Odds and Ends

A bit of a bitty post today as not a lot has been happening in the garden.

I ran my Moth trap over the weekend and among the Moths I captured was this very pretty Light Emerald Campaea margaritata. I was hoping to capture some Hawk Moths but sadly none came to the trap.

With nothing much to do except cut the grass and generally tidy up I retreated into the Alpine house to do some more microscope drawing. I like to work in there as the light is good and very even due to the shading on the glass.

 The first one is the tip of an anther (male organ) from a fushia, the whole thing is only 2mm in size. The second is the flower from a stem of Twitch grass Elymus repens whic is about 5mm in length. I find it a really good way to relax and the more I do the better I will get. At the moment all the drawings are done on A5 paper but I intend to scale up as I improve.

Finally some good news from the USA. A court in San Francisco has banned the use of a Neonicotinoid insecticide sulfoxaflor, unfortunately it is still licensed in the EU but hopefully this new ban may force the EU to reconsider. You can read the whole story here: https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn28167-bees-win-as-us-court-rules-against-neonicotinoid-pesticide/

Drawings

There hasn't been a lot going on in the garden in the last couple of weeks so I have continued on my project to record the flora and fauna.

Whilst I was up in our loft the other day and found my stereo microscope. I haven't used it since the end of my college days some 20 yrs back (I was a mature student in case you think I am lying about may age). I used to love microscope drawing so I thought why not get it down and have a go.

These are my first attempts and are Seeds and Seed pods

Hopefully I will get better with practise, but I am quite pleased with these.

I bet these days they just take a photograph, but wheres the fun it that?