Foxes Lair
  • Home
  • About
    • About Foxes Lair
    • History
    • Landscape and Soils
  • Things To Do
    • Scavenger hunt
    • Picnic Spots
    • Walking Tracks
    • Visit the Arboretum
    • Geocaching and Orienteering
    • Ride Your Bicycle
  • Things To See
    • Birds
    • Wildflowers
    • Trees in the Narrogin district
    • Narrogin spiders scorpions ticks
    • Vertebrates
    • Fungi and lichens
  • Other Places to Visit
    • FAMILY bush attractions
    • WILDLIFE bush attractions
    • WILDFLOWER bush attractions
    • all reserves
  • 1Foxypress
    • Foxypress
    • Vanishing Farms
  • Foxes Lair seasonal guide
  • Contact

Utricularia menziesii Redcoats

16/8/2020

 
Picture
​Greetings fellow Foxies,
 
I discovered these tiny ornamental plants last August in a wet mossy patch surrounding a rock pool on a granite outcrop at Highbury B Block. It is a bladderwort, a carnivorous plant. There are 15 bladderwort species in WA, mainly in wetter areas.
The plants are only about 3 cm high but brilliantly coloured.
I thought that the curved flower receptacle was the bladder, but no, it has another function.
Apparently, it is designed for pollination by the Western Spinebill.
Red attracts birds, its height is right for ground-hunting spinebills, and the curve matches the spinebill’s beak. As the spinebill inserts its beak the beak pushes on to a hinged ovary and pistil and collects a dob of pollen to take to the next plant as it withdraws.

Picture
Western Spinebill. Image Lyn Alcock
Picture
These plants are only about 3 cm high
The unique insect-catching bladders are tiny little vesicles underneath the leaves. I couldn’t see them when I searched recently. Luckily they are well described in this wonderful free PDF book: Plant Life of Southwestern Australia Adaptations for Survival
PictureDiagram of a longitudinal section through a Utricularia bladder. The trap is a hollow utricle, mostly two cells thick, partly filled with water, and under negative pressure. Traps are usually 1–4 mm long.
​Here is an extract
 
 Each trap is partially water- filled, and has a door surrounded by sensitive hairs that direct prey to the opening. The trapdoor opens inwards upon irritation by a passing animal such as a mosquito larva. After the prey brushes against the trigger hairs, it is sucked in because of the release of negative pressure maintained inside the utricle, engorging several times its resting volume. Traps are connected to the plant via stolons, stalks or leaves. Plants may even be rootless.
After firing, the trap restores the negative pressure by removing water from the lumen until the original compressed shape is returned. After this process is completed, which lasts about 30 minutes, the trap is ready to fire again.

PictureSide view with simulated spinebill beak
I took a muntered flower that had been cut off by a grub home for dissection.
 
The flower has three parts:
  • A curved nectar chamber with hinged anthers at the top.
  • A rear tepal  that covers the top of nectar chamber, which has a hole in the centre and an upraised tip.
  • A front tepal that looks like an insect landing pad with yellow bulges that resemble anthers.
 
The top view of the dissected flower shows an entry hole for a spinebill beak with a collar that would exclude all but the smallest insect. Side views show the (very dead) ovary on top of a hinged anther.  The normally yellow anthers are on the underside.
​In summer the plant dies back to a tiny over summering corm.

Picture
Top view
Picture
Dissected flower side view
Picture
Anthers on underside of the hinge
Reference Floral micromorphology of the bird-pollinated carnivorous plant species Utricularia menziesii R.Br. (Lentibulariaceae)

What Made that Hole?

4/3/2014

 
Picturegoanna hole
​Greetings fellow Foxies,
As soon as the weather warms up, you will see fist-sized holes with a round top and a flat base appearing in sandy and gravelly soils. These were dug by 
Varanus gouldii variously known as ‘racehorse goanna’ or a ‘sand goanna’ or even a Gould’s monitor. They commonly hide in hollow logs and may be seen sunning themselves on roads, rocks, and logs. They must be able to sense grubs or beetles in the soil.
Racehorse goannas may look fierce but always run away at great speed, which can frighten the daylights out of some. They have been rumoured to climb people, mistaking them for trees, but in my experience take off in the opposite direction. If you are a nervous type, just walk next to a tall person (who is also useful if there is a chance of lightning).

