Backyard tails

I featured the front yard yesterday. Today, the back deck and backyard. 

 I wrote about this strange bug last August and, thanks to iNaturalist, someone figured it out. I watched it lay eggs over many hours. Of course I took a video📹.

Arthropods Phylum Arthropoda

The egg sack was there all winter in rain, sleet, freezing rain, snow and hail! Now little larvae are coming out. Mystery solved. The spider is on to them. Uh oh!

I have to juggle my plants out back. The pine trees have lost so many branches in ice and snow storms. I rely on the hops vine to shade my plants here. That pine tree used to be thick with branches and the morning sun couldn't get through.

The Hops Vine continues to climb.  

Dawn does what dawn does!

Somebody worked itself to death working out! That was my second thought. My first thought was, 'well done cats!'

After the storm (nearly 2"), that made the goldfish happier, as well as the resident Green Frog.

She sure looks pregnant! We shall see. If you choose to watch the video you can see the last of the phoebe parent flitting about for bugs. They have flown!

Fred June 3 from Jennifer Jilks on Vimeo.

I checked on the phoebe babies and they flew off. That is a relief. The storm cleared the bird poop off the lower deck, and they are done.

I had to be careful putting out laundry. They managed to avoid it, though! The parents grab the poop and take it out of the nest. The nest itself is pristine. 

A bee that wasn't bumbling.

Our provincial premier had complained about the previous government having 29 cabinet members. For someone who campaigned on smaller government, it is ridiculous. Quote of the week from TVO: 

"At the same time, nearly half of Ford’s caucus will now find themselves doing double duty as ministers, too, as the cabinet swells to 36 members; there’s a minister for red-tape reduction, but apparently no one in charge of irony."