Goldfinch on the feeder

This Goldfinch was on the feeder eating the seed and dropping them on the ground.  Goldfinches are very messy eaters.  Pigeons come round on the ground and just feed off the leftovers that the Goldfinches drop.    

Goldfinch

Newt in a moth trap!

This newt was found in our moth trap and I don't know how it got in there.  We caught it in a pot and got some pictures of it.  After we potted it we had to release it because we knew we couldn't keep it.  The newt scurried away into somewhere damp round the back of the sheds.  

Newt on my bed(in a pot)

Not very well

This Emperor moth hatched and it really doesn't look very well at all.  As you can see the wings are small and the body looks huge.  This is because it is a female and they are bigger than the males.  I don't know why it looks like it does.  Do you know? 

Not well Emperor moth

Big spider!

Last year my dad rode his bike down to Broom and stopped in some long grass.  He saw it.  The wasp spider had made a web among the grass.  When dad got home he told us about the wasp spider and so we got in the car and went to where he found it.  At first we couldn't find the spider but eventually my brother spotted it.  We were very surprised about how big it actually was.  Dad told us it was big but I never expected it would be as big as it was.  Wasp spiders are quite big for a spider as you can see by this picture.

Wasp spider

Look at these...

Long neck

This snail that I found on the plant pot has an extremely long neck.  I was very interested in this rather long necked snail.  It kept crawling up to the lens of my camera so every time I tried to take a picture of it, it just moved towards the camera.  Eventually I was able to take one of it( I think it's posing quite nicely).   

Snail

Weevil

I went on a walk to Broom with my dad and brother.  We came to a young birch tree and under a leaf on the birch tree I saw a weevil.  Weevils are very small bugs and there are lots of type of weevil but all of them are small You can see how small it is by looking at the leaf because birch leaves aren't very big at all. 

Weevil

Millions and Millions

We took a walk round Broom lake in the Easter holidays and among the reeds we found millions and millions of tadpoles.  They were all in big groups like this one and were swimming right next to each other.  They must think " move over give me some space!"  The tadpoles stay in groups because fish eat them so not many survive.  If fish didn't eat them the world would be populated by frogs!

Tadpoles

Mating Moths

Last year we found that a female Emperor moth had laid some eggs in our moth trap.  We kept them and now a female has hatched and she attracted a male. 

   

Female and male Emperor moths mating.

Argyrotaenia ljungianas mating.

 After the Emperor moths mated I found a couple of Argyrotaenia ljungianas mating as well.  they were on the patio and they do blend right in(if they hadn't of been on the edge I think someone would of stepped on them).  These are a type of micro moths so they are very small and hard to spot.