Nature Friday – Busy As A Bee

Hi everyone! It’s Millie & Walter here. Thursday we enjoyed our first snow of the season. That is a few weeks later than our average but we aren’t complaining.

We enjoy watching all the critters in our yard.

To warm things up we wanted to show you some of the last bees that were hanging out in our yard a few weeks ago.

Honey bees on the hydrangea

There were just a few hydrangea that the honey bees could enjoy so they were working hard for what might have been their last supper of the season.

The perennial geranium was also still blooming.

The honey bees were also enjoying the geranium that was still in bloom.

We’ve learned to stay away from all those stinging insects.

The bumble bees were lapping up all the nectar they could find from the eupatorium.

Bumble Bees were all over the eupatorium

This is bumble bee heaven.

Here is a little video of the bumble bees in action on the eupatorium.

If you can’t see the video you can go here to see it.

I’m dreaming of the last of the warm fall days.

By now the perennials have all been cut down and the bees are all hibernating (or whatever bees do during the cold weather). We’re watching the snow falling outside and hoping that it accumulates enough to enjoy our first snow zoomies of the year.

We hope you enjoyed seeing some of the bees enjoying the last flowers in our yard.

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Nature Friday – Flowers Around Our Yard

Hi everyone! It’s Walter here.

Let’s check out the flowers and fall colors

As you can see I’m doing quite well and I have all of my Blogville friends to thank for helping me recover so quickly. We don’t have any test results back yet but I feel good as new and I’m told my breath is super fresh now. Enough of that, let’s get to the flowers in our yard.

Hydrangea showing its fall colors

Another pink hydrangea

Some of our Stella D’Oro have started blooming again

The Turtlehead flower is one of the latest bloomers we have in our yard

The insects appreciate having a late flowering perennial in the garden

A tiny spider is enjoying this Eupatorium
(click on the image to make it big if you can’t see the spider)

Lastly let’s see how some of the shrubs have changed so far.

The spirea leaves are starting to turn red

The Callicarpa berries are really starting to turn their beautiful purple color

I hope you enjoyed seeing some of the flowers and fall colors we have in our yard.

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Nature Friday – Painted Lady Migration

Hi everyone! It’s Cindy here. Late last week we were lucky to have some Painted Lady butterflies migrating through our yard. They enjoyed a stop over for some refueling. We first found them enjoying the sedum.

The underside of a Painted Lady Butterfly is not as colorful as the upperside.

The upperside of the Painted Lady Butterfly.

They really loved the sedum…

… and often had to share them with other insects like this honey bee

Here is a little video of the action on the sedum.

If you can’t see the video you can go here to view it.

The next day when we came outside there were many more Painted Ladies and this time most of them were on the Blue Fortune Agastache.

Painted Lady butterflies on Blue Fortune Agastache

At one point we counted about a dozen butterflies on the agastache

Painted Lady Butterfly

The butterflies worked every angle of the flowers

This would make a good Tongue Out Tuesday picture
(click on the image to make it bigger to see what I mean)

The upperside is so beautiful

Here a video of the action on the agastache.

If you can’t see the video you can go here to view it.

We also found the Painted Ladies on our hydrangea.

I hope you enjoyed seeing the Painted Lady invasion we had in our yard recently.

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Nature Friday – Scenes Around a Pond

Hi everyone! It’s Cindy here to show you a little more of what we saw at North Ponds Park a few days ago. There were quite a few wild flowers.

Cattails

Queen Anne’s Lace with a Lady Bug

Unfortunately we found a couple of invasive wild flowers too.

Loosestrife

Spotted Knapweed

There were plenty of dragonflies around but many were too fast or too far away. I was lucky to catch this little guy.

Blue Dasher – Pachydiplax longipennis

In addition to the Great Blue Heron I showed you earlier there were other waterfowl around. I found these young ducks near where the heron was.

Young Black Ducks moved away as I approached.

The ducks cut a path through the algae.

The babies were hanging together but what were the adults up to?

Maybe if we can’t see them the kids won’t find us.

I hope you enjoyed seeing a little more from our walk at the ponds.

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Nature Friday – Bugs and Blooms

Hi everyone! It’s Cindy here. Summer is near the end and so is the growing season for the flowers in our yard. We still have a few daylilies blooming.

Rose colored daylily

Yellow daylily

Some of the hosta still have flowers too.

Hosta flowers

Another late bloomer in our yard is our non-vining clematis.

Clematis “Mrs. Robert Brydon”

The various bees around our yard seem to be working overtime collecting pollen.

Bumble bee on Joe Pye Weed

Bumble Bee on Blue Fortune Agastache

This little guy was so loaded down with pollen he could barely take off.

Now those are full saddle bags

Next I want to show you some dragonflies.

Orange Meadowhawk dragonfly

Orange Meadowhawk dragonfly on hypericum berry

Lastly I want to show you one of the many leopard frogs we have in our yard.

Leopard frog

There are so many of these frogs in the lawn that when I mow the lawn I have to go very slow around the edge of the grass (where they seem to be the most plentiful) to try not to squash or mow over them. We seem to be having a banner year for leopard frogs in our yard this year. It usually takes me about 2 hours to mow our lawn but since the frogs have appeared it’s taken me about 1/2 hour longer because I’ve had to go much slower. I want to get a bumper sticker for my tractor that says, “I Brake for Frogs”!

I hope you enjoyed this stroll around the garden today.

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Daylily Delights

Hi everyone! It’s Cindy here. We’re entering into daylily season in our yard so that is what I’m going to show you today. There isn’t much to say about them so enjoy the show.

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This next daylily is a hybrid that sprouted from the one above.

Hybrid from the previous daylily.

This is the largest daylily flower in our yard.

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This is my favorite of all our daylilies. I just love the burgundy ruffles on it.

I hope you enjoyed this stroll around the garden today.

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We are joining our friends Arty, Jakey and Rosy (a day late, but better than never) for their Nature Friday Blog Hop. You should pop over to their blog to see all the other posts.

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Flower Friday

Hi everyone! It’s Cindy here. There is always something new blooming in our yard now. I like to call this our white and purple/blue phase. Let’s start with the trees and shrubs that are blooming now. (Don’t forget to click on the images to see a bigger version.)

Stewartia tree flower

Hydrangea Paniculata

Hydrangea Arborescens

Lil’ Kim® Violet Althea

The althea (or rose of sharon) looks more pink than violet so it is the only exception to the color theme. Moving on to the perennials. I know I’ve shown you our clematis already but here are some more shots.

Etiole Violette clematis

I just love how the flowers cover the top of the trellis in deep purple blooms. Here are a couple of close ups of the flowers.

Etiole Violette clematis

Etiole Violette clematis

Blue Agastache

The agastache is a favorite of the hummingbirds. Next up are a couple of the hosta that are blooming. We have so many different varieties that we have forgotten what they are.

White Hosta

These hosta flowers have a bit more purple than the others.

Last but not least is one of the new additions to our perennial garden.

Purple Rooster Monarda

We chose this variety of monarda for its mildew resistance and so far it is holding up well. We’ve seen lots of bees, and some butterflies using them and even the hummingbirds go to them.

I hope you enjoyed this stroll around the garden today.

Join the Nature Friday Blog Hop

We are joining our friends Arty, Jakey and Rosy for their Nature Friday Blog Hop. You should pop over to their blog to see all the other posts.

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