Late this afternoon Grillou had a rather unusual visitor. Here she is:
Meet Tettigonia viridissima. She's a Great Green Bush Cricket: une grande sauterelle verte.
How do I know she's a female? Simple. That thing at her rear end is her ovipostor. She's laying eggs. In - um - the coir doormat in our hall :-D . She seemed remarkably unfazed by the presence of a large pinkish-brown animal crawling round her with a camera just a few centimetres away. Tetti (hope she doesn't mind me being familiar) stayed for nearly an hour, during which time she left us with (I'm told) over 300 eggs ...
Life's never dull, here.
Showing posts with label nature. Show all posts
Showing posts with label nature. Show all posts
Sunday, 28 August 2011
Monday, 20 June 2011
Nature rules OK
It's that time of year.
Want to cut back the bay tree on the terrace? Can't. Blackbird still nesting in it - her third brood.
Want to clean the gutters? (All right, 'want' might be just a tiny bit of an exaggeration ...) Can't. Blue tit nest in hole just underneath.
Want to put new light up on L'Atelier's terrace? Can't. Black redstart feeding young in nest right next to the door, here:
Readers with a photographic memory (pun unintended) might recognise this niche as one rejected by The Most Persistent Wren On The Planet three years ago (oh my god!!!!! Three years!!!!!!!!!!) ....
Not that we're short of things to do. The gardens are in their Forth Bridge mode at the moment: just keeping the grass and the brush and the weeds down takes around 18 hours a week (a horrified friend recently declared that "nothing, but nothing, would induce your thoroughly unpleasant looking timetable on me. Tower block in Toulouse rather than that"). Not only that, but we've embarked on some mega-clearing of previously long-overgrown areas in the rock garden, discovering in the process some long lost natural rockery beds that were probably last tended by the family we've met who lived here in the fifties.
All in all, between that and the day job, there's not a huge amount of time left just at the moment to spend working indoors, though slowly slowly curtains are being hung, light fittings and pictures are going up, furniture is being waxed and polished and patina'd, and by the end of this week (I have everything crossed here. And I mean everything) we should finally have water connected to our guest accommodation. I have a feeling that the first time one of us takes a shower in either of the new shower rooms an awful lot of wine is going to be drunk to celebrate ....
Our latest visitor to the garden arrived this week in the shape of an arctia villica: a Cream Spot Tiger Moth. I first spied him (her?) on the night of the eclipse, sitting placidly on top of the terrace lights watching all the other moths going bananas as usual. I swear s/he had a superior look in his/her eye ...
The next day, amazingly it (I give up on gender) was sitting on a blade of grass not very far away; it remained unphased even when I clambered round close by in an ungainly fashion to take pictures.
It even tilted itself at an angle so I could photograph its belly. Now how vain is that?
Pretty though.
Want to cut back the bay tree on the terrace? Can't. Blackbird still nesting in it - her third brood.
Want to clean the gutters? (All right, 'want' might be just a tiny bit of an exaggeration ...) Can't. Blue tit nest in hole just underneath.
Want to put new light up on L'Atelier's terrace? Can't. Black redstart feeding young in nest right next to the door, here:
Readers with a photographic memory (pun unintended) might recognise this niche as one rejected by The Most Persistent Wren On The Planet three years ago (oh my god!!!!! Three years!!!!!!!!!!) ....
Not that we're short of things to do. The gardens are in their Forth Bridge mode at the moment: just keeping the grass and the brush and the weeds down takes around 18 hours a week (a horrified friend recently declared that "nothing, but nothing, would induce your thoroughly unpleasant looking timetable on me. Tower block in Toulouse rather than that"). Not only that, but we've embarked on some mega-clearing of previously long-overgrown areas in the rock garden, discovering in the process some long lost natural rockery beds that were probably last tended by the family we've met who lived here in the fifties.
All in all, between that and the day job, there's not a huge amount of time left just at the moment to spend working indoors, though slowly slowly curtains are being hung, light fittings and pictures are going up, furniture is being waxed and polished and patina'd, and by the end of this week (I have everything crossed here. And I mean everything) we should finally have water connected to our guest accommodation. I have a feeling that the first time one of us takes a shower in either of the new shower rooms an awful lot of wine is going to be drunk to celebrate ....
Our latest visitor to the garden arrived this week in the shape of an arctia villica: a Cream Spot Tiger Moth. I first spied him (her?) on the night of the eclipse, sitting placidly on top of the terrace lights watching all the other moths going bananas as usual. I swear s/he had a superior look in his/her eye ...
It even tilted itself at an angle so I could photograph its belly. Now how vain is that?
Pretty though.
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