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Ah⌠thatâs where our pink wild orchids have gone 
⌠not a sight of one in our garden this year, although the banks and fields are full of them.
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Those tall ones are lizard orchids and they are the ones that have the acrid / goat smell. I have masses and as they come into full bloom and the smell gets worse Iâm going round chopping them down, before our gite guests arrive and decide they are not going to stay! 
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Thanks, we call them, orchis Ă odeur de bouc, have the pink ones another vulgar name?
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If so, I donât know it. Only know them as pyramid orchids.
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Hands-Up⌠whoâs never seen a cow with a wooden legâŚ??
OH took this photo this evening, while I chatted with Daisy-May⌠and she seemed to understand every word I said⌠
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Short and sweetâŚ.
Thank you, Dunnock â now I know what you sound like. Ear piercing! Shanât forget that in a hurry!
I thought it was a bit late in the year, especially as I had seen little evidence of frogspawn this year, but yesterday while sorting through the contents of my surface net sweep on the tin tray I spotted a tiny movement after all the newtlets had gone back to the pond.
It was a miniscule, and I mean less than a centimetre in length, tadpole. Wriggling away and impossible to pick up with my fingers. In the end after a dozen attempts with a small leaf I managed to scoop it up and return it to the pond. It was so small that I couldnât even see the distubance on the surface as it plunged back in.
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Even snails get thirsty, it seemsâŚ
We hit 35c today and I watched as this snail strode along the wall, clambered up and onto the saucer and oozed himself down so that he could start slurpingâŚ
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âStrodeâ, I love that. Not being a gardener I love snails and save or re-settle them whenever appropriate and was fascinated by that study some years ago that revealed they have a homing instinct. 
So they are definitely all âourâ snails here. 
BTW, after the tiny tiny taddie 2 days ago, yesterday a 5 cm giant turned up in the net. No problem picking him up. I think I must be turning into my son with this fascintion with our littlest friends, he had a fascination for woodlice and was overjoyed when I picked up a book for him at a car boot sale, dedicated to those industrious little animals. Must ask him if he is still studying them in Thailand, but I think not perhaps. He has a cafe racer style (think 1950s retro) motorbike, which seems to amuse him these days. Made in China!
They certainly do have a âhoming instinctâ⌠little blighters love snoozing in one particular pot, tucked between the greenery/soil and inside wall of the pot itself.
In fact, I reckon thatâs the ânurseryâ as I find large, full grown ones as well as teeny tiny ones.
Each day, in an attempt to save the fuschia from total destruction, I lift these snoozing snails out and place them on the wall or similar⌠hoping theyâll find somewhere else to nestle.
But, blow me down⌠next evening the blighters are back in situ and my fuschia waves its munched leaves at me⌠aaaargh.
The study I spoke of involved capturing as many as possible in one garden and putting a dab of harmless paint on their shells before chucking them over into a neighbouring garden. Canât remember the percentage of returnees, but it was a very substantial proportion.
We were swamped with snails for years (even had them indoors) and, yes, I did chuck some into our neighbourâs garden quite regularly (and, yes, he did knowâŚ).
But another neighbour had a pet duck, which used to enjoy munching on them.
No pets nowadays, sadly, but visiting wildlife does seem to be keeping the snails more or less under control. I find empty shells here and thereâŚ
EDIT Just found 4 snails in the Fuschia Pot⌠aaarghâŚ
When I purchased my house many years ago, I went through a long period of finding all these little upside down boxes around the property that were all pretty full of snails. My only conclusion was that these were some form of snail traps that the previous French owners had used to catch snailsâŚand then eat them??? I was very intrigued 
If you find a snail looking the worse for wear, immobile under a hot sun, shrivelled up and shrunk down inside its shell,âŚdunk it in water and leave it upside down in a shady spot, and youâd be amazed at how fast they recover and disappear fast, for a snail, into the undergrowth.
Leaving it upside down allows water to remain inside the shell.
Iâve just rescued a large snail from my wheelbarrow, where it was underneath weeds and below the surface of last nightâs unexpected delugeâŚ
Iâve carefully popped it in amongst some wild plants and it seems to be OK⌠Iâm just surprised it didnât drown!
Iâll look that up some time because I too have found both slugs and snails underwater and none the worse for wear.
As well as rescuing garden snails, I tend to rescue anything that looks like itâs in needâŚâŚan ant drowning in a bowl of water, or even a mosquito, both of which would get lethal attention under other circumstances â a mosquito in the bedroom or an ant infestation in the house.
Not sure if Iâve mentioned this elsewhere, but there once was a hornet nest in my kitchen chimney, which I didnât know about at the time, and I went through a period of rescuing hornets which I found over several mornings crawling around looking very poorly on a cold kitchen floor. A little water mixed with honey on the end of a matchstick works well. They lifted their front legs, grasped the end of the match stick and drank the honey water. A couple of minutes on a sunny window sill outside and away they went. Theyâd sit in my hand and I started to become quite fond of them, although I have seen what they do to large live moths! Nasty!
When the nest crashed onto my kitchen floor several days later there was pandemonium and I raced outside into the garden and watched them crawling all over the inside of the kitchen window. I managed to open it and they poured out like an army on the move, and they went whirling frantically up to where their nest had been in the top of the chimney. The pompiers turned up later, one of them dressed in a white spacesuit, killed off everything, cleared away the splattered nest on the floor, swept around everywhere, and left the kitchen looking like nothing had happened.
I rescued a spider from a spider killing wasp which was struggling to carry away its paralyzed prey - too heavy. I put the spider with a few leaves in a matchbox overnight. Boy, was it alive and well the next morning! It had recovered from the first paralyzing bite but wouldnât have after the later second bite in the waspâs nest.
I worry about the grasshopper, preying mantis, low flying bumble bees and others when the lawnmowerâs ploughing through long grass.
I find my need to ârescueâ a bit of a torment sometimes because it involves any insect, reptile, animal, bird or whatever, which is in need, which comes my way.
I once rescued a neighbour, in need, but thatâs a very long story and would be off thread!