Wild Flower Time in Kilmore

A KILMORE GARDEN OF EDEN

Chocolate Lilies en masse

Trigger Plant Stylidium?

When I have my car serviced, it is always returned with one of those little sweet Christmas trees in a plastic bag. These are supposed to make your car smell pleasant, but I find the scent overpowering.

Australian Buttercup

Yesterday, walking in the Monument, the scent was just as overpowering. It was so strong I thought perhaps I had one of the car perfume packs in  my camera bag. It was a sweet and chocolaty aroma.

Chocolate lilies!  I have never seen them growing so densely. The ground is covered in them to almost a metre in height. They are not just in patches, they are everywhere. As I waded through them my legs and trousers became smeared with patches of purple.

Early Nancy

I knelt down at one stage to take  picture and without having to move off my knees, I was able to photograph at least a dozen other flowering plants. There were yellows, blues, whites, purples, pinks and oranges, all there, mixed up together.

Ivy-leaf Violet

Golden Everlasting Daisies

Bulbine Lily

Showy Podolepis 

Chocolate Lily

Slender Rice Flower

Donkey Orchid

Blue Button

Tall Bluebell White Form Wahlenbergia Stricta

Yellow Buttons

      

Tall Bluebell

 

Fleabane

                                                  

    

Crested Pigeons

CRESTED PIGEONS  ( Ocyphaps lophotes)

I have watched these birds for many years. They are often about the town, sitting on electricity wires, watching the world go by. On a still day they can be heard 'hwoo - hwooing' from taller trees. It is one of the sounds of living in this town.





When I come across them feeding on the ground, they are quite timid, and burst into the air with a hectic whistling beating of the wings. Some say this whistling sound distracts predators from young birds which maystill be on the ground.



I watched this pair for a long time on Sunday. Sitting high on a dead tree, they 'billed and cooed' (I think that is probably the right expression for pigeons and doves?). They then played a sparring game with their crests. They looked as though they were fencing, using their long black crests as foils. They both displayed lots of feather fluffing, holding their tail feathers over their heads. The male then mounted the female.

 They flew off to another tree where they sat for  quite a long while in a contented way.

They seemed much more highly coloured than I have seen them at other times. Perhaps, like other birds, their colours intensify during the mating time. The legs were very red, the eyes bright orange, and the plumage more highly marked. They did look beautiful.

Moth Flies

ANNOYING LITTLE FLIES  (Clogmia albipunctata)

I love to read in bed. For the last week or so it has been  chore.

Turn on the light and  I am immediately joined by a crowd of tiny insects. Gnats? Moths? Flies?  

They are so tiny it is difficult to see what they are. Using a 10x magnifier I can just make out what looks to be tiny moths. But they move so quickly that it is hard to get any detail. They are certainly far too tiny for my camera to catch

So I did a bit of asking around. Fleas says one person, bed bugs says another, gnats, midges, fruit flies, and a few silly answers such as baby flies. I know all of those, and these don't fit my observations at all. 

I finally found the answer. I have a friend who is an entomologist. He knew straight away what they are. Moth flies; sometimes called drain flies, bathroom flies, sink flies, filter flies, mothmidge or sewer gnats. They are quite beautiful when they are seen close with their long segmented antennae.

MuseumVictoria gives the following description.

These dark grey flies are 2-4mm in length and have hairy moth-like wings. They have a jerky flight and are observed around bathrooms, in damp subfloors, in greenhouses and in other locations where moisture and the presence of decaying organic matter will support their presence. 

If you are seeing large numbers and you don’t regularly leave your windows open, the flies must be breeding inside your house or in your water pipes. You could have a drainage problem, such as slow-draining pipes, or water pooling in over-watered pot plants. Once you remove all permanent sources of water and fix any drainage issues, the flies should disappear. 

Bathroom flies are not harmful to people and will not damage clothes or linen. They are therefore considered to be of nuisance value only.

( https://museumvictoria.com.au/discoverycentre/discovery-centre-news/2009-archive/bathroom-flies/ )

My drains and bathroom plumbing are fine but the ground and garden all about, is very damp. Everything is damp in Kilmore so I suppose the moth flies are having a good year of it.