Insect Watch

The decline in insect populations is a concerning trend for ecologists.  It has reached the notice of the Financial Times Weekend edition (24/25th August 2024) where I read a long article entitled Where have all the insects gone?

I notice the insects in our garden. The fruitfulness of our crops depends on them.  They generally bring me delight and are greeted with enthusiasm and endearments.  So I wondered if I could informally record any changes to insect populations this year.  Our garden is pesticide-free and backs on to a wooded park perimeter, where as I have previously posted, my husband has constructed a 'bug area' from the fallen logs of the Leylandii hedge felled during the Pandemic.

My first observation is that there have not been as many pests.  I loathe Gooseberry Sawfly and there were fewer of these larvae on my gooseberry bushes this year.  As usual I picked them off by hand.  Our moth trap did not trap any Codling Moths around our apple trees, although these are a rarity, for which I am thankful.  My Rainbow Chard seems to have largely escaped leaf mining grubs and has been magnificent.  Cabbage White butterflies are still in evidence and are in courting flight over my Kale.  Again, their eggs and caterpillars are picked off by hand.  The snail and slug populations seem down but not out.  (I continue to re-home them in the park.)

We did not get any wasps nesting close to the house this year and the bumblebees have not returned to their place in the kitchen extractor fan vent for some years.  However there were sufficient bees to pollinate both our apple trees (which are having a good season), our runner beans, blackcurrants and raspberries.  The pair of House Martins that nest around the corner returned to capture aerial insects and feed their brood.  

Butterflies have been rare (apart from the pesky Cabbage White).  There seem to be fewer flies stuck in our kitchen, but plenty of spiders which are trapping small moths.   I am hoping that when our Michaelmas Daisy clump comes into flower that we will see the Red Admirals, Fritillaries and various kinds of woodland butterflies returning.  In the meantime the bees and bumble bees are enjoying the nectar from the Lavender and the Golden Oregano which we always allow to flower.

We do what we can.  Can I encourage other readers of this post to do so too.

Ipomoea/Morning Glory

 Morning Glory is a half-hardy perennial treated as a half hardy annual.  It is in the convolvulus family.  (Before I continue I must advise that according to the seed packet it is poisonous to humans and animals.)

The packet in question came my way some years ago from one of my 'knitting buddies' as a free seed give-away on the front of a gardening magazine.  They  germinated, I planted them against a fence in the back garden and they failed to thrive.  This year I decided to try again.  So once more to the shed where the plants did well.  Then we transferred them to a very large ornamental pot (from my family) and positioned them under the eaves of the front porch.

Such has been our weather that until now (August) these poor little seedlings were a miserable yellow colour, buffeted by the wind and rain, hardly winding around the ornamental ironwork provided for them, conscientiously fed by my husband.  Suddenly however they have picked up and now seem to be all over our rose Golden Showers.  I was slightly disconcerted by this given their previously poor performance but I now discover on consulting The Bedding Plant Expert (1991) that they can grow to between 4' and 10'.  Unchecked they might even reach our ground floor gutters.  However they have still to produce the spectacular large blue trumpet-shaped flowers which Dr D G Hessayon indicates will last for one day but follow in quick succession.  I inspect them every morning for buds.

All this has a certain irony.  On the allotment we eradicated convolvulus/bindweed whenever we found it.  The smallest inch of white root would regenerate and grow speedily.  Its cossetted cultivated relation has been watched over with much care.  As the old saying would lead us to believe -  there is no such thing as a weed, only a plant in the wrong place.