AstroGypsies

Including the deer flies. I thought I had it bad trying to walk down the road…imagine having no other place to go…but the swamp, on an island…sort of island.

This poor Trumpeter swan was covered in them, her bill, her neck, her head…she was picking away at them as I swatted and jumped to get a look over the grasses…the pitfalls of being the shortest person in your family;)

On a sad note, we are down to two cygnets. The one littlest guy is gone. June 25th was the last time I saw all three and Mother blowing bubbles:( by June 28th, just the two larger babies.

They have so many predators out here in the wild. From the time the egg is hatched until baby is swimming is probably the most crucial, who doesn’t like a nice egg! There are a variety of predators out there…hawks, eagles, owls, great blue herons, larger snapping turtles when the cygnets are very young. Racoons, coyotes and bobcats as well. It’s tough being a baby!

Mother and father and certainly keeping a very very close eye on these two remaining siblings! A turkey vulture flew over and Father got very very tall and large!

I startled a Wood duck female and her nine babies as I was trying to see over the grasses. She gave a rallying cry and got all the kids into line! It took a bit but she swam off with the family to a safer, less human jumping spot! All nine little ducklings! 🙂

At least the temperature has broken for a bit, man it was brutal! I do feel like I am being held hostage by the deerflies, they are particularly brutal this year! I have many welts to show for their hunger! Around the house has been manageable, walk a few feet down the road and you are fair game! I did notice when I had a few dragonflies flying about it WAS better! Go team Dragonfly! I remember a guy inventing a hat with a dragonfly on a spring to keep them at bay, I need one of those!

So many of these beautiful insects around right now! Lot’s to eat apparently!

It is always amazing how different the males and females can be in the same Dragonfly species! Keeps you on your toes trying to figure it out for me! 🙂 Check out the red parasitic mites. They attach themselves shortly after the ode emerges from the larval shell, feed until engorged then fall off into the water again to start the cycle new. Not uncommon in many I have seen so far!

It’s not quite so bad down at the dock! There was one dragonfly, the Green darner I think, keeping a Loon company a few afternoons back! I am always amazed at how long the Loons can stay down without coning up for a breath!

We have seen a glimpse of the two little Loonlets from afar, they dive pretty quickly. It was a Loon yelling fest last night with five different ones calling and screaming, running across the water. Different behaviour than I have seen before. I’ve never seen five here. We had a group of three show up last week, maybe it was the new parents chasing the newcomers off, not sure…or the neighbours dogs barking from the dock. ..0_0…I’ll go looking for the youngsters again soon!

The Ospreys have been putting on quite the show as well. I couldn’t resist this sequence of an Osprey landing. One afternoon we had four different birds flying around on the lake, calling. I thought it might be some juveniles but their eyes are all adult colour, yellow.

It was scorching hot and one Osprey was exhibiting some strange leg dangling behaviour I hadn’t seen before! Maybe it was hot and cranky! It’s how I felt;)

We did get a few thunderstorms to cool us down. Drown those deer flies!

I did say I had a hankering for a landscape day. After the thunderstorm blew through and dropped some torrential rain for a bit the wind died down. We had a lovely double rainbow for a few moments and those reflections!

I went down to the dock…the deerflies also decided it was safe to come out…I didn’t last long! RUN AWAY! ♫♪♫ Summertime….♫♪♪ Every season has it’s pluses and minuses, yeah! No snow shoveling, yeah! Wait…there is mowing;) Sigh…I shall sign off for now. There are still frogs and flowers and bugs and of course the Mewberries;) Stay tunes amigos, saludos!