Saturday 1 June 2013

Blitzing it garden style

The Safari has spent much of the day in the garden at Base Camp today. The moth trap held an absolute zero - all 'minus 273' moffs nowhere near the trap!
Then it was time to have a blitz round the garden to see what we could find. We started at 10.00 and will finish at 10 tomorrow morning.
The plants didn't pose too many problems as we found nearly 30 species that have found their own way on to our patch - worst was an fairly sizeable Ash sapling we've not noticed before that will have the back wall down in a couple of years if we don't take a spade to it this summer!
We had a few sessions of observing with gaps for various reasons interspersed and we finished for tea at about 7pm at almost 70 species. The mothy is out and stealth-cam is peering at a pile of mealworms in the 'quiet' corner where hopefully a Hedgehog will make an appearance overnight.
We've had to use those clever iSpotters for a few things - which is in the rules, indeed it is encouraged.
The results of everyone's efforts will be recorded on iRecord and then on the National Biodiversity Network Gateway. Not that we've found anything that won't have been recorded in this area before - now if we'd been at work this week and done it in the garden there then we might have been able to add a dot or two to the maps.
A couple of things still awaiting an ID...


And still no beetles, butterflies or even an Earwig!  A bat would be nice this evening.
Where to next? Might go to the nature reserve early doors tomorrow.
In the meantime let us know what's being blitzed in your outback.

1 comment:

Warren Baker said...

Sounds like fun Davyman, Good luck with it :-)