This summer has been the hottest for a long time, started back in June with 5C above normal, preceded by a very dry winter. I think this has contributed to fewer insects - although there were plenty of bees, butterflies and moths around my sweet-scented buddleia (note to self: take cuttings in autumn for more plants next year).
We had a fairly short spell earlier in the summer with quite a few wasps landing in our pool at home, due to a nest being made in a nearby "fallen over" pot. Nest got sprayed with Bio Kill, no more swimming with wasps. Other than that, and 2 rather persistent hornets last night when we were eating some delicious barbecued Greek lamb chops, very few insects this year.
Near where we barbecue, we have a large, double-cropping fig tree and we watch "our" resident hedgehog trudge across the top bank towards the tree and disappear in its shadow every night about 9pm, followed shortly by scuffling and snorting as he gobbles up the fallen figs!
We still have 2 kestrels who regularly perch on an electricity pole just below our house, looking for their next meal, plus up to 3 Bonelli's eagles have our valley as part of their territory - I can often hear their very plaintive cries long before I see them. We also have a large pale owl who flies across so silently that if he's not in our line of sight, we don't know he's there.
There's a pair (or more) of Chukka partridge in the valley now - when we first moved in, there were loads, bred and released by the game wardens. Then hunting season opened. The game wardens no longer breed & release into this valley. A few years ago, we managed to get pretty much the whole valley made into a conservation area, so hopefully the wildlife will gradually move back in, especially as the scrub is recovering from the 2013 fire that swept through most of the valley (it started in the field where a farmer was trying to burn his cuttings
).
Last year we had 2 black snakes mating beside our solar panels - it was lovely to watch their swaying entwined dance - and even lovelier to know they eat the young blunt nosed viper, as BNVs are highly venomous and a neighbour was bitten a couple of years ago by one (3 days in intensive care), our cat Ginge has been bitten twice (he should have learnt by now not to play with BNVs) and Andreas lost a goat to a BNV bite last year.
The wildlife is amazing - slow moving chameleons in the bushes, damsel or dragonflies (can't remember the difference!) dancing beside the pool, preying mantis, huge black hairy European tarantulas (not my favourite), small bright green spiders hiding on leaves, butterflies (little blue ones, large yellow ones and all sorts in between), geckos, skinks and lizards by the dozen (sometimes temporarily tail-less courtesy of Ginge!). I'm sure the farming methods help with diversity - small fields with banks separating one from t'other or small terraced fields each with wildflowers & scrub around the edges, rather than the vast expanses of single crop you see in USA.
Unfortunately, not so many swallows this year as previously - maybe caught by poachers en route between summer and winter quarters, maybe insufficient roosting spots as more people renovate their properties - and maybe simply less food as there have definitely been fewer flies/mosquitoes about this year.