Hummingbird

The holiday weekend began today.  By 9am, the air was already hot and stuffy with humidity.  A mockingbird landed on the patio and flashed its wings repeatedly.  It was a youngster - freckled breast, no yellow eye - but flashing is not food begging.  I could not see what set it off and it did not seem fearful as it paused to eat something.  Maybe it was just practicing?  Finally it scared a cardinal off the feeder.  

Then a female hummer visited its feeder and actually fed.  That was a relief because I was beginning to think I needed to toss the whole batch of sugar water.  She looked disheveled and tired.  The pool was full of May beetles.  I stopped counting after I rescued a dozen.  I also very carefully rescued some wasps.  The spider was more of an eviction than a rescue but I am twitchy about swimming with them.  I fished a two-lined spittlebug out multiple times.  Sadly, I found ladybug elytra (the hard wing covers) floating.  A leafcutter bee fed on the mountain mint.  

K experimented and we learned that the crows like peanuts better than barkbutter balls.  Carolina wrens, however, want their barkbutter, so it all works out, except for the squirrels.   A mockingbird took exception to the crow on the roof and buzzed it repeatedly between visits to the cherry tree.  A squirrel also enjoyed the cherries.  There were fireflies after sunset and the air still felt like an oven.  

Scorcher

Bluebirds got away before I was ready but a Carolina wren, a blue jay, and a mockingbird were more cooperative.  The male cardinals continued their routine of stealing seeds and hot pursuit.  The afternoon temperature was in the upper 90s and, despite haze, the sun felt like a furnace.  I waited for shade before getting in the water.  A spider with a load of babies was willing to be rescued but a male was  suspicious.  I didn't see much else in the water.  After sunset I saw fireflies. 

 

Fritillary

Because a thunderstorm was predicted, I swam in the morning.  That meant there wasn't much in the way of wildlife needing rescue, just a firefly.   I emptied the rainwater in the blueberry bucket into the watering can.  That somehow disturbed a jumping spider.  It looked exactly like a species from the Western states but maybe brilliant jumping spider is right.   The blueberries were plentiful but a lot smaller than earlier in the season.  

The usual bees and wasps enjoyed the mountain mint and among them was a green bee I didn't even notice till I looked at the photos.  What I think was some kind of bee fly mimic landed on a chair.  Today's butterfly was a variegated fritillary that arrived as I was dripping dry.  I also saw a tiger swallowtail, a dark butterfly, and an orange butterfly, but none of them posed for me.  Also, there were dragonflies, perched and cruising.  A skink hiked along the step wall. 

While the sky clouded over in the afternoon, there was no storm.  Brown headed nuthatches got seeds despite the cardinals, house finches, and chickadees that think they own the feeder.  Carolina wrens were more interested in suet.  A bluebird and a blue jay found the barkbutter balls.  Something was eating cherries and making the branches bounce, but I never saw the critter. 

Oh, the noise!

The Argiope's web was twisted by the rain overnight.  A bluebird came early for the party mix in the dish feeders and a brown headed nuthatch came for seeds.  The nuthatch ran into a territorial finch but it persisted and eventually got breakfast.  Later a Carolina wren wanted suet.  Titmice also got seeds.  A goldfinch just wanted a drink. 

A monarch butterfly found the butterfly milkweed.  I got just a glimpse of a tiger swallowtail and maybe another butterfly, and of course duskywing skippers.  Dragonflies were plentiful.  A female great blue skimmer, a blue dasher, and a widow skimmer used perches.  Cruising overhead were a prince baskettail and a saddlebags.  Honeybees, bumblebees, carpenter bees, leafcutter bees and those megachili bees with the furry pantaloons converged on the mountain mint along with wasps. 

I fished a centipede out of the water but ants decided it was a corpse.  A horntail was luckier and revived.  It stuck its horn up in the air like a dragonfly obelisking but it certainly wasn't too warm, so maybe that was a way to get rid of water.  iNaturalist said it's an Asian horntail Eriotremex formosanus.  Several brown scarab beetles and a bumblebee also got a reprieve from a watery grave.  After swimming with the bugs, I picked blueberries.  A couple of small organisms flew across the yard too fast for identification.  My first guess was hummers, but they could have been large insects.  A bluebird hid in the dogwood.  

A little before 9pm, I went outside to see if there were any visible sparkles from all the booming and banging.  Only a flicker showed through the trees occasionally.  So I watched the fireflies and pretended they were the sparks.  The moon was past first quarter and overhead, but blurred by haze.  When I came inside, I noticed a longhorn beetle (I think) on the window by the camellia.  

Elusive butterflies

It was another scorcher so I swam in the morning.  Floating in the water were a queen ant,  a robber fly, a firefly, a woodlouse hunter spider, a largus bug, and many more ants, flies, little wasps, and mulch roaches.  I thought the spider was a goner but when I next checked it had disappeared.  I complained because there weren't any butterflies or dragonflies, but they appeared in the afternoon.  I think I captured a wasp killing another insect, but it might have been mating.  

