First Butterfly, Figs and Foxes

I spent yesterday cleaning the house and working in the garden, among other things. I saw my first butterfly of the year, a cabbage white (above). It seemed to want to land on light-colored leaves or flowers, like the Turkish sage leaves above, which are covered with whitish fuzz. I suppose the butterfly is trying to blend in. Nesting birds are probably hungry!

I mowed the lawn, and afterwards Dave and I sat on the garden bench. "We'd be crazy to ever move from here," Dave said, and I agreed, taking in our little urban oasis. I happened to look up and notice...

...that our fig tree has figs on it! This is also a first for us. I didn't expect to see them this early in the spring and I'm a little confused about the timetable, but hey, I'll take it. They're all out at the very ends of the branches, and I don't know if that's because they grow that way or the squirrels have already nibbled them off branches closer to the center of the tree. I'm not sure we'll ever get to taste them ourselves, our wildlife being ravenous, but it's still exciting.

Remember when I found that fig tree ten years ago, discarded in a pot down on the high street, its roots having been cut off? It wilted and looked terrible and I potted it up and hoped for the best, and now it's in the ground and about 20 feet tall. And bearing figs!

I went up to Waitrose at lunchtime to buy some soup, and as usual I checked out their plants. These sad-looking foxgloves were on sale, and since we don't have any foxgloves this year I took the plunge and bought them. I think the two on the right will be fine, but the one on the left is iffy.

On the way home, I happened to pass my neighbor down the street, a 79-year-old guy who's quite talkative. I walked back with him, and he told me about his achy bones and his physical therapy. "I hope you didn't pay for those," he said, pointing at my plants. I assured him I'd gotten a deal, but I think he still thought I'd been had.

I planted them all, so we'll see how they do.

I downloaded the garden cam, and produced this rather spacious and meandering video, which I think has answered the question of how many foxes we have.
-- We begin with the fox I'm calling Arrow, because it has an arrowhead- or dagger-shaped tail. It seems young. It finds something to eat among the bluebells, who knows what.
-- We then see, in quick succession, two more foxes, one with a long, crooked tail and one with a white-tipped tail. I'm pretty sure these are the three vulpine denizens of our garden. (Check out the screen cap of their tails below for comparison, and I think you'll see what I mean.) I'm not sure if these are still Q-Tip and/or Guy Fox, the animals I was seeing last year. I suppose I could go back and compare with earlier videos but I haven't done that yet.
-- At 0:50, you hear the construction crew next door as they disassemble the huge scaffold that's been covering our neighbor's house.
-- At 1:10, a bird (robin?) is once again trying to perch on the camera.
-- At 1:22, we have a nice sunny, peaceful view with some wind. I thought it captured the spirit of our garden well.
-- At 1:42, a squirrel nibbles something and seems curious about the camera (but doesn't quite get there).
-- At 2:02, you get a good view of the crooked-tailed fox. There's a lot of back-and-forth exploring.
-- At 2:52, a little robin perches on a rose and then flies into the shrubbery.
-- At 3:12, I put down some chicken skin from dinner, which the foxes promptly eat.
-- Pale Cat appears at 5:17, a day before I saw him sitting on that gatepost a couple of streets away.
-- Crooked Tail prowls around again, followed at 6:08 by another nibbling squirrel. I wonder what it's eating?
-- At 6:24, Arrow is back, followed at 6:48 by Crooked Tail, whose name I have established in the process of writing this post. (Remember these visits are actually hours apart.)
-- At 7:03, we see Crooked Tail apparently unconcerned as a helicopter flies overhead, probably either the police or an air ambulance. Ah, urban life!

Fox tail identifier: L to R, Arrow, white-tipped tail, Crooked Tail

I'm not setting up the garden cam this week because we'll be out there a lot and I don't want a ton of footage of us!