Aberbrothock: Garden Pollinators and a Killer Cat

Sunday, 27 July 2025

Garden Pollinators and a Killer Cat

Mostly insects and primarily Hover Flies, photographed in my garden when we had visitors, and others from Boddin Lime Kilns in cooler conditions. As usual ID's are "best effort" using ObsIdentify, Paul Brock's book, and often Peter Falk's Flickr.

There's been an uptick in butterflies in the garden with seven species seen, most photographed. The Large White Butterfly in the picture below is the largest butterfly I've seen, it was clearly larger than any species seen before.

I have only a few insects from past garden lists to find this year. I'll be shifting more to birds and Damselflies and Dragonflies.

A new cat appeared in the garden this week and it was unphased by me escorting it off the premises. It returned over a few days, day one it killed and ate a frog, day two a mouse, day three another frog, and probably more unseen. Day four and there was no cat, maybe it moved on, or went home. However, that night Olive noticed a cat had been killed on a road nearby, or was the cat I saw the one reported missing in the opposite direction, I'll never know...

But it does show how domestic cats can affect wildlife.

"In the UK, domestic cats are estimated to kill between 160 and 270 million animals annually, including 40 to 70 million birds".

"In Australia, cats (both feral and domestic) kill an estimated two billion native animals each year. This includes a significant number of birds, mammals, reptiles, frogs, and invertebrates". "Cats have been identified as a major factor in the extinction of at least 22 native Australian mammal species".