A blue jay came for barkbutter balls and brown headed nuthatches for seeds.  The sakaki was nearly finished blooming.  A great crested flycatcher made a commotion chasing something through the oak leaves.  A skink wanted to get behind my chair and made a detour through the grass.  A female downy had a go at the suet.  A pair of geese with three half-grown goslings paddled upstream while a fish jumped in the background. 

A tiger swallowtail and a dark butterfly proved impossible to photograph.  Wasps and bees were more cooperative.  A very dark skipper visited the mountain mint.  I could see insects going to the asters but I couldn't tell what they were.  One might have been a Southern purple mint moth and another some kind of beetle.  Prince baskettail dragonflies patrolled the hazy sky.  A different dragonfly perched on a dead twig at the top of the wild cherry.  And a Needham's skimmer used one of the perches.  

Cicada

A blue dasher dragonfly perched outside my window.  Its wings were oddly dark but eyes and body markings were right.  Ground cherries were blooming.  Flower clusters appeared on the beautyberry bush.  The young garden spiders were doing well.  Wasps visited the mountain mint.  Blue jays preferred the barkbutter balls.  My swim was very late in the day.   

I was enjoying the evening, watching fireflies, when a cicada started singing.  

 

Scorcher

The wind was very strong.  I decided it was safest to swim early before the heat brought out bloodsuckers.  I rescued two bumblebees from the water, very carefully.  Queen ants fell in, drowned, and bloated so their abdominal segments were visible.  Sad but interesting.  I also fished out another oriental beetle.  

When I got out, an Eastern amberwing dragonfly was clinging to the mountain mint, but it didn't wait for me to get the camera.  I found another infant Argiope spider, this one on the aster.  The reddish slime mold looked shriveled.  A larger dragonfly with dark eyes used a garden stake.  It might have been a bar-winged skimmer but I didn't get a good look at the wings.  A skink headed across the patio toward me, then noticed me.  The thermometer registered 97° but the wind made it bearable.  

In the evening, I wasted pixels trying to capture a firefly.  I finally got a golden streak.  

Wet

Rain fell overnight.  A gray morning was followed by a shower after lunch, then sunshine.  Bluebirds, brown headed nuthatches, a Carolina wren, and a female downy visited in the morning.  A squirrel climbed up onto the feeder hanger and waved its tail around, which made me wonder if it was in heat and dispersing a "come hither" pheromone.  The wild cherries were turning from green to red.  

In the pool I saved a couple of brown May beetles (Phyllophaga) though I probably shouldn't.  Also I saved a small spider with racing stripes and saw another that appeared to be an ant mimic.  When I got out, I watched the prince baskettails cavort overhead.  The Argiope spiders survived the rain.  Fireflies blinked at dusk.  

Widow skimmer

Since an afternoon storm was predicted, I hustled myself into the water in the morning.  I saved a few beetles including a firefly.  The nuthatches swarmed the seed feeder while I was in the water.  A cardinal gave them some grief.  I finally got pictures of the widow skimmer I've sensed lurking at the corner of my vision.  The afternoon rain arrived as predicted and afterward the sky cleared.  

Warm

Rain fell overnight but the sky cleared and the air was warm and humid.  The small black panther had a staring match with a squirrel.  The squirrel left unharmed.   The cat appeared to have been damaged previously because there was a patch of missing hair below its right ear.  Anyway, it did not hang around.  After it left,  bluebirds arrived. 

Blue jays visited the barkbuter but escaped my camera.  Brown headed nuthatches ate seeds despite the house finch on the perch.  One nuthatch fed another but it wasn't clear whether the recipient was offspring or mate.  I'm inclined to think it was a fledgling.  

Gladiolus, daylies, and butterfly milkweed bloomed.  I went swimming and fished out a couple of spiders.  A mushroom popped up just below the retaining wall.  The moon was bright but hazy.  Fireflies eluded me.  

Fireflies

A goldfinch pair enlivened breakfast.  She didn't seem to be as fully committed to vegetarianism as he was.  That is, she was interested in what was in the dish - barkbutter balls and mealworms.  The brown headed nuthatches were committed to seeds.  I spent most of the day on the computer and it was dusk when I got outside.  But there were fireflies.  

Heat wave

Again we entertained goldfinches.  The Carolina wren was back.  The male bluebird with the bent feather stopped by for some seeds.  A blue dasher used one of the perches.  Two sunflowers reflected mid day sunshine.  K said the outdoor thermometer read 100°.  

I saw a squirrel do a back flip twice by the birdbath.  Then I realized there was another squirrel behind him.  I don't know if he was trying to impress her or if she bit him but he was definitely thinking about romance and nursing his right arm. 

The night was still quite warm when I sat outside.  It didn't feel humid but there was no breeze and eventually bugs found me.  Fireflies advertised their desire for a mate.  Something quite large and soundless flew overhead toward the creek.  I believe it was an owl. The full moon had not yet risen. 

Evening lights

The goldfinch pair came to breakfast.  There followed a day with too much running around.  I didn't get outside till twilight when I enjoyed the moon and the fireflies and the offshore breeze.  

