AstroGypsies

How is that, we seem to go from cold and snow to scorching heat and humidity!:) No complaints, it’s busy out there. It seems everything explodes at once, plants growing wildly, that lawn, out of control, bugs appearing out of the wood work, literally hundreds of gypsy moth caterpillars descending from the trees like Tom Cruise Commandos ready to take over the world…sorry Tom, I have a handy broom, my weapon of mass destruction for wiping out as many as I can as I see the poor young oaks being devoured. Some people at the lake sprayed, it would only hit the tops of the trees, done by helicopter, the next day it poured rain all day…washed it all away, it’s a sugar base…seems like an expensive waste sadly…I’ll stick with my broom;)

If my last blog was bird centric, this will be bug centric! All Winter, only an occasional spider peeks out of a crack, now the world is swarming with all kinds of insect life! I belong to a wonderful group on Facebook-Insects and Arachnids of Ontario-If I don’t know what it is, someone here will! There are dragonfly experts, boy, do I need one of those! The first dragonfly appeared May 3-early I was told, a “Teneral” American Emerald, followed up by a host of others! Oh my, there are SO many! I’m actually starting to kind of know a few of them! I did have to look teneral up: of, relating to, or constituting a state of the imago of an insect immediately after molting during which it is soft and immature in coloring-juvenile:)

So, just a few different kinds of dragonflies, and I thought bird ID was hard at times! The good news is they are eating the mosquitos and gnats that so like to bite me, Mike no, he must taste bad, I seem to be a buffet to them! Long sleeves, pants, socks, and they bite right through the material. I had to wear my mosquito hat a fair bit in the last few weeks, just have to be careful not to scare Gamora, she thinks I am the creature from the black lagoon when I wear it, the ONLY thing she is scared of! She tried to attack a snapping turtle yesterday morning….I looked out the screen door at 6, pre-coffee, ie, in a daze, and thought, how could a cow have pooped on our driveway…logical, or not, that is what it looked like….I forgave her the four holes she had dug in the driveway and garden! She was covered in my vegetable garden dirt! I was able to rescue the two hot pepper plants she displaced and relocate them and now we wait…60-90 days for baby turtles! We’re stepparents again!!;) ha! In Ontario, females do not begin to breed until they are 17 to 19 years old!!! Isn’t that wild!

“Do you want a chipmunk to eat?” asked Rocket “You look tired and hungry after all that digging and egg laying!” Let me reiterate: no chipmunk was actually hurt in the making of this photo, but in the confusion to keep Gamora from getting too close and leaping on the turtle, Rocket dashed off and reappeared 20 seconds later with a young chipmunk. It was promptly removed, missing a bit of butt hair (rocket does not know how to kill, he just carries them around by the behind, or tail) to a safe rocky area away from the turtle and Rocket…Rocket said he was just being polite but we said live offerings/sacrifices were not allowed at this time;) These traveling Mewberries, always into trouble! When the younger two were bored our lovely lady Snapping Turtle made her way across the lawn and down into the leaves all the way to the lake. Groot lay on the lawn and watched, to make sure she was gone!

She was a lovely coffee companion, and most certainly the same lady turtle as last year, but we had two, so will be watching for the next one! The Snapping Turtle is Canada’s largest freshwater turtle, reaching an average length of 20-36 cm ( 7-14″)  and a weight of 4.5-16.0 kg ( 10-35 lbs) so she was on the small to medium size I’d say:) and they live up to 100 years old! Now we wait 60-90 days to see if anything hatches and hopefully no predators will dig the eggs up. I still haven’t seen any information if they lay in multiple nests so will watch all 4 areas she was digging in! We’re going to be stepparents! There have been some birds by the way! Ha! Didn’t think you’d get out without a few feathery friends did you?

Went to visit a lovely lady and her husband and her beautiful cats near Westport (We met on a Facebook page I was asking about US tax accountants…ugh!) She said they had a Heron Rookery at the back of their farm and did I want to come and see it! Social distancing of course! Not just Herons we discovered after taking a few shots! A least six Great Blue Heron nests, and one beautiful pair of baby Great Horned Owls! Absolutely beautiful! It was such a treat to walk back to these amazing birds and such pleasant people! Nice to make new friends this way!

So not backyard birding for a change! Am I lazy, or lucky to have so many amazing yard birds, stay tuned for more babies next week! I do work hard at photography, but sometimes I just get lucky! I didn’t much get to many blooms and butterflies but we’ll save that for next time! I’ll leave you with the little red canoe! Saludos amigos, see you soon! Hoping our weather will be clear for tomorrows solar eclipse!