Vacation Time - Day 4 Part 1

Update: Brilliant Adrian from The Bug Whisperer has commented that they are the eggs of the Lacewing and he is quite right. Thank you. You are a star!!

To see what it looks like, click here or here.

Being only an hours drive away from Kruger National Park, there is no way I could resist going there for a day, so I left early in order to get there when the gates opened. The sunrise with its soft colors was unbelievable.
This is a birders paradise but usually as you get near, they fly a little way from the road so one needs a better lens than what I have. This one however decided I was no threat and stayed just where he was. It is a Burchell’s Coucal, a rather large bird, twice the size of a large pigeon at least. Its claim to fame is the sound it makes which is like liquid gurgling out of a bottle and the belief is that when you hear it, it means it is gong to rain so we call it the Rain Bird. It eats frogs, insects and small reptiles amongst other things.

I have found that one of the best areas to look for insects in the early morning is on the walls of buildings where they perch for the night and so I headed to the nearest. This was a most unusual find and although I can see it is the eggs of something, I do not know what it belongs to. This whole thing is maybe ½ an inch in diameter and this picture is exactly as it is from out of the wall. It is not hanging down as I would expect but sticking straight out. I looked to see if something which laid them might be lurking around but the closest was the spider below and I know it does not belong to it as I have seen their nests and eggs.

PLEASE SOMEBODY TELL ME WHAT IT BELONGS TO!! This is one time I would have loved to have gone back on a regular basis to see what hatches out or brought it home, but there is no way I could have detached each strand and done that. So here I sit, clueless again!! It is SO frustrating!!

A “Flattie”, about the size of a quarter waiting for something edible to come along.

Another unusual one. A Clear-wing moth. They all have such spectacular colors. This one was guarding a clutch of eggs.

Namaqualand Daisies. These are one of the nicest flowers to have in a garden. They are long-stemmed and come in a rainbow of colors and easy to propagate too. In the picture is its seedball which you scatter and lightly cover with soil. Alternatively, the roots can be divided into more plants.

When finding flowers like this, it is a good idea to always look inside them as very often small katydids like this will be hiding there.