Blogtober Thirty One

The Haunted Garden, a ghostly tale of a bewitching annual ritual.

The setting for this orrery story is the eerie twilight of June 21st 2026, the Summer Solstice, rather than the eldritch dark of an All Hallows Eve. The ghostly goings-on portrayed below were filmed in the hour before midnight so, yes, I had to stay up especially late 🥱.

Inexplicably, this snippet didn't make it into the blog back in the Summer but it is, to date, the most ethereal thing that has happen around here this year.

Sadly, the accompanying sound hasn't transferred well from phone to computer, as it features a mournful Curlew call and a slightly more chipper Blackbird song (also, thankfully, none of my yawns).

These are male Ghost Moths, lekking to attract and impress a female. At dusk, in June, they appear from the grassy sward and perform this swaying flight. Whilst the males are a ghostly white, the females are a pale orange and yellow. Their caterpillars feed on the roots of Docks, for which they have my undying gratitude.