Nature's Perspective

 The weather has changed rather drastically from a couple of days ago; today was about 20ºF cooler and completely overcast. It did not have much of an effect on my ability to find bugs, though. There still were not very many.

 I found a small, avian tragedy today. Under a tree I saw a lot of feathers scattered, which I recognized as a mourning dove. And then I saw an egg:

 This one was unbroken, but...

 ... nearby was another one. I think that something must have attacked the nest, not to get at the eggs, but to get at the bird sitting on the eggs. The eggs were collateral damage. And yet, that tragedy for the bird family is a bonanza for a colony of ants. Nature seems cruel from a human perspective, but not always for the other creatures around us.

Backyard Bug of the Day:

Just kidding. I got a better picture than that.

Okay, better than that.

I think this is a species of tachinid fly, from the genus Trichopoda.

Another species of the same genus. Much smaller.

Other Bugs:

Juvenile praying mantis

Tree hopper

Thick-headed flies. There were about half a dozen of them on a small patch of goldenrod. I have never seen so many of them in one area before. A patch of goldenrod is a good place to hang out if you are a thick-headed fly, because the adults feed on pollen, but also these are parasitic on bees, laying their eggs on them. Since bees feed on goldenrod, too, it's a win-win situation for the thick-headed flies to be there. Except that there were no bees there, only thick-headed flies.

When the moth laid her eggs on this milkweed plant it took her a couple of days. It then took a couple of days for them all to hatch. So it makes sense that the caterpillars are not all in the same instar.

Tiny wasp, probably less than a half inch long.

Leaf hopper

Dragonfly