general back yard pics

Every day I wander around the yard and take pictures. I used to pull weeds also, but gave up about half way through the summer. If you let your plants grow big enough, the weeds get choked out and only grow on the edges. The green thing in the center of the first picture started life the size of your fist. We tried three different places before it took where it is now. I'm going to have to move some of the plants next to it because it should grow to 5 ft. wide and 3-4 ft. high. It's some kind of astilbe. This year the hydrangea have exploded. All summer long we've had great blooms. It's supposed to bloom till the first frost. The small pink things are flox I think. The goldenrod and sedum are full of bees. You can hear them when you're close to the plants.

Our little friend.

Everytime I see these guys I have this urge to break out in that famous operatic song "Kill the Wabbit".

nothing cooler than this

This is why I spent all summer sitting outside in the backyard.

The last of the Hosta

Funny that the first hosta to pop up in the spring is the last to bloom, heralding the end of summer.Somewhere in all this mass of hosta is momma and papa hosta which we got from the mother-in-law, Shirley. So if anyone wants to know the what or how of my gardening bug, blame Shirley. Who knew that after I planted my first hosta I wouldn't know when to quit. Well, ya know , I don't have it quite right yet, so I have to keep planting. If you look close, you'll see open spots for more hosta.

is it fungus or fungi?

To me it's some kind of mushroom. This delicate little beauty was in our front yard. It's growing on a root of a long gone tree.

More Bees

The yard is still lousy with bees. You can hear the buzz from them flying around all the flowers. Good thing they are so single minded and like flowers and not people.. The big ones are kinda scary.

Bees

Bees love ligularia and hosta. All the hosta except for the lanciflolia are pretty much played out. The ligularia are still in full bloom.

Birds

Our yard is lousy with birds, from 5:00 in the morning till dark, when the bats come out. They are fun to watch and hard to photo. Here are a few pics from today. The hawk was a pleasant surprise.

Butterflies and Moths

Taking pics of moths and butterflies is an adventure. They do not light for very long on any flower. If I see one in the yard, by the time I grab my camera and get to the flower, it's gone. You can't cast a shadow over them when you catch them on a flower. If you do, they're gone. You have to wait till they're involved in a flower before you take the pic. There's a blue one that I've been trying to get a pic of all summer with no luck. All the pics were taken with my pocket camera.