Two surprises in the Garden: Japanese White-eye and Pipe Plant

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Dear All,

With the rain letting up for a few hours over the weekend, we had two surprises in the garden. The first was a beautiful Japanese Bush Warbler (‘Uguisu’)

Correction: on further research it is not an Uguisu (though we have them round us), but a Japanese White-eye ‘Meijiro’. Apparently they are very seldom seen on the ground….,

that struck our window and sat stunned on the balcony for about 20 minutes. After my best impression of a hawker (the little thing crawled onto my outstretched glove and I gently held it aloft – a far cry from the gallant medieval hawker, something the size of a Robin) the beautiful little thing fluttered off and perched not far away for another 10 minutes, almost as if to say thank you. We have quite a lot of these little birds around in the forest, but they are very hard to see owing to their coloration and arboreal habit.

Also of interest was the re-emergence of the Indian Pipe plants that I mentioned quite a few blogs ago (but didn’t have a picture). They are very strange things, one of the few flowering plants not to have any chlorophyll. They are secondary parasitic, attaching themselves to a host fungus, which is itself feeding through tree roots. They mainly live underground for years, but just occasionally, when the conditions are just right, pop up (about 5 inches tall). Weird but as with all things nature, fascinating. Please see the rather ‘arty’ photo below.

Best, ptarotuos

• 30 Jun, 2014
• 8 likes

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