Environment

Glucose for a lethargic bee and bird kill in the garden

Sat Jun 30 2018 - 06:00

I saw these tiny butterflies (about thumbnail size) on a golf club green on Bull Island. They appeared to be mating. Are they actually small moths?

Tom Byrne, Blackrock, Co Dublin

They are common blue butterflies.

These caterpillars are munching their way through my wisteria.

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Ann Noonan, Ringsend, Dublin 4

They are the caterpillar of the vapourer moth. The female is wingless and the caterpillars feed on the leaves of trees and shrubs.

At Keem Bay in Achill I spotted a lethargic bee on the sand. Remembering that the great David Attenborough said that a tired bee should be given glucose, a friend produced a glucose tablet which the bee enjoyed and flew away.

Susan Geran, Clontarf, Dublin 3

The hawthorn hedge at the top of my father’s field looked grey and dusty. We googled it and found that they were cotoneaster webber moth caterpillars, busy under their silken webs, eating away at the hedge.

Paula Fitzgibbon, Blessington, Co Wicklow

They were the caterpillars of the small eggar moth, which build webs on hedges.

This regular visitor enjoying a bath causes warning tut-tutting by the garden birds. There have been feathery signs of bird kill in the garden, for which I blamed a neighbour’s cat.

Meriel J Heather, Green Park, Dublin 14

You can blame your visiting male sparrowhawk for the bird kill.

I wonder which bird produced this lovely egg?

Damien Maguire, Trim, Co Meath

It looks like a dunnock’s egg.

Ethna Viney welcomes observations and photographs at Thallabawn, Louisburgh, Co Mayo, F28F978, or by email at viney@anu.ie. Include a postal address.

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