Flora and Fauna Friday this week is traveling back to Saskatchewan in the mid 1990s.
The Muskrat (Ondatra zibethicus) is native to North America but has been introduced to parts of Europe, Asia and South America.
This individual is swimming across a pool on a farm near Punnichy, Saskatchewan, Canada.
My Flora and Fauna Friday this week is the Small Copper Butterfly (Lycaena phlaeas).
Alternative common English names include American Copper and Common Copper.
I didn’t realise until recently that the Small Copper butterflies I had photographed in England were the same species as the ones that I have seen in Ontario, Canada.
The butterfly is a Holarctic species, widespread and common across Europe, Asia, North America and also North Africa.
This backlit individual was photographed in a garden in the village of Wybunbury in southern Cheshire, England.
Flora and Fauna Friday this week features the Prairie Lily. This specimen was photographed in a ditch near Punnichy, Saskatchewan in the late 1990s. I used my Olympus OM Zuiko 350mm lens to isolate it from the other plants growing in the ditch.
The Prairie Lily is the provincial flower of Saskatchewan.
This week’s Flora and Fauna Friday is a Corncockle (Agrostemma githago) flower photographed in a garden in Cheshire, England.
Once a common weed in wheat fields it is now uncommon due to modern farming practices. However, nowadays it is being grown in cottage gardens. All parts of the plant are poisonous.
This week’s Flora and Fauna Friday is a Thirteen-lined Ground Squirrel (Ictidomys tridecemlineatus) in the late spring. Alternative common English names include Striped Gopher and Leopard Ground Squirrel.
Photographed near Punnichy on the Saskatchewan, Canada prairies in the late 1990s.
Welcome to my second Flora and Fauna Friday.
This is a young European Rabbit resting outside the warren. Photographed at the Brown Moss Nature Reserve near Whitchurch in Shropshire, England.
This is my first post in what will probably be a new weekly feature, Flora and Fauna Friday.
This Friday I have chosen a pair of Silver-studded Blue Butterflies mating on a grass seed head. Photographed on Prees Heath near Whitchurch, Shropshire, England in the mid 1990s.
The butterflies at Prees Heath are an isolated colony with most Silver-studded Blue colonies being found in Southern England and Wales. They get their common English name from the small, metallic silver spots near the rear edgeof the wing.
