Harvester ants and harvester termites with Malmesbury gousblom

by Diana Studer

- gardening for biodiversity

Harvester ants

Indigenous ants are a vital part of the web of life, especially these harvester ants which live on seeds. At the entrance to the nest is a heap of husks. Some of the seeds which they take underground into their nests are able to grow, and they work at seed dispersal. They live in “dry areas” - Field guide to insects of South Africa, by Mike Picker, Charles Griffiths, and Alan Weaving.

Harvester ants bearing gousblom seeds

A Swartland garden in July

by Diana Studer

- gardening for biodiversity

Our garden decides which colour features thru the year. Red and yellow flames echo the kitchen hearth at the Owl House. I've learnt a deeper love for my blue-green Melianthus major as I see it cherished by Northern foreign gardeners. Theirs is cut down by frost, and mine is bravely cut to the ground, stalk by stalk as the seeds fall. Strelitzia is not only flame-coloured, but also flame-shaped.

Teeth on the leaves of Melianthus major
Strelitzia about to open

Striped mice and snowy mountains

by Diana Studer

- gardening for biodiversity

Chunks of grubbed out grape vines are arranged here to give wildlife, lizards and snakes… a place to live, to escape the cat. Looking out of the bedroom window, from where we can photograph in peace, I saw a striped mouse enjoying the early sunshine on a winter morning. Very alert, he dived back among the branches at the slightest sound or movement. He is conveniently at home next to the overspill from the bird feeder. Rhabdomys pumilio, the striped mouse lives in our fynbos and renosterveld.

Striped mouse looking this way

Rain spiders Palystes sp.

by Diana Studer

- gardening for biodiversity

There are two forms of wildlife that make me shriek out loud. I have a totally irrational horror of grasshoppers, locusts. I will cross the road to avoid one. They don't bite. They don't hurt. But what if it would jump ON me. 

The second would be these rain spiders INside. I am OK if they are outside. We had one on the sliding glass patio doors. High up, towards the centre, near the opening. That evening I slid the doors open to tell M'sieur Chocolat the kitchen is about to close - Final Orders?! And something, large, walked very delicately, across my forehead. Well, my fringe, over my hair. As I drew breath to scream, I realised it was 'just' that rain spider. Disturbed in her evening hunting, by me, opening the door. 

Rain spider from above

Nguni cattle each one different

by Diana Studer

- gardening for biodiversity

Think of the pictures in a child’s book, of a cow. White with black spots. Or maybe brown. Now think of Nguni cattle, every cow has her own pattern. Nguni pictures remain, across the years, my most popular downloads.

Nguni herd with Olifantsriver Mountains in 2011

Tabakrolletjie snake

by Diana Studer

- gardening for biodiversity in Porterville, near Cape Town in South Africa

This is a guardian angel post. Written to Cape gardeners for biodiversity. Even if you can't abide snakes - get to know the tabakrolletjie. Duberria lutrix (common slug eater). GOOD guy. Please be kind to him! Don’t kill off these snakes by feeding them snail bait in dead and dying snails. If your garden is well mulched, some of these little snakes are living in your garden. Beneath logs and stones, or near the pond – wherever the snails are living.

Remember that old nursery rhyme – what are little boys made of? Frogs and snails and puppy dog’s tails. You are what you eat. Meet that “little boy – made of snails!” The slugeater, is one of the good guys because he, eats snails.

I know that is true, because only once in twenty years of gardening in Camps Bay, did I see the life and death struggle slowly play out. The snake had caught a snail. The snail doesn’t want to be eaten, so he resists. The snake hangs on like grim death. Grim. Death. Until the snail tires … and the rest, is Lunch.

Tabakrolletjie snake

The policeman and the prima donna

by Diana Studer
- gardening for biodiversity in Porterville, near Cape Town in South Africa

We have no manicured lawn. We've learnt to adjust to a hotter summer, but still in the Western Cape’s familiar mediterranean climate. They say build it and they will come – and indeed they have!

The Story of Elephant’s Eye

Chapter 7

Gardening for biodiversity

We live in a small country town, our garden behind a wall. We have a few diamond panels at the base of the wall – for frogs and snakes and lizards and striped mice. Our wildlife is birds and smalls.

Rosyfaced lovebird dining out at Spirulino's

Most exciting was the endangered Black Stork for which we named the little island in Ungardening Pond. Porterville lies in a dip which was once a vlei, and I wonder how many generations back the frogs remember coming here. These summer nights towards Christmas the frog and cricket oompah band is in fine form.

Cape mountain leopard cub at Mied Se Berg

At the end of August as the Western Cape battled thru fierce winter weather, my husband returned to Driehoek. Dr Quinton Martins of the Cape Leopard Trust and Jurg were still hoping to catch the wary Spot and replace the battery in her GPS collar.

Nieuwoudt Pass between Citrusdal and Clanwilliam

Cape mountain leopard 3 hours later

As I write Cape Town is locked in the fourth glacial cold front bringing sub-polar air from Antarctica, with freaky hail storms. Inspiring a Chip Snaddon cartoon about bi-polar bears off Cape Town. While Europe is immersed in floods. In Switzerland young birds are battling the cold and wet. There are not enough insects to feed the fledglings and it will be a few good years before the bird population recovers.

