Rain

I left the camera indoors for fear of rain, so naturally something strange happened.  As I  emptied the pool skimmer, a mockingbird, looking disheveled and possibly injured, landed beside me.  It drank from the puddle I had created, then slowly limped across the patio and huddled beside a chair for a while.  I didn't want to make it nervous so I didn't watch it all the time, and eventually it disappeared.  A red bellied woodpecker up in the hackberry feasted on the berries.  And the rain held off till nearly evening.

Small spiders have been in and around the pool, perhaps among the offspring of those mama spiders I rescued.  Big carpenter bees competed with the wasps on the mountain mint.  Honeybees were there too.  A black swallowtail even joined the nectar eaters.  The bird grasshopper was back on the hibiscus. 

The pair of Carolina wrens enjoyed the bark butter.  They were looking quite frumpy in their molt.  Between one shot and the next, the wren morphed into a brown thrasher.  Later a blue jay sampled the bark butter.