Thursday 23 June 2022

More bugs and blooms!

The wildflowers on Lot #3 are amazing. The ground is very shallow here.

The Hops vines are growing like mad. Our growing season is so short! You can see the sparrow near the middle of the photo!

This is lot 2, and this area was covered in sumac, only some remain in the background. Previous owners, maybe the first one, mowed it all down. I transplanted the cedar on the right. It's coming along.


I spotted a monarch this morning. Our milkweed isn't as prolific as it was. We have some, though.

Can you see it? On the coleus! 

I think this is a cicada, but I'm not sure! I have to do more research.
UPDATE: I submitted it to iNaturalist, and it is Black Horse Fly, Tabanus atratus.

I was watering the garden, and accidentally watered one. It had to dry off some, and I apologised.

Cicada from Jennifer Jilks on VimeoBlack Horse Fly, Tabanus atratus

Horseflies: one flew up under my dress and bit my leg!


Blonde Butch comes by, often around 4 p.m., and I love seeing her in the grasses. I'm letting the wild flowers have their day, and I'll use the lawn tractor.  Blonde Butch from Jennifer Jilks on Vimeo.

Out in the forest, the crows are just a hoot. 

4 crows from Jennifer Jilks on Vimeo.

13 comments:

Tom said...

...it's a buggy place out there.

Patio Postcards said...

During this season as the Deer, Horse, Mosquitoes & other flying pestilences take over the skies, I retreat more indoors. I use to think it was just morning & dusk that was the worse, it seems now it is all day. I can feel the pain of the Horsefly bite.

Kathy G said...

I talk to bugs and critters when I'm outside too. I bet you had some choice words for the horse fly!

Karen said...

I have just cut all of the hops down at my back porch. They will grow back again, but I can't let them get too out of hand.
Our milk weed is thriving. Saw the first monarch yesterday before the rains came!
Our soil is thin and poor too. We discovered the sloping yard rising back of the house is indeed an esker. (is that how you spell it?) Under about an inch of poor soil is total gravel. One would think it had been dumped there.

Elephant's Child said...

Thank you for sharing nature's bounty.

RedPat said...

I saw a Monarch the other day but really haven't seen many butterflies at all and few bees.

William Kendall said...

I am quite fond of crows.

Mae Travels said...

Your wildlife is very pretty and your yard looks pleasant. Too bad about the biting insects.

best..mae at maefood.blogspot.com

River said...

I enlarged the photos but couldn't see the monarch. I saw the little green cricket. That horsefly is a nasty critter, they bite hard. We don't have them where I live and don't have all those grasses either, thank goodness. With my hayfever and asthma I'd never get outside! It all looks lovely and green though.

Jenn Jilks said...

True, River! I didn't manage a photo!

Divers and Sundry said...

I love seeing all the space available there for insects and wildlife. I live in a city where the monoculture lawn is the norm, and I hope someday we'll tolerate more flowering yards.

Yogi♪♪♪ said...

Here in Oklahoma we pay a fortune to try and get rid of cedars and there you are transplanting them!!

As a kid in the mountains of Utah the horse flies ate my lunch. My hands will swell up tot he size of softballs.

Jeanie said...

I think bugs are hard to capture. You did it admirably! Happy weekend!