The forecast said that today was to be the one nice day this week - not raining, and not cold (the current definition of cold being temperatures in the 50s. Because it's almost May). It is too soon to tell if the rest of the week will be as grim as foretold, but they were spot on about today. It was nice.
This is currently my favorite tree:
Flowering crab apple. The first one that really looks like spring is a real thing.
Today was pretty buggy - not the buggiest day, but respectably buggy for late April, even if it took me forever to actually find a Backyard Bug of the Day.
Backyard Bug of the Day:
A beetle. I am too lazy to look it up right now, and actually I'm running kind of late on blogging tonight, so let's just leave it at that. I should know what this is, but I don't remember.
I got a little closer to getting a good bumblebee picture today:
The creeping myrtle is in full bloom in the rock garden, so there were quite a few bumblebees and some other bees. Most of them moved too fast for me to get pictures of them, though.
Ants were kind of the big story in the backyard today:
There were random ants on trees...
And on rocks...
And I found a huge ant colony at the top of the driveway, with many entrances and busy workers coming and going from all of them.
You can see that some of them have chunks of dirt in their mandibles as they clear out their tunnels.
Then elsewhere in the yard I spotted this.
One of the things you learn about ants when you're in elementary school is that they are really strong, and can carry things bigger and heavier than they are. Well, I spotted this ant carrying something about its size, and was surprised on closer look to realize it was a spider!
Here's the above picture zoomed in. (I hope this isn't a problem for the arachnophobes. The spider is dead, if that is any consolation. But I wanted to put this in the main part of the blog, not at the bottom in Arachnid Appreciation, because, well, the spider is dead).
It dragged the spider quite a ways, over rocks and other obstacles.
I don't know if it killed the spider, which would be pretty impressive, or if it found the spider already dead. Either way, it was cool to watch.
I emptied the rain gauge of the 1.75 inches of rain and as I was putting it back in the stand, I spotted this:
Ladybug. It appears to me that the ladybug has clamped its body down onto the surface of the rain gauge to keep from being washed away by the flow of water as I dumped it. It started to crawl upward just after this, and then lost its footing and fell to the bottom of the rain gauge. I tilted it so it ended back up at the top. Getting out of the rain gauge would be a wise thing for the ladybug.
And speaking of the wisdom (or lack thereof) of ladybugs, I had a ladybug encounter inside - I found a ladybug in the bathroom sink when I went to wash my hands. I nudged it off to the side so it would not get swept away by the water, and the dumb thing started walking right toward it when I turned the sink on. So I nudged it away again, but the little critter was persistent, and in spite of my efforts, it managed to get swept away at the last second as I was turning the water off. I felt bad about it, until I saw the ladybug crawl out of the drain.
Random bug:
I didn't get a close look. I think it's a weevil, perhaps.
Arachnid Appreciation:
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Mite.
The rain gauge continues to be a popular hangout for spiders.
Same spider as above.
As on most sunny, warm days lately, the house was covered with jumping spiders. You'd really have to see it to understand this, but sometimes it kind of looks like they are sentries guarding the house.
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