Picture
Western bearded dragons build similar but smaller holes, but are rarely seen. The shingleback lizard (bobtail skink - it isn't a goanna) is our most commonly seen reptile. These lovable reptiles try to look fierce, but are harmless. Please don't let dogs near them?
Picture
racehorse goanna's lair
Picture
bobtail skink
Picture
western bearded dragon
Picturerainbow bee eater burrows
​Rainbow bee eater nesting burrows look similar to goanna diggings but are rounder and deeper, and occur in clusters. I used to see their nests in the road burden by the side of the track on the north side of the arboretum, but alas no longer. I suspect that chicks became goanna tucker, as  rainbow bee eaters normally burrow in gully walls that are harder for predators to reach.  Rainbow bee eaters appear in early summer. They are acrobats of the bird world being fast and agile, and doing loop the loops as they catch bees on the wing. They have a lovely rolling chirrup call. World War II Spitfire fighter planes copied their wing shape to maximise manoeuvrability.

Picture

Mistletoe

6/3/2012

2 Comments

 
Greetings fellow
If you cast your eyes upwards in Foxes Lair in February, you may see lovely red mistletoe flowers.
Ah mistletoe, the flower of love dedicated to the goddess Athena and placed above doors at Christmas where people who meet must kiss. If you have a hankering for osculation, arrange to meet the intended person in Foxes Lair.
Now that you are fired up I mention that Mistletoe is a stem hemiparasite that rarely kills its host, and the name literally means ‘dung-on-a-twig’. The mistletoe bird, which has a very short digestive system, eats the berries and deposits droppings containing seed on host branches. A germinating seedling produces a connection like a vegetative placenta (haustorium), which enables it to tap into the host’s sap.
Picture
Mistletoe bird pair (female left)
Picture
Mistletoe on a wandoo branch
Picture
Mistletoe berries
There are two species. stalked mistletoe Anyema miquelli  is a broad-leafed species, which favours eucalypts.  Acacias host the much leaner wireleaf mistletoe Anyema preissi.

​
Dodder laurel is another stem parasite, but is a holoparasite.
Mistletoe berries are a bush tucker, which are sweet but so sticky that they the flesh can't be separated from the seed; this helps the seeds to stick on branches after passing through whatever eats them.
This fabulous blog shows that mistletoes are an integral part of the bush. Their fruit is food for several birds and animals, They do not necessarily kill their host, and are sensitive to fire.
Picture
Stalked mistletoe (left) wireleaf mistletoe (right)
2 Comments

Australian Shelduck Ducklings.

14/10/2011

0 Comments

 
PictureDuck down on a twig
Greetings fellow Foxies,
The Australian Shelduck nests in tree hollows in Foxes Lair. Every June pairs of adults can be seen circling around honking loudly and competing with other pairs on the few suitable large dead marris.  To take the ducklings to a brooding area, the female calls to them from the ground to jump. No mean feat as the landing is pretty hard.
Dr Alan Kerrigan captured these amazing images below that I have to share with you.
Alternatively they fly ducklings to water on their back, often relentlessly pursued by ravens. Very sad but inevitable.
I often find duckling down on bushes under these trees, which I suspect was a raven's meal.

0 Comments

    Author

    Doug Sawkins is a friend of Foxes Lair 

    Categories

    All
    Animals Other
    Birds
    Disorders Plant Animal
    Fungi Lichens
    History
    Insects Bugs Other Arthropods
    Landscapes Soils
    Other Reserves And Places
    Reptiles
    Spiders Other Arachnids
    Tree
    Walks Other Facilities
    Wasp
    Wildflowers Orchids
    Wildflowers Other Summer Autumn
    Wildflowers Other Winter Spring
    Wildflowers Parasitic

    Archives

    February 2023
    January 2023
    December 2022
    October 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    January 2022
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    November 2019
    October 2019
    July 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    September 2018
    July 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    July 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    September 2014
    August 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    May 2012
    March 2012
    October 2011
    September 2011
    August 2011
    April 2011

© 2015 All Rights Reserved. Doug Sawkins, Australia.