Hmph

My overall assessment of the bugs in the backyard today is that they were bratty and uncooperative. I understand not wanting your picture taken - I hate it myself, but don't pretend you are going to let me take your picture and then fly away just before I press the shutter button. That's just obnoxious.

As you may have guessed, I didn't quite get the pictures I wanted of today's Backyard Bug of the Day, but I did get a couple of decent ones, so...

Backyard Bug of the Day:

The Backyard Bud of the Day was a little more compliant:

 I used to know what this was. When we bought the land for our house we had to wait a couple of years to build, and at that point I got a wildflower book and identified almost every wildflower I found on the property. Then I promptly forgot almost all of the names. But I do know that soon this will be a cluster of tiny, white flowers like a miniature bouquet.

And I did find this sawfly larva behaving in an interesting manner...
Click Here to see a Sawfly Larva Rockin' Out

The soundtrack on the video is provided by the birds in the backyard and the garbage truck. Anyway, I have no idea why the sawfly larva was doing that. Oh, and the video gives you a little sample of why the wind is a total pain in the neck when you're trying to take pictures of bugs.

I did manage to get a picture of one other bug.

I assume this is a ladybug, but I don't know if it really is a ladybug, or is one of those bugs that look like a ladybug but aren't.

Every other bug I saw (except the spider I will show you at the end) declined to be photographed, thank you very much.

No, wait, there's one more! Not a good picture, but an action shot, so good in its own way! (I know, I should just stop saying the pictures aren't good. Although some of them aren't. But when I say that, the translation is that it did not come out the way I wanted).

Fly! (It looks more like it's coming in for a landing, but trust me, it's flying away. The brat).

Well, there's always plants...

 It's almost the end of the line for the first crabapple (should that be crab apple? I should look that up).

Petals all over.

But the second one is looking pretty good. Nowhere near as many flowers as the first one, though.

And the dogwood is in full bloom.

There was some plant weirdness...

 No idea... It's on an oak tree...

 This one isn't weird so much as... I don't know what. It just seems improbable that this tiny little flower from some other tree that went wafting on the breeze could stick itself in a tiny hole in the side of a cedar tree.

 I am assuming this is some kind of plant disease, but I don't know.

Okay, this isn't weird. I just took a picture of it because I liked the way it looked. So maybe it's me that's weird.

For the record, the birds were just as uncooperative as the bugs (but they are almost always uncooperative):

But there was ONE backyard denizen who was cooperative today!

Squirrels almost never cooperate, so this was a coup!

Okay, last of all, a spider. Not exactly an Arachnid Appreciation picture, but more of a commentary. I have a tendency to anthropomorphize the things I see in nature (well, anywhere, really), so in my mind I think I know what this spider is thinking...
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"Well that's just great! Now EVERYONE is going to be able to see my web! How am I supposed to catch any unsuspecting bugs with all that junk in my web!" [Dramatic spider sigh...]

Or, maybe I am just projecting...