A pine warbler came for suet but settled for barkbutter balls. Starlings and crows had the same idea. The birds finished off the suet so I switched to barkbutter balls. Two bluebirds got in a fight over the dish. The barkbutter also attracted brown thrashers, blue jays and a Carolina wren.
A green heron flew downstream squawking. An egret stalked along the bulkhead and the green heron flew back upstream. A cormorant and a turtle shared a log.
I saw a couple of skinks. A female great blue skimmer used one of the perches. I also saw wasps and a ladybird beetle. Since I had taken advantage of the weaker wind to spray neem oil on the mountain mint and other plants that were infested with spider mites last year, the insects didn't hang around. I also sprayed the hibiscus sprouts to ward off sawflies.
The butterflies seemed to prefer treetops anyway. There were tiger swallowtails, a cabbage white, a much smaller pale butterfly, and a dark orange butterfly. A black swallowtail caterpillar munched on parsley
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