I was walking in my local forest, on the Fermanagh-Donegal border, when I found what must have been a fungus. It resembled waning wax candles.
Emer O Shea
Ballyshannon, Co Donegal
It is one of the group of fungi called elfin saddle, and probably the white saddle mushroom, 'Helvella crispa'.
A sparrowhawk took a pigeon midflight and fed on it for 10 minutes in the driveway of my neighbour's house.
Rosaleen Fleming
Kimmage, Dublin
Early in the summer when birds were fledging we heard a commotion between the birds in the car park of Castlewarden Golf Club. A number of adult jackdaws were attacking a very small one, which they killed and ate, leaving no traces. We found it very shocking. Can you explain?
Sheilah Kehoe
Terenure, Dublin
There have been no reports of jackdaw cannibalism. I can only suggest that perhaps the jackdaws had chased a predator that had attacked the fledgling, and killed it, to remove it and prevent the predator returning.
Reports of sightings, with photographs, of convolvulus hawkmoths from Gordon Birch in Dún Laoghaire, Co Dublin, Brendan Sheridan in Greystones, Co Wicklow, and Jane Harvey in Abbeyleix, Co Laois, in September, and in early October from Elaine Parsons in Brittas Bay, in Co Wicklow. The convolvulus hawkmoth is a recent summer visitor from southern Europe, borne northwards on favourable southern winds.
Ethna Viney welcomes observations and photographs at Thallabawn, Louisburgh, Co Mayo, F28 F978, or by email at viney@anu.ie