Lovely day

Today was very pleasant, more like June than June was.  The sky was hazy and plenty of clouds kept the temperature from rising past 90.  The air was not sticky and the breeze felt cooling.  The morning sun caught the orb of the Argiope's web, not just the hackled threads in the center.  A squirrel sunbathed on a oak branch.  A red headed skink crossed the patio. 

On my way to the water I saw a feather-legged scoliid wasp but it was gone when I came back.  Lots of honeybees and many other bees and wasps were busy in the mountain mint.  I thought I saw a silver spotted skipper in addition to the duskywings.  While I was swimming, a tiger swallowtail spent considerable time in the wild cherry, but disappeared before I got to the camera. The tiger swallowtail returned in the afternoon and I got lucky.  A red spotted purple butterfly flitted around the cherry in the afternoon. 

Mid day, a dragonfly perched on a dead twig at the top of the cherry.  A widow skimmer settled onto the short perch near where I was sitting.  A bigger dragonfly that I couldn't identify got into a fight with the widow skimmer, I've no idea why.  They disappeared over the roof but she soon returned.  A prince baskettail was on patrol overhead.  A dark dragonfly took over the dead cherry trig, maybe a slaty skimmer?  It was evicted by a house finch.

A Carolina wren was very serious about pecking apart a barkbutter ball.  It seemed displeased and moved to the seed feeder.  A house finch fledgling up in the oak demanded food, keeping both parents busy.  Brown headed nuthatches streamed in to the seed feeder.  Bluebirds were wary of my presence outdoors.  I heard blue jays all day but only caught one in the oak.  Late in the day, a downy supped on suet.  

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.  

And Rain Again

I saw a titmouse and a wren before rushing off.  When I got home, a bluebird was waiting.  So was the spider in the window.  Speaking of windows, a stink bug tried to get through the glass, I can't imagine why.  Bees and wasps dined on mountain mint.  A tiny spider photobombed my picture of a great golden digger wasp.  It might have been a young woodlouse hunter.  Dragonflies patrolled the air.  A Carolina wren caught something that looked like a spider or maybe a cricket. 

A very dark, heavy cloud menaced the sky when I finally got to swim. However, it blew away to the Southeast without wetting anything.  An hour later, after supper, we got about twenty minutes of rain.   Afterward, a pair of goldfinches showed up for seeds.  

Rain

Another hibiscus flower opened.  A male goldfinch came for seeds but he was very anxious and twitchy.  I hustled outside early because of the rain prediction.  That proved fortunate for a bumblebee and a mama wolf spider.  A green planthopper, maybe Acanalonia conica, occupied a twig I use for fishing spiders out of the pool skimmer.  Afterward, I spent some time drip-drying and watching the show on the mountain mint.  Clouds blew our of the South, passing in front of the sun so I didn't have to keep to the shade.  

I saw honeybees, black Megachile bees, scoliid wasps, threadwaisted wasps, potter wasps, and the big wasp I thought was a horse guard but am informed is a Feather-legged Scoliid Wasp Dielis plumipes.  A hummer rushed through the yard, taking a sniff at various plants but ignoring the feeder.  A brown headed nuthatch decided I was harmless.  I could only find one of the two Argiope spiders in the mountain mint.  A widow skimmer was back on the short perch by the yellow rose.  The rain began after lunch and fell gently all afternoon.  At first, a Carolina wren ignored the rain and ate suet.  The window got wet and I quit watching.  

Hibiscus flower

The first flower opened on the hibiscus on the first day of July.  A brown headed nuthatch got up early.  Bluebirds came along later.  While I was swimming, a Carolina wren got very close.  After I got out, it visited the feeder despite my proximity. 

I chased the furry-legged bee across the mountain mint.  Wasps and skippers mingled on the flowers.  The Argiope that relocated along the railing seemed bigger.  The web in the aster appeared untouched so I think something must have happened to that spider.  Skippers dueled in the air whenever they encroached on one another.  A widow skimmer was hard to see behind a garden stake.  A blue dasher perched at the top of another and obelisked in the heat.  

Butterflies

The male goldfinch was back this morning.  I glimpsed a towhee for just a second.  A Carolina wren argued with a downy woodpecker but in the end they both got some suet.  A great blue heron preened on a dock post in the afternoon sun.  I didn't see any nuthatches or bluebirds till late in the day. 

The party on the mountain mint expanded to include a fiery skipper and a buckeye butterfly.  A blue dasher chaperoned.  The bee with the pantaloons was back.  A big carpenter bee showed up.  So did the first great golden digger wasp of the season.  Cicadas sang in the trees though I didn't see any.  I rescued a robber fly from drowning. 

A black swallowtail was more interested in the rue.  A Guinea paper wasp agreed, but for different reasons.   A bud on the hibiscus looked ready to open.  Unfortunately, the sawflies got way ahead of me and chewed up all the leaves and damaged many flower buds.  What I think was a tiger bee fly, Xenox tigrinus, landed on the retaining wall.  

Arthropod day

Two female pileated woodpeckers started the morning.  It appeared that the one eating suet was feeding the other, but behind the post so I couldn't be sure.  Later the nuthatches slipped between the cardinals and house finches to get seeds.  Chickadees and titmice also visited the feeders and a titmouse asserted its status.  A female bluebird noticed that I had put out fresh barkbutter balls.  A juvenile bluebird visited the seed feeder.  A crow found the mealworms that the bluebirds tossed out.  A blue jay also got into the mealworms. 

The largest Argiope spider refurbished its web in the window.  All three of the smaller ones seemed to be doing well, though the web in the aster was still fingerprint shaped, not a straight stripe like the other three made.  A dragonfly hunted from one of the perches.  It might have been a bar-winged skimmer.  Later a prince baskettail flew loops over the pool.  Pool rescues included a centipede, a mama wolf spider and babies, and a bumblebee.  I don't know if the centipede revived of became someone's lunch, but it disappeared.  When I got out of the pool, a robber fly landed on my arm.  I persuaded it to move to my left hand but that was still too close for the camera.  After a moment it flew off and I have no idea what my attraction was.  

Two duskywing skippers fed with the wasps and bees on the mountain mint.  There was at least one honeybee.  I think one bee might be a two-spotted longhorn bee.  It certainly had hairy hind legs.  A large wasp with a striped abdomen That I think was a horse guard wasp Stictia carolina also fed on the mountain mint.  While I'm delighted that they attack biting flies, it is concerning that one expects to find prey here. 

This year, the gladiolus flowering has been more sporadic than I remember from other years.  A few fresh flowers opened on the butterfly milkweed but there was still no sign of caterpillars.  I just noticed that the blueberries ripened before the wild cherries.  The temperature peaked at 93° then yo-yoed with the clouds and sun.  Twice, raindrops spattered me when I went outside but didn't wet anything for more than a minute.