Naturefile

[Sutherlandlass]

Wow.. There's some fantastic photos on here, I love nature

 

[catinahat]

One of my favourite walks is to the fairy glen in Rosemarkie

 

[mo53]

Beautiful photographs. Thank you all for sharing .

 

[paula.nolan42]

Finally got back out walking. Made all the better seeing bluebells

 

[13lizanne]

Your garden sounds wonderful @Galja, I hope that you do manage to send us some photos. I would particularly like to see the Zdravec flowers, your plants are very different from the ones I have in my garden. Where did your family originally come from I'm guessing Eastern Europe or Greece? We're very uninterestingly all from Scotland for generations back although one set of my great-great-grandparents were from Italy

 

[Deleted member 108625]

Hi @Galja, your garden sounds amazing! I live in a maisonette so I don't have a garden but our block has a communal lawn out the front with several trees including a huge horse chestnut. We get some visitors including grey squirrels, bats, robins, magpies and various small birds. We used to have foxes visiting but there has been a lot of building work in the area so they've moved further out into the suburbs. I look forward to seeing your photos, the fauna you have sounds very different to the varieties we get over here!

 

[Cumberland]

Just thought I would stick a pic of my garden on here
I have lots of bird feeders, bug boxes and a wildlife pond with lots of my froggy friends

 

[chris lowe]

I have a small yard but in it I have Moso, Japanese temple and Nigra bamboo, grey, black and a new hybrid form of squirrels, a 160 year red oak, a couple of cornelian cherry trees, a couple Russian pomegranates, several wild quinces, poddling radishes, mostly white violets, native dogwoods, a couple barberry with tiny yellow flowers, a number of native ferns, invading vinca, loads of chocomint, gooseberries and blueberries, mossy brick that needs cleaning and other mostly edible stuff that I wait for. We have to spray the bamboo shoots when they emerge for they are immediate fodder for tree rats *our huge squirrel population), and yes, we get tons of different kinds of bird because we are on a flight path rich with them. Some of the favorites are the rare Baltimore Orioles, various hummingbirds looking like giant insects, the resident cardinals, the resident doves and the various barn owls that come at night, make a pitstop and escape after munching on insects. I started with three Zdravec (kind of Bulgarian and Macedonian geranium that has edible leaves and flowers that blooms on Pascha (Eastern Orthodox Easter) which now lines a path to the back of the yard in slate on both sides.

and I have pklants I hate but keep for I do not have the right to bomb them no matter how many of the wrong kind of insect they attract, for other people love them or some beloved insect or animal eats part of them or they attract butterflies or whatever. I even harbor thoughts of arbicide against a couple wild dogwoods I would like gone. So not all my thoughts approach thanatopsis

I have a digital camera that I am to lame to learn how to use but if I get brilliant and do so, I might share pics.

Sounds more like woodland than a small yard

 

[chris lowe]

The baby ducks are gorgeous - is that from this year?

I just went out to try and take some photos of my spring flowers whilst the sun was on them and spotted this chap catching some rays. I didn't think they were about this soon, but checking on their life cycle, they do emerge in March and April to start feeding after overwintering somewhere safe, before they breed in May. I was telling my Mum and she said she saw one last week, but it's lower nearer the coast where she is, so generally a bit warmer. I couldn't really get close enough to get a decent shot at a better angle, so this is substantially cropped, so the quality suffers a bit.

We've seen the bees starting to buzz & had a red admiral & brimstone butterflies. We don't normally see birds but had a wren & blackbird today (too many cats around)

 

[13lizanne]

The plant is beautiful, such delicate flowers in my favourite shade of purple and the leaves also are unlike anything which grows here. Thank you. You are quite the gardener @Galja ! We have a cherry blossom tree and Acer tree in our front garden, snowdrops, bluebells, tulips, daffodils, iris, geraniums! Hybrid thistle, cornflower etc. In our rear garden, which is larger we have a Rowan tree, roses, too many types of cottage garden flowers to mention and several flowering shrubs along one side of the garden. Both gardens have lswns also, our old house backs on to woodland with a small loch where we enjoy daily walks. My husband is the main gardener with some input from me.

 

[Deleted member 108625]

Hi @Galja, I do have some small patio pots out the back but my hay fever has got worse in recent years so now they have been taken over by wild flowers. We have some bluebells at the moment and we have also had various other flowers which I can't identify. Several years ago I used to have a hanging basket and have also grown strawberries but my allergies mean I get a headache and start sneezing almost as soon as I walk out the door. Your photo is wonderful, the flowers are such a pretty colour

 

[Cumberland]

by the way, is that a STONE boletus Edulis in your yard? i.e. porchini mushroom in Italian

It is a large ceramic shiny mushroom had it for over 10 years

 

[Cumberland]

It's also my favoirte edible mushroom, especially when I get it dry, reconstitute it, use it hither and yon dishes

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boletus_edulis

Note that the article also has a pic of a highly deady poisonous mushroom of a related shape, an Amanita, a gilled mushroom under the cap wheras all of the Boletus have sort of pinholes under their cap

Although the Amanita has a similar shape, a mushroom that smells somewhat the same but gives you a tummy ache grows here on the east coast of America, the Boletinus. The way you tell whether you have one of these is to press a thumnail under and if is turns blue, avoid it

Thanks for the info link

 

[debrasue]

In looking for pics, I also foun this guy's blog which ALSO states that his zdravec bloom on Orthodox Pascha

We call this South African Geranium, and have quite a bit of it in the garden, (despite the local rabbits chomping on it enthusiastically when it's young). It's very long-suffering; we have one particular patch which my husband insists on chopping off with the lawnmower every so often, but it comes back thicker than ever before, and it's very pretty. Transplants well, too.

 

[13lizanne]

An Acer is a Japanese tree with copper coloured leaves. My digital camera is set up for windows 8 which is the software we had when we got the camera, but we have windows 10 now and they are not compatible. I refuse to replace a perfectly good camera! So, the tree resembles a British copper birch but not as thick trunk, branches etc. Its leaves turn purpley-red in summer and are copper coloured at other times - it's a beautiful and elegant tree. Both it and the flowering cherry in the front garden are from Japan.

 

[Welshman1952]

Out yesterday birding and managed to capture a host of various birds. I won't bore you with them all, but here was a rather nice photogenic little reed bunting that stayed for a while as I sat in a hide at Tittesworth reservoir.

 

[Liam1955]

@Welshman1952 - Good photography, would like to see more that you took!

 

[debrasue]

Out yesterday birding and managed to capture a host of various birds. I won't bore you with them all, but here was a rather nice photogenic little reed bunting that stayed for a while as I sat in a hide at Tittesworth reservoir.

Beautiful! And I agree with @liam1955 - I'd like to see more of your pictures.

 

[Welshman1952]

@liam1955 .. Oooh don't say that! I am such a bird photography nerd that I will bore the pants off everyone here. But as you tempted me here are a couple more samples ☺☺

The first is a Snowy Owl

.. And this, of course is a swallow

Hope you enjoy ☺

 

[debrasue]

Here's one of mine - a gorgeous nuthatch who decimated my niger and sunflower seed feeders last summer, bless him. I haven't seen him this year yet.