Evening storm

At breakfast, the male hummer slipped in for a drink.   I saw an eagle later, but it was gone too fast to react.

Wasps transferred their interest from the rue to the mint.  . A couple of buckeye butterflies joined them.

I discovered that the web by the pool steps belonged to a spider that looked to be a black widow.  It had red on its black abdomen.   A mama spider occupied the top step of the ladder.  K found another on the wall of the house.  It was in the clutches of a cobweb spider and appeared dead.  But the spiderlings still clung to it.

An egret waited by the dam outfall.  A night heron landed in the trees beside the dock where it was only a dark shape obscured by leaves.  Toward dusk, a great blue heron stalked across the dam spillway. 

Dragonflies were all around.  The 12-spotted skimmer made occasional passes overhead.  While I was in the pool, a blue dasher darted around over the water.  Late in the afternoon, two spot-winged gliders dangled from the lavender.  I also saw a female widow skimmer. 

We'd had fair weather cumulus clouds sailing ENE all day, but the clouds that boiled out of the West looked different.  Soon I could see dim flashes as the light from lightning bounced off the cloud cover.  Eventually a wave of rain passed through as darkness fell.