August brings those lazy days of summer for we humans, but for many animals it is a busy time of year with new mouths to feed. Bumblebees are reputedly the busiest animals in the garden and they will be taking advantage of any nectar- producing flowers that you have planted. There are around 25 species of true bees found locally and one of the easiest to identify is the red- tailed bee shown here; all black with a distinctive red tail. Their nest is usually found under slabs or stone walls and it will contain between 100 and 200 bees.
Foxes will also be looking after their young. The cubs normally stay with their mothers until autumn, when they will be driven away to find territories of their own. In rural areas, most foxes only live for 12 to 18 months, but urban foxes survive longer (probably why they have taken up residence in so many of our cities). More than half of all foxes are killed on the roads. We saw the fox shown here near to Huncote, out and about in the middle of the day.
Moths are also particularly active at this time of year. There are over 2,400 species of moth found in this country, but as the vast majority of these are night-flying they are rarely seen.
When they are seen they can be truly spectacular, as you can see with this Elephant Hawk-moth photographed in my back garden.
There is a tendency to think of butterflies and moths as weak fliers and therefore restricted to their local region, but this is not always the case. Painted Lady butterflies for instance migrate from North Africa each spring, breeding as they cross Europe. In some years, large numbers of Painted Ladies cross the English Channel and can be found locally; I saw one in my garden in June. If conditions are suitable, they breed prolifically, but by late summer when temperatures start to drop, they must either return across the channel or die. The situation is similar among the moths, with the Hummingbird Hawk-moth also following a migratory path from North Africa or Southern Europe. These moths fly by day and may be seen feeding by hovering in front of flowers, rather like the birds after which they are named. They only occasionally breed in this country and in the milder winters that we seem to get these days, they sometimes survive until the following spring.
August brings those lazy days of summer for we humans, but for many animals it is a busy time of year with new mouths to feed. Bumblebees are reputedly the busiest animals in the garden and they will be taking advantage of any nectar- producing flowers that you have planted. There are around 25 species of true bees found locally and one of the easiest to identify is the red- tailed bee shown here; all black with a distinctive red tail. Their nest is usually found under slabs or stone walls and it will contain between 100 and 200 bees.
Foxes will also be looking after their young. The cubs normally stay with their mothers until autumn, when they will be driven away to find territories of their own. In rural areas, most foxes only live for 12 to 18 months, but urban foxes survive longer (probably why they have taken up residence in so many of our cities). More than half of all foxes are killed on the roads. We saw the fox shown here near to Huncote, out and about in the middle of the day.
Moths are also particularly active at this time of year. There are over 2,400 species of moth found in this country, but as the vast majority of these are night-flying they are rarely seen.
When they are seen they can be truly spectacular, as you can see with this Elephant Hawk-moth photographed in my back garden.
There is a tendency to think of butterflies and moths as weak fliers and therefore restricted to their local region, but this is not always the case. Painted Lady butterflies for instance migrate from North Africa each spring, breeding as they cross Europe. In some years, large numbers of Painted Ladies cross the English Channel and can be found locally; I saw one in my garden in June. If conditions are suitable, they breed prolifically, but by late summer when temperatures start to drop, they must either return across the channel or die. The situation is similar among the moths, with the Hummingbird Hawk-moth also following a migratory path from North Africa or Southern Europe. These moths fly by day and may be seen feeding by hovering in front of flowers, rather like the birds after which they are named. They only occasionally breed in this country and in the milder winters that we seem to get these days, they sometimes survive until the following spring.