New Shoelaces

 I had to replace the shoelace on one of my hiking shoes today, and I sat out on the back porch steps to do it. While I sat there, a butterfly fluttered by right in front of me. I had to move my other shoe to keep a jumping spider from jumping into it. And then a tiny mayfly landed on the shoelace I was in the process of lacing. There were lots of other bugs flying around, visiting the wildflowers growing in my lawn, just zooming by. I cynically thought that this was probably going to be the extent of what I saw, that I wouldn't find any bugs on my walk, but then... it took me about half an hour to walk around the field. Normally that takes about 5 minutes. 

There was a lot to see, but it wasn't just bugs:

There was a deer...

... and there were lots of chipmunks...

And lots of birds, though most of them I only heard:

My bird song identifying app said there was an indigo bunting in that tree. More on that later...

And there were flowers. This is blue-eyed grass, one of my favorites. This is the kind of thing you get in your yard if you're not mowing your lawn, which is incentive enough for me.

But mostly, there were bugs. I hadn't even walked all the way around the field when I found my Backyard Bug of the Day:

I don't know what kind of bug this is. Hemiptera is the order. Okay, fine, I'll go get my bug book... Cosmopepla lintneriana. It's a stinkbug. More exciting, it's a new species for me and my backyard. New species are rare for me now, so it is always a thrill to find one.

There were other bugs in the field, too:

The blue-eyed grass was popular with bees.

This bee...

... was chased away by this bee.

This would have been Backyard Bug of the Day, (or co-bug of the day, anyway, because a new species always gets chosen), but it was too uncooperative for me to want to reward it:

Honeysuckle borer

There is a wild cherry tree in the field that is in full bloom, and full of bugs, too:

Mostly beetles

I found a carpenter bee digging into one of the bird houses in the field:

This is a female bee. The females dig the nest; the males just provide security.

 Then... into the woods:

Beetle

Longhorn beetle

Assassin bug

Crane fly

Moth fly

Assassin bug

It seemed to be eyeing this spittle-bug hideout (I don't know what these blobs of bubbles are called), and I wonder if it knows there's a bug in there...

I found a pair of Six-spotted tiger beetles propagating their species:

She seemed to get tired of giving him a piggy back ride.

Stilt bug

Sweat bee on daisy fleabane

 

Crane fly

I went off the trail today, and came upon a hollow, dead tree with a massive swarm of insects inside:

At first I thought they were bees, but...

I think they are termites.

I didn't want to get close to them, there were so many, and I wasn't sure what they were, or what they would do if I tried to lean in for a photo.

Spittle bug!

Moth inside a dandelion. Unfortunately, I had my zoom lens instead of my macro lens when I saw this.

There's still water in the small pond after all of the rain from last week:

I could see tiny things (probably copepods) swimming in the water, but I couldn't photograph them. This frog is resting comfortably on the leaves and other vegetation floating in the pond.

Meanwhile, in the big pond...

There's a lot of turmoil under the surface. I am assuming it's the tadpoles, but I can't see what's going on underneath, I only see the ripples. The pond is always calm as I approach, and when I get there, particularly if I make noise, the pond surface erupts into ripples. It's fascinating.

Of course, some of the ripples are caused by frogs leaping into the water when I arrive. And then sometimes they pop back up again.

There's a spot by the stream–well, when there's a lot of rain this is IN the stream–where there is a hole that leads who-knows-where (the frogs know), and there are often frogs near this hole. If I get too close, the frogs disappear into the hole:

Even with all that rain last week, the water level in the stream is going down.

Okay, about the indigo bunting...

I've been using the bird song app for a couple of weeks, and it's been really interesting, mostly because it is identifying birds I have never seen before, and I am suddenly aware of how many birds are really in my backyard. Waaaaaay more than I have ever seen. And it makes sense, because most of the time when I am in the field, or in the woods, I hear a lot of birds, but I hardly see any, especially when there are leaves on the trees. And to be quite frank, they mostly sound the same to me. There are only a couple of birds I can identify by sound. Still, I was skeptical about the indigo bunting identification, because I thought if there were indigo buntings in my backyard I would have seen them. It's not like all those warblers that all look the same, or all the sparrows, or even the wrens. But the app keeps saying there are indigo warblers, and mostly in a specific tree. Also, there are several of them, because they are calling back and forth to each other. So, on my way back around the field at the end of my walk, I listened, and looked at where I was hearing the sound, and saw this:

This tree is not in my backyard, it's on the other side of the wall, and probably soon going to be cut down for the house that is going to be built there (not that I mind all that much in this case; this tree is an invasive species). And that is the indigo bunting in the tree. Can't see it?

So, I was able to see that there are indigo buntings here, but I still couldn't find the one in the oak tree where I keep hearing it...

I gave up and went inside. But later, I decided to go out with my binoculars, which are much better for spotting birds than my camera with the macro lens on it. Once again I found the bird in the above tree, and through the binoculars I could see it really well, and was struck by its gorgeous blue color. I decided to go back in the house and get my camera again, but with my zoom lens on it, instead of the macro lens...

Okay, but a) it flew away when I tried to get closer, and b) I forgot to put the extender on my lens. And c), drat, out of focus.

So I went back to the house. I put the extender on my lens, and also got my telephoto lens. Or what I refer to as "the big lens."

This time I was determined to find the bird in my own tree. It was extremely difficult, and took a lot of patience, which is not one of my gifts. The tree is fully leafed out. BUT! There is this one branch with no leaves, and finally, the indigo bunting flew to this branch!

Now, I don't know if it's singing to claim territory, or to attract a mate, which are reasons birds sing in the spring, but this bird spent a LOT of time sitting in this tree singing. Every once in a while it would fly to a new spot in the tree, but it stayed a long time, which was great for me, in this situation.

Not as great is that it was in a shadow, behind a branch (as birds tend to be), and it was that time of day when you really can't see the colors of birds very well. Also, this is a tall tree, so even though I could get closer to it, the bird was way up there, so not close.

I switched to the zoom lens, which doesn't let in a lot of light...

The bird flew to a new spot, so I moved to see it, and tried to get closer...

Now, you're probably thinking that this must be Backyard Bird of the Day, but... it's not. Because while most of this tree is in my backyard, some of the branches extent over the wall, and so this bird is technically not in my backyard. I am pretty lax about some of my rules, but not this one.

Another bird flew into the tree, and I don't know if this is a female indigo bunting, or something else. The females are not blue, they are brown. But this bird looks quite a bit bigger than that indigo bunting... But then, it's hard to tell up a tree.

Also, very uncooperative.

Now you're just being fresh.

So, now at least I know I have indigo buntings in my backyard, and that's pretty cool.

Arachnid Appreciation:

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

There are spider webs full of pollen aaaaaaall over the woods:

I always imagine that the spiders are frustrated and annoyed about the pollen on their webs. If so, there are a LOT of frustrated and annoyed spiders in my woods.

This spider's web isn't full of pollen, it must be fairly new. Notice the exuvia from when she shed her skin.

Romance in the web. The female is the larger spider above.

This spider was funny, but annoying. It kept zipping from the top of the leave to the bottom and back again. It was hard to get this picture. I have no idea why it finally stopped for a minute for me to get some shots. It moved incredibly fast. There was a time in my life when that would have absolutely freaked me out. Now I just think it's amusing.

There's something so charming about spiders in flowers!

I didn't see any snakes on my walk today, but when I was walking back to the house after my escapades photographing indigo buntings I came across Snake of the Day:

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

Another garter snake: