Today’s take-away special is definitely the oregano nectar smoothie. The Cabbage White butterflies and the honey bees have been gorging themselves, and while I am not too thrilled about feeding up the Cabbage Whites – given the mayhem they can create among my cabbages and broccoli – I have to admit they did look very lovely flitting around in the guerrilla garden. In fact I think I shall rename our unofficial planting behind the back fence ‘the biodiversity plot’ because, even as I write this, there is an awful lot of it going on there.
Noteworthy action includes crowds of longhorn beetles busy replicating in the spearmint flowers and on some ragwort that has recently arrived uninvited; skipper butterflies on the lesser knapweed, ringlet butterflies on the phlox and oregano; also passing tortoiseshells, peacocks and commas, and some rather small hoverflies.
Most of the bumble bees, however, are inside the garden still scoffing on the drumstick alliums. Now for a gallery of some of today’s lunch-time clientele:
Tish Farrell 
We’ve got a mass of solid yellow butterflies that I am assuming create some kind of nasty caterpillar. We seem to have a LOT of those around these years.
Hope they are not a garden decimating variety.
The Cabbage Whites are everywhere! There were even a couple on the courts at Wimbledon, Tish 🙂 🙂
Ha! Hope they did not distract the players 🙂
Well, I could blame them for Rafa’s failure to get past Novak, but that wouldn’t really be fair. 😦
Banjaxed by butterflies – doesn’t really wash does it 🙂
🙂 🙂
The table seems to be full. A feast for all of Nature.
They are definitely tucking in all round 🙂
Delightful, Delovely … and delicious!
Up until a couple of weeks ago we too had nice cabbages etc. The hens have gorged themselves. Oh, well, there’s always next season!
Ate the cabbages did they. Naughty hens. I hope they are laying extra yummy eggs sans cabbage flavour.
Apparently they won’t lay until they are around six months so I am told. Eggs should start arriving September/ October … ish.
A biodiversity plot sounds like you are doing your bit for nature!
Hopefully…:)
Surely
Lovely! The cabbage whites are beautiful!
Beautifully captured. I like the male cabbage white (males have 1 spot fe-males 2).
Your term “bio-diversity plot” and your description/photos of nature at work make me so happy Tish. I’m feeling a bit bombarded with environmental bad news at the moment.
Oh that’s so lovely to hear, Su. Glad to bring some cheerful news and views 🙂
Worth the extra words, Tish. Great to read about, and wonderful images of some lively wildlife
Many thanks, Debbie.
Inimitable peek at the denizens of your surrounding vegetation.
Your garden really is an excellent example of gardening with and for wildlife, Tish!
Thanks, Dries. I’m especially happy because we have had such hot, dry weather, at one point I thought the garden inside and outside our fence was going curl up and die. We had a single short downpour on Friday, and that revived everything.
Biodiversity plot sounds very technical Tish, I think I like guerrilla garden it sounds feral and ferocious as befits the rampaging wildlife and the uninvited plants. In NZ ragwort is a noxious plant and I spent many hours chipping it out of the cow paddocks. Ah such memories just one word in your post brings back….
Ragwort used to be a notifiable weed here too. But suddenly no one cares about it any more, and it’s growing everywhere. For some reason our cattle pasture must no longer be deemed to be at risk.
The paddocks were a sea of yellow, so hard to control
That’s what is happening here now. Looks pretty spectacular though.
Like the colour of the rape fields. Has that been harvested yet?
No not yet. They sprayed it with something last week. It’s turning v. brown and brittle now.
Not so photographic now then.
It has its moments – all copper in the early morning light.
I had never appreciated before how good oregano is for bees and butterflies, but ours too is teeming. Which is good because it self-seeds everywhere!
I really love it. I think I have two sorts. I initially spread it around behind the fence to help keep the snow berry in the field at bay. Not entirely working.
Ahh so that’s what those orangey things are, longhorn beetles, I can’t remember seeing them until this year!
There’s definitely a lot of them about.
I would say your bistro is the best in the neighbourhood. 🙂
It’s certainly very busy!
Absolutely lovely, Tish.
janet
Many thanks, Janet 🙂
I love your country café Tish and so it seems do the bees and butterflies and bugs! You might enjoy reading this report about Wenlock Edge: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/jul/26/damned-as-dangerous-but-ragwort-is-full-of-life
Oh this a great article. Thanks, Jude. I really ought to keep up with our local Guardian writer. His link to the ragwort info is v. useful too.
I thought it was interesting about all the different species of butterfly that it attracts.
Wow!
Oh, butterflies. I’ve noticed such an abundance this year. That third to last photo..that one’s called a little wood satyr. I was sitting under my tree and one landed on my hand and sat there for a very long time. I even managed to take a video (posted on Instagram). This happened 3 days in a row. Such a beautiful experience.
I love that name, Julie, little wood satyr. It’s magical after the long winter that many of us had, to now be surrounded by clouds of butterflies.