Record heat

Yesterday was very hot.  It broke the record by 4°.  We spent most of the day on a trip to Yorktown where I was giving a presentation.  On the way I saw a half dozen pelicans in the water near Willoughby Spit.  Coming home, I saw a couple of gulls.  The bridge-tunnel work may have discouraged birds or perhaps it was the heat wave.  This morning was cloudy and gusty.  Dry leaves blew across the yard.  It was in the 70s and humid.  All I saw was a squirrel making off with a nut.  

 

A summer day

By mid day the temperature reached 80°.  A squirrel splooted on the cool concrete in the shade.  The poor thing was limping and looked very chewed up.  K poured water in the birdbath and I left a few peanuts nearby.  But I don't know if the squirrel returned.  

A dozen gulls played with the Southwest wind high in the air under a blue sky.  A small red spotted purple landed in the sakaki.  I also saw a cabbage white.  The oak had patches of leaves that had caramelized.

A mockingbird found the beautyberries.  I heard other birds and saw some zip across the yard too fast to identify.  A wasp and a bee were busy.  Tiny spiders webbed twigs.  The Berkley's polypore appeared smaller and kind of moldy.  

Windy

The wind dried off the rain residue and eventually cleared the clouds away by late afternoon.  However it seemed to have grounded the birds and insects.  At lease, I saw nothing except some distant soaring birds.  

Wet

Rain fell in the night and didn't try out very quickly during the day.  A downy came very early for seeds.  She continued to ignore the suet.  Chickadees streamed to the seed feeder.  At least three birds flew out of the dogwood but I could not tell what they were.  A photo revealed that one was a titmouse.  A great blue heron perched on a post, then flew down to stalk along the shoreline.  The sun shone briefly in late afternoon but then the weather turned to drizzle.  

 

Gray

Wind and rain were predicted from the remnants of Hurricane Isaias, but the day was just overcast.  The wildlife must have gotten the forecast because I saw little sign of anything but a wasp and some chickadees.  Sassafras leaves turned orange.  The saltbush bloomed.  I assisted some milkweed seeds to disperse.  A cricket's corpse was caught in an abandoned spiderweb.  

In the front yard, a magic leaf fluttered from an invisible spider thread.  Purslane and lantana still bloomed and buds on a goldenrod stalk began to yellow.  A pepper ripened.  So did magnolia seed pods.   

White sky

Despite the overcast there were sharp shadows.  A female rose breasted grosbeak was busy in one of the dogwoods but I didn't see any activity in the beautyberry bush.  Still, that's a "life bird" for me!  A thirsty squirrel dived into the watering can and retreated in good order so I didn't have to rescue it.  The camellia had two flowers.  

2 too big spiders

A Carolina wren visited at breakfast.  After stuffing its crop with seeds, it perched on a chair back to peer in at me.  A string of ten geese paddled upstream.  Today was considerably warmer and I would have gone swimming if the pool had not been covered.  I went outside hoping to see birds eating beautyberries but instead I was surprised by a skink that dashed across the pool cover and then hid under it.  I could hear birds but they were shy about coming into view.  Asiatic dayflowers were still blooming.  The Christmas fern made spores.  

I wandered over to the fig patch and discovered two large webs.  The owner of the lower one scuttled into hiding, sort of, as a ball on the underside of the gutter.  The one in the middle of the higher web ignored me.  I believe they were some kind of Araneus orb weavers.  They were in a good location to catch mosquitoes, I discovered.  After I circled back I saw what I thought was a young eagle.