poison plants; nail board; beads:beds
OK. This is the critter I was sent outside to look at - the grasshopper- not often seen in this garden. You may notice it is on the ragwort, which I reallised was covered in cinnabar moth caterpillars. I got excited about this as I got the wildlife ID book out and identified it and realised it had been a cinnabar moth I saw a couple of months ago inthe garden, and I had never seen one here before, nor the caterpillars. I have since discovered that the caterpillars and the ragwort itself are poisonous, but, as far as I can make out, the caterpillars are only poisonous enough to make them taste horrible to birds, and that ragwort is poisnonous to horses as well as cows and sheep. Horses know not to eat them, but it sometimes ends up in hay. I usually get rid of the stuff as I had an incling that they were undesirable weeds in Ireland, where they are called boholons. As far as I know ragwort is not dangerous to humans unless they are involved in pulling up lots of it, where it is recommended that gloves and a mask are worn. I thought the cinnabar moth caterpillars might do the job for me and finish off the plant, so I wont have to do anything.
My back was still bad today, so we didn't go out again, but the children were saved from boredom by the arrival of Jr and Elaine, who made some interesting CD mobiles and sculpture ideas, involving plasticine and bits of old rope that was lying round the garden. We polished off the rest of the ice cream and just about all the other food in the house, as I haven't been able to go shopping, but I have finally managed to get some ordered to be delivered tomorrow.
I did manage to make something though: not sure what it's called - a nail board for elastic bands- a sort of Montessori thing. I need to do some more of these- need more offcuts of wood- maybe when I get those bookshelves in the living room... I did bring a little table and chair down for Jem last night, so now they all have their own little table to work at in the living room, as well as the rugs.
I had a text fron Brendan saying he had got the beds as he had been passing IKEA on the way somewhere. We thought he meant the beads, Hama beads, but I've got a horrible feeling he meant beds, he's bought some beds! Because I said "hama beads?" and he said "whoops!"
posted by Rosie @ 22:55
8 Comments:
You asked him for beads and he bought beds???
Never used to wear a mask or gloves to pull up ragwort, and used to pull up loads as it grew all over the field where my horse grazed. We were always told that it was only poisonous once it was dead, but maybe that was because that was how it usually got into the hay. :)
ahem, I think it was a bit of confusion over the priority/urgency of things, but then I can get beads myself and its not often someone actually offers to go to iKEA for me. I had just discovered that the only mattress that will fit the children's extendable beds is an IKEA one, being 2'8", or 80cm, and they are currently surviving with their baby matresses in 2 and 3 pieces, so I suppose it is quite needed, really. But J was sure he had meant beads when he wrote beds, I thought it was funny. Maybe he'll get the on the way back.
no, I think the mask and gloves sound a bit over the top , but used for volunteers,as part of risk assessment, bla, bla. I think it's more dangerous when dry as the horses won't eat it when its alive.
We've got ragwort too. It grows in the oddest places: there's a clump growing through a crack in the drive here. I think it's quite a pretty 'weed' but I understand it's on the list of plants we're supposed to pull up and/or notify someone when we see it. Not that I take much notice of such lists, dictatorial and unenforceable as they are. I wonder why they called it ragwort? They used the old generic names to convey information about plants, didn't they? But I can't work out what ragwort means.
We've got ragwort here. It grows in the oddest places - like through cracks in the drive. Why is it called ragwort, I wonder?
Oh, I thought it had lost the first comment. You can see how much of it I could be bothered to type out again ;-)
beds. no beads.
that sounded like beds, no, beads! No, he did get the beds, they didnt have any beads. This is a very long saga and it will all become clear in the fullness of time.
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