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The riot of colour continues here. Everything is racing like mad to flower and seed before the heat flattens them. The cliffs above Xlendi are awash with fennel and French honeysuckle, the air is full of bees and the scent of the aromatic thyme I walk on.
I come across a Hummingbird Hawk-Moth, the first of these I've ever seen, tiny and remarkably like a hummingbird, wings a blur as it hovers and feeds. Sadly it evaded my attempts to photograph it, so the picture courtesy of Wikimedia.
I come across a Hummingbird Hawk-Moth, the first of these I've ever seen, tiny and remarkably like a hummingbird, wings a blur as it hovers and feeds. Sadly it evaded my attempts to photograph it, so the picture courtesy of Wikimedia.
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The Swallowtail, Papilio machaon is a little easier to find, they are resident and common here and have it seems emerged from their winter hideaways. The caterpillars of the British subspecies will normally only feed on Milk Parsley, and is restricted in the UK to a few areas of the Norfolk Broads. The European subspecies here is not so particular, they feed on umbellifers such as fennel, wild carrot, angelica and hogweed. The females usually lay 2-3 broods a year, in the hot summer temperatures the butterflies will emerge from pupa in 2-3 weeks.
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Blue stonecrop, Sedum caeruleum, which as the name suggests is red with purple flowers, is blooming. It germinates in water and thrives in shallow depressions in the abundant limestone habitats here in Gozo.
Another new discovery is the Tassel hyacinth, Muscari comosum, which I found growing only in one rocky fallow field, a small community of them along the south-coast Sanap cliffs.