My 'Wildflowers for Pollinators' meadow - October update

I wrote a posting about this back in August with my findings and conclusions. I feel I may have been a bit hasty with regards to one particular plant which up until late summer didn't seem to have many insects interested in it at all. Those were the tall orange French marigolds which were a part of the seed mix. However since late summer, and particularly this last six weeks or so, this plant has been the star of the show, not just for aesthetic reasons but because suddenly all the pollinators have gone crazy over it!

Orange Marigold

I'd also mentioned that very few butterflies seemed interested in this meadow. That also changed since September, and whilst I've only taken one photo of a butterfly in the meadow, there were plenty more interested (I have hundreds of butterfly photos taken all over the garden so that's why I haven't any more in this little meadow).

Here are some photos taken a week or so back. Since it rained many of the plants have had a new lease of life, and although they still look rather tatty, they have managed to produce new flowers here and there, such as the blue cornflowers, viper's bugloss, phacelia and the various cosmos and corn marigolds.

The marigolds on the other hand have never once looked scruffy and are still a blaze of orange colour, really brightening up the veg patch as nearly all the marigolds seem to be up one end of this patch, which is total coincidence.

Orange Marigolds swamping the strawberry plants!

The less sunny side. I have now weeded and pulled up the beetroot
that you can barely see here!

The tall pink and white cosmos have continued to flower but they
were later flowering than some of the other flowers.
Birds love their seed heads.

Phacelia is already self seeding all around,
but that's fine as it is grown as a
green manure anyway

So here is a selection of insects taken in the meadow over the last month, starting from yesterday and going back to mid September. I was still photographing bees and hoverflies in it yesterday, despite the fact that the temps have dropped from warm and wet with temps of about 20/21C to extremely chilly daytime highs of about 13/14C, even with sunshine! Brrrrrrrr!

A new hoverfly that I haven't seen before, taken yesterday.
I think it is one of the Eristalis genus but can't find one just like this.

Obviously other flowers are still attracting pollinators like this Eristalis (a different one)
on a Corn Marigold, and what I think is a plant bug of the family Miridae.

Bicoloured Cosmos with a little bee (not entirely sure!) on it.

I didn't get a really clear shot of this cute little bee, but inside a pink Cosmos
the light reflected and in all the shots I took it appeared to have purple eyes!

Here it is again on a Marigold. No purple eyes this time!
I believe it is a Colletes which are known as Plasterer Bees.

There have been cute fluffy bees on the marigolds every day.

More orange, but this time it's an Orange Cosmos
with a Ladybird hiding under the petals

Yet another Eristalis, on a Corn Marigold

Finally, the only butterfly which I did actually take on the Marigolds.
A Peacock (Inachis io).

I have made a decision about this patch. I'm leaving it in situ for next year, as the seed mix contains biennial and perennial plants too, and I'm interested in what they may be. I'm sure I'll have to do some serious weeding here as I know these annuals will want to germinate and take over, but they can grow elsewhere as I want to know what else is growing here, and give them space! I don't need this patch as this would be my bean and pea bed next year, and I have other plans for next spring, so won't be growing any of these veg, other than some French beans (haricot vert) which can be sown later on.

Ignoring the obvious Dandelion, up the shadier end where the annuals were less dense,
I see many of the biennials and perennials which were also in this mix of flowers.

So, all in all even more of a success than I had originally thought! And much as I love veggies, this has proven far more interesting..... :-)
 

Bee hotel update - October

There has been much more activity since I last updated back in July. Many more solitary bees of all sizes have been laying eggs in the holes drilled in the wooden blocks, including many of the really tiny holes that are only about 1mm diameter.

In August as I was walking past I noticed two new blocked up holes. They stood out because whatever material was used to block up these nests was a different colour from the more dull browny grey mud colour usually used. As I got in for a closer look I was lucky to witness the actual bee come along and continue to work on it. You can see the two reddy yellow coloured blobs in the top of the square block here.

The bee didn't seem to mind me at all so I watched for a while and took several shots of it. No, I can't ID it, let's just call it a medium sized solitary bee! This was on 22nd August.

On 19th September as I was walking past I was surprised to notice that those two blocked up holes, and a number of other ones, suddenly had holes in the material that had blocked them up! I'm not sure what is going on as three weeks doesn't sound a very long time for the larvae to develop. I was under the impression that the larvae would remain in the bee hotel over winter, to emerge in the spring as young bees, to continue the whole lifecycle all over again. 

