Butterfly bonding

Lost Ladybug Project

I found this ladybug yesterday afternoon in a wheelbarrow filled with rainwater. I thought for sure it had drowned. But nope, it was still alive! Picture, please, for the Lost Ladybug Project. Then I set it free on a milkweed loaded with aphids. Meet a parenthesis ladybug (Hippodamia parenthesis), a native species. Asian lady beetle (Harmonia axyridis).
 
Check out this LLP contribution here.

A walk in the Wildscape

I headed out the back door and spotted this handsome wolf man. But, alas, he's missing a leg and likely passing soon.

We've been gone a lot lately. Then rains kept us inside, and I had deadlines to finish. So today was the first time I'd strolled through our Wildscape in a long, long while. GLORIOUS! WONDERFUL! I love nature so much.

This is a new butterfly species to me. Meet this pretty long-tailed skipper (Urbanus proteus).

A puss caterpillar! (Also called an asp.) First one I've ever spotted in our gardens. DON'T TOUCH! 

A banded argiope that I just happened to spot!

Look, a Gulf fritillary child!

Can you find her? The orbweaver?

I spotted this dapper jumping spider guy and took a bunch of photos. You can almost see his little spider brain working as he crawls atop the chain link fence. ANT!

 

I had to share some photos of the coreopsis that's growing quite happily in a rock! There's a life lesson there somewhere...