Wild Things

Categories: uncategorized

Date: 12 April 2007 20:57:15

We seem to have been visited by quite a lot of queen wasps recently. I've lost count of how many I've seen in the garden over the last few days. So far two have managed to get into the house and were quickly dispatched. The one I saw yesterday died as a result of being walloped with a copy of Carols for Choirs. It's nice to know that this book which normally only comes out at Christmas also has its uses in the spring. It's just the right size, weight and thickness to get rid of an unwanted wasp.

Queen wasps are not good news. At the end of the summer/beginning of the autumn, the young queens mate with the male wasps (drones) before hibernating. In the spring, they start looking for suitable places to build a nest where they lay the fertilised eggs from the previous autumn and start a new colony. Well, that's the simplified version. Anyway, they are in my garden, presumably looking for somewhere to set up home. I think regular inspection in the loft and shed are in order to check for any nests so they can be destroyed before they get out of hand.

Last night, just before going to bed, I opened the back door to let the cat in. When he came in, I wasn't aware of what he had in his mouth, but very shortly afterwards (i.e about 2 seconds) I was aware of a small rodent running around being chased by the cat. The rodent (which at the time I assumed was a mouse) very sensibly hid under the sofa where the cat couldn't get to it and wouldn't come out again. I was b*ggered if I was going to move the sofa and try and catch it myself, so I went to bed in the hope that it would venture out again and get caught by the cat.

When I got up this morning, that's obviously what had happened as I found the dismembered remains of a small rodent in the middle of the living room. The cat had eaten the head and torso, but left the unappetising bits at the rear end, but enough was left for me to determine that it wasn't a mouse as I'd originally thought, but rather a baby rat.

Aaah - those glorious years in pest control taught me useful things like rodent identification and the life cycle of wasps!

Some months ago I planted some tulips. Now, I'm not much of a gardener and usually manage to kill anything I try to grow, so I started getting excited when shoots started appearing. A couple of weeks ago, buds appeared. One of the buds has now started flowering. It is yellow. I've never seen a yellow tulip before. Is this normal?