This black widow greeted me when I took out the trash and a ribbon snake greeted Laurie while she was hiking in the petroglyphs.
Category: Animals
Hummmmmm
A hummingbird was foraging on one of our butterfly bushes in the late afternoon light.
These Eyes
This jumping spider has plenty of eyes to cry for it’s lost love. Rosencrantz looks nice in stripes, and now that our butterfly bushes are blooming they are attracting all kinds of insects, like the scarab in the last photo.
Rio Guadalupe Canyon
NM 485 becomes a one lane road as it enters Rio Guadalupe Canyon, so we parked on a wide pullout about 1/4 mile from the mouth of the canyon, and walked along the edge of the road into the canyon. After photographing the “Falling Rock” sign, I turned around to find a humming bird moth working the flowers in the brush behind me. The first guardrail along the road was covered with graffiti.
Distracted by Hawks
These two hawks were hunting from one of the trees on Meadowlark Lane on the way home, which provided quite a distraction for me.
Sharing
A bee and wasp were foraging on the same plant, which I found interesting. The double-winged damselflies are out, and a tiny crab spider was hanging out on a red rose.
To show Sarah the ghost photo from last week, I searched for “Ghost” in the search field in the upper right-hand corner of the page which brought up “Ghost Under a Full Moon” followed by “Stretch 2004 — 2013 RIP”. Sarah noticed that the ghost in the left-hand edge of the photo looks like the young Stretch in the photo below it from the search. The photo of the ghost was taken near Stretch’s grave.
Macro Magic
After another “Monday! Monday! Everything breaks on Monday!” Monday, I came home, got out the macro lens, and went out to see what the small world in the garden was up to. The most cooperative critters were Bartle Bee, Evil the Boll Weevil and a tiny, curly cucumber tail.
A Monarch that Matters
Apparently someone of the royal family in England had a baby recently who at some point might be in line to be a monarch. I see bits and pieces about this on Internet news, but I don’t pay enough attention to know who is who. I don’t really understand why the American news media finds reporting on the birth of this baby to be a higher priority than reporting on all the real issues we need to address in the US. We fought and won a war of independence against Britain over 200 year ago, so why all the hubbub and distractions over a baby who will never make a difference in our lives?
Now when it comes to a Monarch butterfly (who most people do not give a flying pheromone about) showing up in the early morning hours, teasing me in various areas of the property until it found a delicious echinacea to distract it long enough for me to get some decent photos, is at least blog worthy. Monarch butterflies migrate thousands of miles and pollinate plants making them quite useful. But unless you are a weirdo like me, you have probably followed more news on the baby British Monarch, than an orange an black winged Monarch butterfly fluttering around in your yard.
What was interesting about my Monarch photo shoot is that in the photos where I had full, bright, early morning sun, the butterfly glows in the bright light. In the photos were the clouds were blocking the sun, the photos are pastel and have a more painterly look to them.
The Blog Before The Storm
I took this photo just after midnight on Friday morning. It was so windy and so much rain on Friday night, that the lightning was never clear, just bright flashes and loud crashes. Since the clouds are building up again, I thought I better get the blog posted before the storm hits and we lose power again. We got home at 4:30 pm yesterday and by the clocks that keep a memory of the time they went off, the power had been restored just an hour before we got home, which, if correct, means we were without power for 21 hours. The June bugs and roses are happy after the heavy rains, and Rosencrantz was enjoying a patch of catnip in the late afternoon light that was falling between the thunderheads building up in the western skies.
Wet and Dark
We had been without power for 15 hours when we left for Tristan’s and David’s to charge devices and get on the Internet. About 7:00 pm last night very high winds and pouring rain that took out the power. Puck was out during most of the storm and finally came in soaking wet about 8:30, bringing a good amount of the 2 inches of rain we got with him. He reluctantly posed for photos illuminated by our flashlights, but finally gave me a nice “Chat Noir” pose. The neighbor’s corrals and arena were still flooded this morning, and the horses were fed on the high spots along the edges. The morning sun was brilliant in the fresh air, and the sunflowers and bees were happy after the rains.
Off Center & Not Even 