there was a ripe strawberry.

It didn’t even have a slug bitemark in it. In fact it would have to be quite an athletic slug that got its teeth into it.

There are other strawberries coming, but this is the first ripe one.

Cinnabar moth

 

Cinnabar moth on alfalfa

This was a ‘serendipity’ photograph but an easy one because the cinnabar moth didn’t look like it was going anywhere soon.

We used to find cinnabar moth caterpillars, which are striped orange and black, on ragwort in the Norfolk dunes, but I’ve never found any here.

The flower the moth is drinking deep from is alfalfa.

Bee orchid

Bee orchid

At long last I’ve been vindicated for my sentimental style of strimming in the orchard.

I leave the odd little island where I think the flowers are particularly pretty or there’s a species I want to encourage.

The net result is that rather than a nice, even greensward, I create a piece of ground which looks as if it’s had the mange.

On the prowl with my camera, this orchid caught my eye in the middle of an island of longer grass.

It’s a short flower so I’m lucky to have spotted it and I can only hope I didn’t mow any others down.

Its name comes from the fact that it mimics a female bee in order to attract male bees for the purpose of pollination.

The bee orchid which is native to the UK is apparently a bit behind the times because the particular species of bee it’s trying to attract is now extinct, so it has to self-pollinate. I don’t know whether this is also true of Italian bee orchids.