Crows

The female downy was back for more seeds.  A male cardinal didn't want to share.  He was more tolerant of a male goldfinch, but not a male house finch.  The downy tried to sneak in underneath the feeder.  It didn't work.  When the house finch finally took over, he bullied the downy too.  Eventually the female goldfinch arrived.  The house finch ignored her but she wasn't as kind to her would-be mate.  

I have concluded that the second web was an abandoned effort, not the work of a second spider.  Maybe it caught so much debris the spider didn't feel it was worth mending.  The wind made the orchard spider bounce in its fresh web.  Then a gust ruined it.  Poor spider.  I don't know if it tried to mend the web or waited for the wind to drop.  

Aside from the wind, it was a lovely day.  A bluebird landed among the red flowers.  Then a murder of crows came to raid the barkbutter balls.  Because of their size, this was not easy.  Those balls must be really tasty because I'm sure they spent more energy than they got back in nourishment.  One rapped on the window as if it understood where they came from.  I wondered what would happen if I went out with a refill. 

Fireflies flashed and cicadas buzzed at twilight.  Something flew very fast over the house.  Cloud wisps and faint bars turned pink.  

 

Restocked barkbutter balls

We were gone all morning and I spent the afternoon catching up.  But during our round of errands we visited the bird store and restocked.  The orchard spider's web was bigger but I didn't see the spider.  Fireflies flashed at dusk.  

 

Fireflies at last

I missed recording yesterday.  The goldfinch pair came back. A punk male cardinal was down to two crest feathers.  The orchard spider tended its web.  A blue jay demanded barkbutter balls.  The weed I tried to identify got tall enough to block my view of the feeder perch.  A blue dasher hunted from the top of a bamboo stake. 

A little rain fell overnight and left every surface wet.  But by breakfast, the creek smoothly reflected the sunlit bulkhead.  The male pileated woodpecker came in search of suet.  Then a brown thrasher landed on the dish of barkbutter balls hanging by the downspout.  It was displaced by a mockingbird.  A blue jay followed.  They don't like that dish as well as the other because it swings more.  When evening came I saw fireflies for the first time this season.  

Humid

At breakfast, the windows were fogged which was strange because the temperature was the same inside and out.  I guess the air was so humid that it wet every surface.  As the outside temperature rose, the glass cleared.  The young cardinal photo-bombed a picture of a Carolina wren.  Wet-looking clouds passed over but no more rain fell.

In the afternoon, I covered myself in bug repellent which may have worked because all I encountered was a mosquito attracted to my face.   A blue dasher dragonfly watched from a high twig on the wild cherry and later a slaty skimmer used one of my perches.  Bees and wasps and one cabbage white bustled around the mountain mint.  A few honeybees came back.  A black swallowtail passed through without showing interest in parsley or rue, so I figure it was a male.  Ants crisscrossed the patio but one seemed to move oddly.  Sure enough it was a spider, a small woodlouse hunter. 

A couple of white breasted nuthatches took turns at the seed feeder, in between finches and cardinals.  Hummers visited the fresh juice.  The balding blue jay ventured to eat mealworms while I sat outside dripping.  Another watched longingly from the dogwood.  A female goldfinch checked the sunflower for any forgotten seeds. 

I saw several skinklets hustling across the patio.  Why do they think they need be over there and then a few minutes later over here instead?  I was surprised in the evening to see two fireflies blinking under the maple.  It seemed very late in the season for them. 

Siblings

Two fledgling bluebirds ate together at the feeder.  They were very photogenic.  I suppose that having spent their lives this far side by side, they are comfortable sharing.  A parent watched over them from the top of the pole.  A blue jay stayed up in the trees.  A skink slipped out of sight before I got focused. I rescued a firefly. 

The day was mostly overcast, though the sun's position was obvious through the cloud layer.  It was humid enough to bring out dragonfly prey.   An unfamiliar dragonfly landed on the rim of the birdbath. It caught, fought, and finally released a small fly.  After checking with iNaturalist, I learned it was a two-striped forceptail Aphylla williamsoni.    Later the twelve-spotted skimmers, Libellula pulchella, patrolled the twilight air. 

Skinks

At lunch time, there were skinks.  I waited till late in the day to swim, but it was still buggy.  But I was able to rescue a pigeon horntail.  It must have just fallen in because it was still buzzing.  I couldn't get it to grab anything so I lifted it out with my hand, with some trepidation as a horntail looks like a yellow and black banded syringe.  It did not wait around for a photo session.  Fireflies lit up the evening. 

Mydas fly

The goldfinches couldn't wait for the sunflower seeds to ripen.  Two osprey soared in circles.  A female hummer came for an evening meal.  She was antsy and wouldn't settle on a perch.  A downy woodpecker decided I was harmless. 

I saw more butterflies today - skippers, snouts, and a red admiral.  Lots of wasps and bees gathered on the mountain mint, also a wasp-mimic mydas fly.  I rescued a robber fly along with several beetles. 

A damselfly with orange eyes lurked beside the water.  Orange bluet, Enallagma signatum, seems the best fit for identification.  In the evening, I glimpsed dragonflies, but they were high and moving fast.  The smoke haze didn't help. 

The orchard spider still had its web slung from the dragonfly perch.  It had caught a fly, I think.  I tried to catch a firefly with its light on, but all I got were blurs.