Wildlife Challenge!

[StuartR]

Re: Wildlife Challenge!

Hope you deleted all the non keepers then Stuart You know it makes sense

Well here's one I didn't

Like a pig in a trough it was and look at the business end

[Mike Parr]

Re: Wildlife Challenge!

I dont often take photos of birds, this one was taken from the car

[Mike Parr]

Re: Wildlife Challenge!

Not sure if these count as wildlife

[StuartR]

Re: Wildlife Challenge!

The more I look at my bee pictures (see earlier in the thread) the more I wonder if this is a "normal" bee (they're all of the same specimen).

In the last pic I was worried about its proboscis looking like a fang but look at this (I know the pic is not that sharp but I though I'd share it in the hope there's an apiarist among us who can tell me if this is a "normal" bee or a rare foreign visitor)

[Mike Parr]

Re: Wildlife Challenge!

Oh dear I think I interupted something here

[StuartR]

Re: Wildlife Challenge!

Alerted by screams from 'er indoors and the daughter, followed by s-n-a-k-e , I hoped that the grass snake that visited my pond last summer had returned early due to the warm weather.

I grabbed my camera and ran up the garden just in time to spot this slow worm disappearing into a pile of old logs I'd left in my "wildlife corner"

I just managed to grab a couple of shots before he disappeared - mind you he was a big'un, the concrete slab in the second picture is just under an inch thick so I made him at least a foot long.

[Ian]

Re: Wildlife Challenge!

Alerted by screams from 'er indoors and the daughter, followed by s-n-a-k-e , I hoped that the grass snake that visited my pond last summer had returned early due to the warm weather.

I grabbed my camera and ran up the garden just in time to spot this slow worm disappearing into a pile of old logs I'd left in my "wildlife corner"

I just managed to grab a couple of shots before he disappeared - mind you he was a big'un, the concrete slab in the second picture is just under an inch thick so I made him at least a foot long.

Great stuff, Stuart and lucky you for having such an interesting - and rarely seen - visitor.

I've never seen any snakes in the wild in the UK. Your slow worm is actually a legless lizard, is it not? (And perfectly harmless too).

Ian

[coupekid]

Re: Wildlife Challenge!

Alerted by screams from 'er indoors and the daughter, followed by s-n-a-k-e , I hoped that the grass snake that visited my pond last summer had returned early due to the warm weather.

I grabbed my camera and ran up the garden just in time to spot this slow worm disappearing into a pile of old logs I'd left in my "wildlife corner"

I just managed to grab a couple of shots before he disappeared - mind you he was a big'un, the concrete slab in the second picture is just under an inch thick so I made him at least a foot long.

Superb Stuart! lucky chap for having that in your backgarden!

[Ian]

Re: Wildlife Challenge!

Superb Stuart! lucky chap for having that in your backgarden!

Here is a good page on Slow Worms:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/wildfacts/factfiles/281.shtml

Ian

[StuartR]

Re: Wildlife Challenge!

Great stuff, Stuart and lucky you for having such an interesting - and rarely seen - visitor.

I've never seen any snakes in the wild in the UK. Your slow worm is actually a legless lizard, is it not? (And perfectly harmless too).

Ian

Yes, quite right, although to all intents & purposes it looks like a snake

As a country boy I've seen plenty of slow worms but I think this is the first since I moved up to Essex from Kent nearly 20 years ago. Whether this is because they're getting rarer or they're more common in Kent I wouldn't know.

I've seen quite a few grass snakes and adders in my time but never when I've had a camera with me. I've newts in the pond (they just appeared one summer) but I only see them when the camera is indoors!

We saw a couple of lizards in our garden a couple of years back (I'd previously only seen these in Kent as well) but, you've guessed it, I didn't have a camera with me and they disappeared under the fence into the 6' stinging nettles in the field behind the house so I didn't go looking for them. I'll be keeping an eye open for them again this year.

Moral of the story: carry the camera at all times, especially when walking in the garden - perhaps I'd also have got a shot of the herons that visited my pond a couple of times!

Add all the usual birds, butterflies, bees etc.and it's surprising what you can find in a 110' x 35' garden! We only stopped getting regular visits from foxes when we put a six foot fence up a while back.

Even our cat brings back the odd thing to the back door!



Weasel or stoat...anyone...?

[Caz]

Re: Wildlife Challenge!

Lately, we've been feeding Snoopy (our dog) outside, as the weather's been so nice.

However, the birds have cottoned on to this and are queueing up to see what she's left! Some mornings, there's a queue of sparrows along the grass and sometimes I've seen a pair of blackbirds sitting on the rim of the bowl. The male usually sits on the right, feeding the female.

This was taken last week - I was first in, so was able to put the bowl right outside the back door when Snoopy had finished. I was sat about 6 feet from the open door. A couple of sparrows came down (that picture isn't too clear - their heads disappeared inside the bowl!!), but I did manage to get the blackbird - his mate wasn't about.

Caz

[Ian]

Re: Wildlife Challenge!

This is the forum's most replied-to thread thanks to Ben's inspirational idea of a wildlife challenge - over 200 posts

Ian

[Pops]

Re: Wildlife Challenge!

Mrs Sparrowhawk

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