Swift Half update - 12th June 2011

• A few words from me on the garden, rather than our incubating swifts...
• After the driest spring since records began and neighbouring counties have been given official (agricultural) drought status, its rained on and off here (ON all day today) for a week or so now.
• The garden has certainly appreciated the rain, even if I havent!

• The evening primrose has given us its first flowers, the sunflowers are doing well and the pond is not evaporating at all at present!
• The damsons and pears will get the moisture now they so desperately need to swell - maybe we will get a good fruit crop after all, this year.
• We have many tree bumblebees taking nectar from the bramble flowers in the rear and rear-rear gardens - I've not located their tree (or bird box) nest yet, but I'll keep searching.

• A huge foxglove has appeared in the garden (along with a good size clump of wheat again, like last year) - and the bumblebees seem to love this!
• At last I've finally seen a lone young woodpecker in the garden. A couple of days later than  last year and on its own-  no sibling, not even a parent feeding it. Very strange!
• The newts still dominate the pond - all sizes from tiny wee newts with gills, through mid size, orange-brown newts with shrivelled gills, gravid green females and small, lively leopard-headed males. All palmates still.

• A local fox bothered the hens this morning, I caught the tail-end of the action at ten-past five (am) this morning - the poor girls have had a bit of day - scared to buggery and back by a very inquistive fox at dawn and then rained on all day.... still.... no damage done yet - I'll probably keep them in all day this week, whilst I'm at home -  and I've bricked up the bottom of the coop, so with any luck the fox'll not be able to dig itself into their run.
• Finally, I caught a new moth for the garden t'other night - a "beautiful hook tip". (Quite badly named in my opinion, unlike most other moths. Hook tipped it certainly is, brown, dull and distinctly un-beautiful (I'm afraid) it is too!)