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to me because it’s beautiful and I’d never seen one before. It’s not particularly rare and it doesn’t even eat aphids – sorry gardeners. But it’s recently adapted its habitat and is becoming more widespread. At 4.5-6mm long it’s roughly the same size

ponds.If you have a garden pond, no matter how small or large, then you'll be able to grow aquatic plants In addition to looking attractive, pond plants can provide useful surface cover and shelter for aquatic wildlife.Grow pond plants in aquatic

I have bumblebees nesting in my garden. They didn't choose to live there, I introduced them. Or rather, I rescued them.With a reputation for being a bit of a bee fanatic, I get the odd call from friends of friends who have bumblebees nesting

I've been quite frustrated with my garden lately. I'm getting impatient waiting for plants to become established; there are too many gaps in the borders and the recent cold spell has prevented the quick germination of seeds I sowed on bare soil. All

and sleeker beast; it must have been a black variety of the much larger and squatter 'brown' Rattus norvegicus. It was sitting beside the stream, which bubbles down through the ornamental gardens, grooming itself in the drizzle when I trotted past

A catastrophic and fatal error closed down the laptop on Friday and left me unable to post a blog entry last week. This followed an equally frustrating Christmas ipod incident.So I'm venting my anger by working on something that does not have a plug, and for which I do not need t...

, commuters, joggers and roller bladers (even though there are signs saying not to, but hey - this is Paris). There's lots going on but I have to admit that there are not many signs of wildlife. The plants are fastidiously tended and the borders manicured

.Although we've had frogs and toads in the garden for years, they've never bred successfully, and we've never had tadpoles in our small pond. I'm hoping the newts will have better luck. Since I re-made the pond after its leak last year, we've not had much else

(gardeners insert your own reasons here), and, I'm afraid, to bemoan the fact that not enough funding or political clout is given to insect study and education.I'm one of a number of 'international entomologists' who has been invited to blog about their daily

In January I blogged about 'winterkill', after letters, emails and blog comments flooded in from gardeners who'd found dead frogs in their ponds. One commenter, Wishful Thinker, suggested I blog about winterkill before winter, so people can take