Garden insects of Late Summer

Watching which bees and butterflies choose which one of our favourite flowers is very satisfying. Especially thrilling is seeing new creatures using our normal garden structures for their own purposes.

 

For the quickest result now in late summer put some tall bamboo canes along the hottest border where there is shelter from bushes. Darter dragonflies perch on the tops and swivel their huge eyes watching for flies to catch. In a few seconds they are back on the same perch facing the open space in front of them.

 

A hawker dragonfly will do a non-stop patrol of our boundaries. However bare fences don’t count. They go round and round the space exploring all possible gaps between bushes where flies are emerging from the foliage. Small fruit and hazelnut trees, twining climbers, a hedge, soft fruit bushes and shrub roses are sufficient provided they are joined together like a glade not isolated. One even flew at knee height back and forth along narrow paths between borders. I could not see flies in the air but it must have been worthwhile to continue for more than 15mins. in our hedged front garden well away from the pond elsewhere where it hatched.

 

A hedge does not have to be cut square creating a wall of shade. Shaping it with dips and humps like the downland has 2 benefits. The slopes can reflect the sun as it moves which brightens a north facing garden; there are more surfaces to notice the wildlife which use it. Red Admirals will bask on Ivy flowers in the autumn if it is clipped in early spring to make a slope facing the midday sun. Moths have more choice of aspect and effective shelter in the densely clipped structure. The Sparrows spend half the day scuttling in and out. One of the dips is perfect for wedging a simple tray for mealworms into the centre for the chicks and hesitant juveniles. It is out of sight of both Magpies and the army of cats nor will it blow down in a gale.

 

Although an area of shaggy lawn provides clover etc for bees and remains green in a drought it is still worth watching the sunny part of a close cut lawn. Mini volcano holes of mining bees continue to appear where the grass is very short and thin with no tufts and we are more likely to notice the yellow ladybird or the tiny green beetles and spiders crossing it. The mown lawn is also where hoverflies and little bees feed on Daisies which turn their heads to face the sun; as their name suggests, Days’ Eye.

 

Another annual visitor is Comma which basks in the centre where the ground heats up; that is if it is not basking on the chairs.

 

The sunny edge of the lawn is where the Field Grasshoppers chirp. It is a drier and hotter place under mounds of Lavender, Sage, Winter Savory, Caryopteris, Plumbago where they lean forward and the grass becomes thinner. They do not stay in our long grass which remains cool despite being on light soil and in the middle of the garden. The chirps come from different places as they escape the shadows creeping up the garden in late afternoon. Border edges of loose bricks, tiles, flints, logs become a place to bask and chirp.

 

The rose which climbs past the kitchen window has the perfect circles of the Leafcutter bee. I had given up looking  and only noticed them while standing at the sink in August. As the rose has plenty of stamens on its large bunches of small flowers we can also watch bumblebees from the sink. There are the same circles in Winter Honeysuckle leaves.

 

Now in the summer holidays is the time when a Jersey tiger moth or a Hummingbird Hawkmoth are more likely to appear. These are elusive ‘blink and you miss it’ insects which we usually notice only once. Both are as precise about their route through the garden as all the other insects in this blog. We have learned to recognise the Hawkmoth as no more than a speedy blur and the hum of its wings can be heard if there is quiet . 2 or 3 Lavender flowers per second. So fussy is it , one Lavender bush will be ignored in favour of a smaller more sheltered one behind it. Nor does it fly anywhere other than the south facing boundary leading to the Abelia next door.

 

The Jersey Tiger is more likely to be resting vertically in the light shade under the white Jasmine where its stripes are perfect camouflage against the fern like leaflets. We are impatient to see the vivid flash of its underwings but then it would be gone.

The top tip of the Jasmine which drapes over a bay tree is where a Silver Washed Fritillary rested one evening in the last shaft of sunshine. A bumblebee or a bush cricket or a Red Admiral may also be soaking up the last of the heat in the bricks in the gaps between the stems of the climbers on the house.

 

It can be hard to predict where wildlife will choose to go. So it is always worth trying an idea in more than one place in order to discover the preferred one. Clearly the more variety of shapes of plants, kinds of little places and nooks and crannies we make in our garden the more opportunities there are for a creature to find a home. It does not have to look like a fuzzy nature reserve  or derelict but the borders do need to be: