Early October

Endgame

The last new hornet queen leaves the nest to make her way into the autumn as two of the workers watch by the entrance.

Vespa:   Well that's the last of them gone; finally we have some free time for us. It has been a hard summer getting all the new queens raised. You'd think we'd get a bit of gratitude from the old one, but no; might as well wish for jam everyday instead.

Crabro: If you think there will be any free time then I suggest you make the   best of it. Have you not noticed how cold it is becoming, or that the light fails ever earlier these days?

Vespa:   Hey I've been busy you know. Feeding these ungrateful new queens was pretty hectic. So what if the days are not as warm now.  We will fly only on the sunny days and spend the other time here at home among the family. Though I have to say the mood of the hive is so much gloomier of late. You think everyone would be happy to see the end of our great work.

Crabro: And there you have it. It is the end of our great work and also it is the end of us. You do understand we won't see another summer sister? We have completed our task in the great scheme of the world. We are not fertile and we cannot feed in the winter. We are expendable; there is no food and even if there were, we cannot survive its cold. We shall linger a few weeks more and maybe the frost will come late if we are lucky.

Vespa:    It doesn't seem to be very fair then. We do all the work and then die.

Crabro: Fairness is immaterial. The queen is worn out and ready to rest as are also most of us. The new queens have mated and will feed and then sleep till the days of spring return. Then completely alone they must begin all this again. Do not envy them sister for theirs is the hardest task of all.

Vespa:    What of the males then. Will they survive?

Crabro: The males who mate die soon after and the rest well they follow pretty soon after. They are bred for a single purpose and once they have left we do not let them back again.

Vespa:    How come you know all this happens to us sister and yet I do not?

Crabro: Because sometimes due to chance one of us workers will survive the awful winter and emerge again in the spring. I remember I fed and then I slept among the paper cells till the new queen awoke and then I was able to serve her.  This is my second year. I am older than the queen herself.

Vespa:    You know I always thought your wings were ragged. But I didn't like to say.

Crabro:   May I tell you a secret sister.

Vespa:    Of course

Crabro: I layed a single egg once and watched it for weeks till it hatched. It was a male and it was raised and in the autumn it flew out to mate and I never saw him again. I remember it had silver antennae which is very rare for us wasps. Normally they are completely black.

Vespa:  Can we lay eggs then? I thought only the queen could do that.

Crabro:  Normally that is the way of things but sometimes if we wish it enough we can produce them.

Vespa: I wonder what happened to your boy?

They sit on the paper comb silent and the old queen comes over.

Queen:    Come on girls, you know the rules; no loitering at the entrance. Away with you both; there is still some nectar to be had yet. She flicked them playfully with her silver antennae and they bowed and flew off into the dawn.

Vespa:  did you see; her antennae are silver

Crabro:  I always wondered about that too.

Assassins

Humming to a destruction

To pierce the rising dawn
These yellow-black assassins
With slender rapiers drawn
The wasps have raided summer
But in winter they cannot stay
And we watch their dissolution
Where autumn takes all away
They fly upon a fading sun
Still slender, swift and sleek
But now they are a hunted prey
When the frost arrives this week

Chaos

Before the evening dew draws down on day's soft breath setting upon the coldness like a dream's afterglow we shall sit in splendour among all this sweet chaos we have nurtured. For are we not artists and sculptors taking nature's rich earth  and working it with eager hands to the shape of magnificence; and if anarchy intrudes, we will let it in, so that we may wonder all the more. For here betwixt this sweet throng of unbridled green richness we may marvel at creation and growth and offer a lost hope for summers touch to linger upon it and us for a little longer.

 

 

Grapes and tomatoes ripening despite the long cold and wet summer

 

Courting spiders on the buddleia

This butterfly looks like it had a narrow escape which took part of its wing

 

Believe

You say I imagine it all

When I tell you fairies exist
But what else tends the world
To its flowered summer grace
I have sat among trees at dusk
As they appear in the twilight
Older than the moss on ancient stones
And younger than dawns' dewy kiss
And this privilege did not find me
Soak me in enchanted favour
Drip by surprising drip
For we see only that we believe

Wildflowers and Aquatics

Doevecote

To this new refuge earth we give our thanks

Along with greens and seed, bred and ledge
Now no more nights are spent in thorny hedge
And to this new home we will humbly pledge
That though upon you head we'll gladly poop
We'll never defile inside our hexagonal coop

I made a hexagonal dovecote and though I don't think the angles would please Pythagoras it all came together with copious amounts on brute force and wood glue (and it only cost £20)

Lesson

And see this thing of beauty that I plucked like a jewel from its stem. But this thing of splendour is also a sorrow to me, for though its magnificence cannot be doubted by my selfish deed have I plucked out the eye from the face of the rose. And then is it a worthwhile theft to treasure so briefly a thing of loveliness within the hand and watch it swift to its fading? Or is it better, to gaze and be enchanted by its fragrant charms as it sits upon its thorny structure till it wanes and fails as nature intended. And then knowing that is so, gaze at this flower you have stolen and wish all you may, but you cannot put it back and therein lies the greatest lesson we will ever learn.

Dragonfly

Seek shelter under July sky

Change arrives; entwined lie
These empty husks did not die
They simply learnt how to fly

July Garden

 

The Rose

At last the lady doth reveal herself; she is fragrant and opens in red energy to the dawn. She will have no less than the want of all men's eyes upon her till sunset comes and then within the sweet calm of night she will arouse within them their secrets of day. For maturity comes and with it the passion of expectation is played upon the green lawns of July. For this is the daughter of William Shakespeare and we would have no less to grace our garden

 

 

Dragonflies

This first picture is of a dragonfly that has emerged from a nymph that has attached itself onto a nymph case from a previous day. it has not been out long and its body is transparent green to the sunlight

 

Nice clear nymph case photo

 

Ready to shimmer and fly away

 

 

 

 

There have been 21 Southern hawkers come out the pond so far this year.

Exchange

And with such dark dreams

They have grown and slumbered
Slithered in the dark depths
Now the sleepers awake
To haul themselves out one world
And take their place in another
Exchange states; water to air
And now they whirl upon sunlight
And brush upon the summer stars

 

 

Consort

A kiss of the equine's consort

Upon the tender skin of man
And this sweet summer world
Is how you repay me?
Not in kind words or music
Nor peaceful idyll under climbing skies
But with fangs and stings
With this despised and pitiable fly
Your winged, monstrous vampire
That slips and sneaks upon us
In bloody, unbowed requirement
To ever take without soliciting
And leave this week of violence
Aflame in the wretched flesh

Willow

An army of renewal unleashed upon airs

Feather-clad warriors of the spring willow*
We are invaded by falling snow in June
White plumes soaring upon the clement air
For the fastest way to travel is by vanity
And nature gifts them downy wings to fly on

*The willow trees are letting go their seeds with aplomb at the minute. While sat in the garden yesterday the floating seeds looked liked snow floating down in the sunlight. Never seen that before.

June Garden

Concern

Because he wanted to put his wings to the test

The eager little brown bird flew out of the nest
But his new wings were really much too small
And so down to earth he did quickly fall
It was lucky giants found him and put him in a bush
His mum found him, now he's learned not to rush
For little birds with wings that don’t yet flap
When they fly a nest early usually end up in the crap
And this is a lesson we could all do to learn
If something is in trouble then show some concern

Fall of Empire

It is always upsetting to accidentally knock a wasp nest down when gardening but they build in the most peculiar places sometimes. It seemed particularly poignant the other day when the spent blossom petals were blowing. Here's hoping she manages to raise another nest somewhere else. Wasps are the unsung and mostly despised angels within the garden. A world without bees would be less sweet but a world without wasps would be a world filled with a lot more bugs.

And the incandescent queen rages

As her paper kingdom is blown away
The empire collapses before it has begun
Topples from high grace to ruinous fibres
Falls amongst the velvet snowdrifts
Where the blossom fails, falls and fades
And the papery coffers of her undertaking
Are emptied of their larval ghosts by the wind
To desiccate and cease under the midday sun
Among the coral petals laid on the sandy dun

 

The Rose

When a deer crossed my path

Well then that was a blessing
But when it devoured my rose
Then I knew it could be a curse
This nemesis of the rose in spring
And should I again meet him
Under greening bough at dusk
It is more than a pound of flesh
I shall warrant will be taken
For I shall have his haunch
And it will be venison for tea
And poor Mr Shakespeare
Alas, only a tragedy
Will you write this year

Soldiers

Towering siege engines rise up

The lofty mechanism of assault
And this is no gentle coup
War is now upon us
And nature's green soldiers
Mass upon the boughs and fields
And we may fight it
Become a partisan of order
But we will ever lose
The green tide sweeps the world
And the wise do not fight it
But are carried on its verdant crest
And remain at peace in growth's war