Richard Bell's Wild West Yorkshire nature diary
Friday, 27th April, 2007
ANTS
ARE GATHERING around a blue-bottle that has expired on our
lounge windowsill. Meanwhile more ants seem to be appearing, scouting along
the crack between window and sill. Where are they coming from? Is it the hole
where the television aerial comes in? I go outside but I can’t see any
ant activity.
I go into the garage and grab a tube of flexible frame sealant (which I’ve had in for months, I’ve forgotten just what I intended to do with it now) and the gun/dispenser it slots into and within minutes we’ve filled the crack.
Barbara mops up the dozen or more of the small, reddish brown ants, probably twenty of them. I’m not as hard-hearted; I would have gathered them in a bug-box and released them outdoors!
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We’ve never noticed them in the house before. What has attracted them now? Is the feathery mineral wool insulation we recently had injected into our cavity walls an ideal habitat for them?
Cherry Blossom TimeWe’re in Wakefield this afternoon to deliver the new
booklet. Walking back along George Street we go under a stand
of flowering cherries. The lawn and pavement beneath them is
completely covered with fallen pink blossom but there’s still plenty of
colour on the trees.