Morning bird song
The birds are in good voice this morning...
🐦🎵🎶
Lunch time in the Animal House
It's lovely to be back on site after the Christmas holidays. I clearly made it down to the Animal House in time for lunch this afternoon... 😊
3rd set of twins born today
Lily
This time last week we were splashing around the farm in wellies and rain coats ☔
Today we enjoyed the beautiful sunshine 🌞
....as did Lily and her piglets 🐷😄
Where did the sunshine go??
It's a little on the damp side today 🌧🌧🌧
Cased Caddisfly Larva
Usually at this time of year, in and around Wales Nature Week (which this year is 31st May - 7th June), we spend the day at Pontypool Park with children from a number of Pontypool schools, building dens, toasting marshmallows on the camp fire and minibeast huntung, discovering the biodiversity of the ponds, woods and grassland.
As the theme of this year's World Environment Day is "Celebrate Biodiversity" and with us all having the opportunity to slow down and take notice of our surroundings, now is an ideal time to get out and about, even if it's just in the back garden, to discover the range of plant and animal life that exists and find ways of helping maintain and improve their habitats.
Maybe you could count the number of wild flowers you see when out and about on a daily walk, make a bird feeder to hang in the trees for the birds that visit your garden, go on a minibeast hunt or build a minibeast hotel to encourage them to come and stay 🐌🦋🐛🐜🐝🐞🦗🕷
The video below shows one of our regular and fascinating finds at Pontypool Park. At first glance, it just looks like a stick but watch carefully and you'll see little legs appear as it takes itself off along the bottom of the pond.
It's the larva of a Caddisfly that after hatching, collects stones, twigs and other debris it finds to build a protective case, binding it all together with silk it secretes from glands around the mouth.
Not quite ready yet... 🐣
Hatch day!!! 🐣
Although day 21 is the day we were looking forward to seeing some action in the hatching department, nothing has happened just yet...
If you watch the egg in the video carefully though, you can just see it wobbling as the chick inside moves about to get into the correct position to make its first "pip" 😀
Good morning 🌞
A very good morning to you all 😊
