What interesting creatures live in your garden?

Fortunately, the chipmunk population has been on the decrease since DS let his cats out of the wood shop. I don't mind them harvesting acorns in the fall -- and they will -- but I don't like all the holes everywhere. This is the first year my begonia bed hasn't been bothered by those munchkins digging up the tubers and just tossing them here and there.

Besides the moth Gypsy found:
gyp moth.JPG insect ID.JPG

I found this unknown fellow on my Sycamore tree last year. Too pretty to harm, I hope it is something useful.

Another surprise (to me) was dancing with a cicada wasp when we built our retaining wall. She looked so big and dangerous, but ended up being a big softy in my eyes -- of course, I am not a cicada.

Over the years, the little pond has brought many different varieties of frogs and lots of toads. And if you want lots of bees, try St. John's Wort. Has to be a dozen or more different bee-like insects flying around that plant. Sedum is another bee and butterfly attractor although the variety of bees is much smaller.
 
That's pretty! We had some wonderful butterflies and caterpillars here over Summer. I wish I'd taken more pics... The bees on the other hand were scarce, but we still find many, many on the beach. I don't understand why they go there though? Surely the salt water...???
 
My garden has toads and birds, and there is a salamander living under the chickens' water dish. It just pretty well stays in one place there. Cool and moist, I suppose, is what it is looking for. We have a few garter snakes in the yard. Nothing very exciting this year.
 
Chipmunks, House Sparrows, Robins, Leopard Frog, the occasional toad of Spring Peeper - nothing too interesting. I once found a female Ichnuemon wasp sitting on one of my sunflowers, no pictures.
 
I took the dogs out yesterday morning and a pair of mockingbirds were very vocal about our presence. They got real close, so I knew something was up. Sure enough, we found this cutie in the rosemary bush.

Mockingbird baby.jpg


A couple of years ago, my husband came in to get me so I could see what he found--a red wasp voraciously eating a tomato hornworm!

wasp eating hornworm.jpg


I have caught toads and put them in the garden, but see very few. The lady next door feeds all the feral cats and I think they have decimated my frog population! But I had a little green tree frog hanging out in the collard greens last year, much to my delight.

frog collards.jpg


And we have beneficial insects too. I love the orangey-red assassin bugs, they stalk the aphids and eat other bugs eggs. And everybody loves ladybugs. My 4 year old collard green stalks finally bolted and went to seed this spring, I cleared most of them out, but left 2 stalks to save the seed. They turned gray with aphids. I almost pulled them up too, but realized that the good bugs have to have something to eat, so ya' gotta have the bad bugs. Well, let me tell you, the lady bugs showed up, mated, hatched larve and they all went to town on those aphids! But it was so hard not to yank those gray aphid infested collards up!

Ladybug on potato plants.jpg


I also have the occasional little brown grass snake, blue tailed skink and green anole lizards.

Then I have this very interesting creature that likes to "help" when I am in the garden........

Parker hay twine.jpg
 
@baymule Wonderful pics! Thanks for sharing. That baby bird is adorable and I love that interesting creature that likes "helping" in the garden. Looks like such a sweetie.
 
I just remembered something funny that happened to me a few years ago. I had an old metal watering can that I used to catch water dripping from a leaking hosepipe. One morning I grabbed the can and started watering some plants near the house with the water I collected, but only a trickle came out the spout. I shook the can and patted the can, but nope, something was blocking that spout and it was not budging. Probably a stone, I thought, so I had a look... and nearly dropped the can I was so startled when I saw this little face, staring back at me:

DSC02151.jpg


And here it is, badly shaken, but unhurt in spite of it's ordeal:

DSC02152.jpg
 
baymule said:
I took the dogs out yesterday morning and a pair of mockingbirds were very vocal about our presence. They got real close, so I knew something was up. Sure enough, we found this cutie in the rosemary bush.

View attachment 3159

A couple of years ago, my husband came in to get me so I could see what he found--a red wasp voraciously eating a tomato hornworm!

View attachment 3160

I have caught toads and put them in the garden, but see very few. The lady next door feeds all the feral cats and I think they have decimated my frog population! But I had a little green tree frog hanging out in the collard greens last year, much to my delight.

View attachment 3161

And we have beneficial insects too. I love the orangey-red assassin bugs, they stalk the aphids and eat other bugs eggs. And everybody loves ladybugs. My 4 year old collard green stalks finally bolted and went to seed this spring, I cleared most of them out, but left 2 stalks to save the seed. They turned gray with aphids. I almost pulled them up too, but realized that the good bugs have to have something to eat, so ya' gotta have the bad bugs. Well, let me tell you, the lady bugs showed up, mated, hatched larve and they all went to town on those aphids! But it was so hard not to yank those gray aphid infested collards up!

View attachment 3162

I also have the occasional little brown grass snake, blue tailed skink and green anole lizards.

Then I have this very interesting creature that likes to "help" when I am in the garden........

View attachment 3163
Click to expand...

Something about the green frog sitting on the sea-foam green, palm-like collard plant - good picture.
 
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