Even one of the original two Mason bee holes, which were the first two occupancies way back around March or April, had opened up. These are the two in the middle row below, the largest size.

Below - These two red-brown holes are close ups of the holes that the August bee was filling in at the top of this post. I wondered whether maybe a bird had been pecking at them but I saw no sign of any debris on the outside windowsill where this sits, indicating that something was trying to get at them from the outside. The hole, middle below, has a bit of a hole and within that, a smaller opening. It looks too neat for it to have been a bird pecking at it.

I'm rather at a loss to understand what is going on, as the numerous websites I have read all say that the bees will emerge in spring. I've also read about using chicken wire to protect against woodpeckers, but I can't see how that would help in any way as chicken wire has holes in it bigger than any of these holes!

I know this all happened in September and it's now October, and thankfully I haven't noticed any change since then. I've just been a bit slow to update this, that's all. 

Confused of Brittany. :-/

Veg patch update - October

This will be the last one of the season, that's for sure! I took these photos on Sunday when it was already rather soggy, but since then we've had an enormous amount of rain and yesterday morning our seasonal stream had started flowing into our lake and by the evening it was a raging torrent! This morning the lake level had filled to about 4" short of the overflow and very soon we will be hearing the sound of running water again as it flows over and feeds the stream which runs beside my orchard.

An overgrown jungle with plenty of flowers in it!

Possibly the only tidy(ish) area with my PSB and Purple Curly Kale.
The peaches this year were not very good and had a lot of rot, so although
I have picked and eaten some the rest the birds can have, which is why I have left
the non rotten ones in piles for them. They're not interested though!

Gardeners' Delight. These large cherry toms are always so loaded
in very long trusses it is impossible to get through them in a short
season without a greenhouse which would need to be heated both
early on and late in the season - which I don't have
and woudn't do anyway - toms are cheaper to buy than electricity!

My chillies are loaded and I've been picking and drying red Cayennes
for a month now. Not quite sure what is happening with the
Piment d'Espelette as I seem to have all shapes of chillies on those plants.
I feel I was sold a duff packet of seeds, and that cost me over €10
so I'm not entirely pleased. They also need to be red/ripe or they are no use.

Chinese Cabbage.
Full of slug holes but hopefully
the hearted bits when ready will be OK!

I do have other veg such as leeks, which are a bit small and pathetic this year and I hope they will swell up now that the soil is moist. There are still beetroot for harvesting, lots of spring onions, a few radishes and loads of rocket. I even have a few small cucumbers left even though the plants are finished. As for the courgettes, I had the grand total of 9 from 2 plants (should be more like 50!). The last two that were forming I waited about 5 days until they were big enough to pick because I wanted to make a last savoury cake, but when I went to harvest them they had pitted marks of rot all over them. Even waiting 5 days for a courgette to get big enough to pick as a smallish courgette is quite ridiculous.

My Sunflowers are a bit of a mess now but the Calendula is
still looking good and colourful, so long as I keep on deadheading!

By one of my gates. There were actually once some veg here -
now it's just a lovely flowering jungle of Nasturtiums (new ones as
the older ones have gone over) and self seeded Verbena b. and Dill.

There are still a few strawberries to harvest -
when I can be bothered!

Still tons of raspberries

I don't really like these orange ones as they lack flavour;
in fact I wasn't aware that I had transplanted one of these plants to my new raspberry bed.
However raspberries spread like crazy so there is no guarantee that what you dig up
will be the plant you thought it was!

Yesterday in the pouring rain I harvested all the remaining tomatoes; the cherry toms are now spread out on my living room floor and the big tomatoes spread out here in my cellar-come-mud room. This also is the sum total of my pumpkin harvest - 3 potimarrons from 2 plants! I shall be making green tomato chutney with some of the big green toms and the cherries should ripen up slowly indoors.

What's left of the tomatoes

Here's a recipe which I first made about 10 years ago and is incredibly tasty. As we've only really got rocket left as a salad green I remembered this recipe of 'Grilled Spanish onion salad with parmesan and rocket' from Delia Smith, who is a very well known English TV cook and cookery book writer. Ignore the salt, she's always heavy handed with it and there is absolutely no need with parmesan which is quite a salty cheese. I also use a frying pan or griddle rather than the grill in the oven.

Rocket, griddled onions and parmesan - delicious!