This is Jack by the Hedge or Garlic Mustard growing in my garden – like a weed some would say! But I love it. It’s quite pretty but it is also one of the food plants for Orange Tip butterflies (Milkmaids, Lady’s Smock or Cuckoo Flower is another).
So every Spring, I look at the flowers and try to spot the eggs of the butterflies – single orange eggs laid on the stem under the flowers. I spent 10 minutes on Tuesday looking and found a couple of eggs. Each time I spot one it’s a thrill – a real thrill.
Here’s a less-than-brilliant photo, on my phone, from last year. That orange blur? That’s the egg of an Orange Tip butterfly. It’s such fun finding them!
One of the three plants for spring wildlife round here. Garlic mustard, lunaria, and wild garlic. Right now they are all in full flower and all attracting pollinators, as well as being pretty to look at, I don’t know why people consider them weeds or spend so much energy hoicking them out.
I have just returned from my daily dog/wildlife walk. Yes I know I am privileged to have about 5 km of the river Severn between Llanidloes and Newtown to walk along. New today was my first Small Copper for the year and a Spotted Flycatcher. I also learnt I cannot hear Spot Flys any more as it was calling and I didn’t hear a thing, Oh dear. Along the way I looked at the 6 Cuckoo flower stems I passed 3 had Orange Tip eggs. Each stem had two eggs, as OT caterpillars are cannibalistic if both hatch one is in trouble
If you can still get a thrill from finding Orange-tip eggs, that means (a) you are still a child at heart and (b) your heart is in the right place. I find that Long-tailed Tits always make me smile. Silly, really, but there we are.
Not silly at all. And i honestly don’t think you have to be a child at heart to get a thrill from nature. I’m 48 and I get just as much in fact more pleasure now than I ever did (except not from all the wildlife destruction that goes in, that breaks my heart every day)