Uitkyk Pass looking towards Algeria Forestry Station

The elusive Cape mountain leopard Spot

When I wrote on the 24th of November, the weatherman promised ‘very cold, wet and windy conditions are expected to set in over the north-western high ground’ in the Cederberg. Sutherland has had MINUS 2C in November! Jurg was hiking at Driehoek as October turned to November volunteering with the Cape Leopard Trust and helping to monitor the traps.

The Cape Leopard Trust

Caracal at Driehoek for the Cape Leopard Trust

It’s been 3 months since Jurg last went to Driehoek volunteering to monitor traps for the Cape Leopard Trust. This time, the signal went off near Quinton’s base at Matjiesriver. 

Jurg with sedated caracal
Photo by Dawie Burger of Driehoek

The team met at the walk thru trap for caracal. Jurg wanted to take a picture of the caracal IN the trap – but Dr. Quinton Martins was adamant. ‘We have to get the caracal out of the cage, before he hurts himself!’ First the welfare of the caracal.

Gardening for wildlife in a Cape winter

We garden for wildlife. If a tree falls in the forest, and no one is there to hear it, does it still make a sound? Between RL and gardening, rediscover your sense of wonder. Take time out, see what wildlife makes its home, or pauses, in your garden.

In Paradise and Roses both of our strelitzias have a flower open. I know our strelitzias are grown in California, I wonder if the hummingbirds use them as a nectar source? Strong stem and a bowl overflowing with nectar brings an impatient queue of  masked weavers and  Cape weavers.

Strelitzia reginae occurs naturally only in South Africa: eastern coast, from Humansdorp to northern KwaZulu-Natal in coastal bush and thicket. It grows along river banks in full sun, however sometimes it occurs and flowers on margins of forest in shade – from PlantZAfrica.

Weaver on Strelitzia

Patch the Cape leopard and his collar at work

Jurg has been to Driehoek once more with the Cape Leopard Trust. Back in February he saw this klipspringer family.

Male klipspringer

Mother and baby klipspringer

Caught a Cape mountain leopard

After midnight the phone rings. My heart sinks. But it is Quinton – Tell Jurg, we've caught A LEOPARD!! Jurg falls out of bed and in one and a half hours he has joined the others at Driehoek. Driving carefully to avoid two grysbok, a duiker, and rabbits who run along the road.

Waiting with the Cape Leopard Trust at Driehoek

The young Cape mountain leopard is in good hands – Dr Quinton Martins researcher at the Cape Leopard Trust, Dr Marc Walton the on-call vet (that’s animal not war) from Ceres,

Wilderness camps with the Cape Leopard Trust

Drive away from our home in Porterville, North towards Clanwilliam and up into the Cederberg mountains, where endangered Cape leopards live. Since September last year Jurg has been volunteering with the Cape Leopard Trust. In January he went to help refresh the Toktokkie Camp before this year’s children arrived for their wilderness camps.

Klipbokberg on the road to Ceres

Seven steps built by a mud wasp

When I look across to our mountain, to the clouds that come and go, sometimes I see seven steps to heaven  (Miles Davis). That first step is unattainable, and even if I could reach it, insubstantial. My foot would simply pass thru the water vapour. Earth-bound my mind turns to the legendary Seven Steps in District 6. Again, insubstantial, demolished during apartheid, living on in memory and music. In my living memory, that part of Cape Town has always been a green slope below the mountain, at the far edge of the city.

Seven Steps to Heaven

Cape mountain leopard on camera

The Ungardener returned to Driehoek in October, still hoping to help trap Spot, the Cape mountain leopard.

Driehoek dam

While Dr Quinton Martins of the Cape Leopard Trust has traps set, he needs help monitoring 24/7. That is where the Ungardener comes in, as a volunteer.

With the Cape Leopard Trust at Driehoek

Imagine you are hiking in the Cederberg. Ahead of you is a red flag.

Warning flags for leopard traps at Driehoek in the Cederberg

As you get closer, you read about Cape Leopards.

To Driehoek in search of leopards

Since we moved to Porterville the Ungardener has hoped that one day, hiking up in the Groot Winterhoek Wilderness Area, we would see Cape leopards. In the newsletter from the Cape Leopard Trust they recently asked for volunteers. He spent a week at Driehoek in the Cederberg, which flow on from our Groot Winterhoek mountains.

Mountain stream looking across to the Koerasieberg
 at Driehoek in the Cederberg

Leopards and other predators are a problem for stock farmers. They were hunted and trapped. At Driehoek is an Anatolian shepherd dog. Himself was dozing in his chair, when something leapt on his stomach. He woke up thinking leopard!

Return to Groot Winterhoek

Walking with me, the Ungardener is limited to about two hours. With FREQUENT stops for yet another flower. And I me myself, like to walk, on the level, on the jeep track, so I can look at bugs and flowers. He would like to go further, along the river, a full day hike. Andre our Computer Man had never been up to the Wilderness Area. Last Monday, Computer Man and Ungardener hiked towards De Tronk along the river, returning via a very steep uphill slog on my jeep track.

Hiking in the Groot Winterhoek in August