FINALLY, our boy has a mate. A female orchard oriole visited today, and was clearly with the male.
Finally spotted a female visiting the feeders. (Male had been spotted previously).
2 cottontails playing on the lawn across the street at around 6:45 PM
More male ichneumons--which species?
I assume that this is a male of the species, but which one?
Another species of giant ichneumon, sharing the same stump with Megarhyssa atrata. A dozen of these were searching the wood beetle holes on the stump, and laying eggs.
This tree, and all others of its species in the forest, were being ravaged by...something.
Awesome, tons of these around. I just love these amazing wasps. I have a video as well, which can be viewed here (turn sound down, it is loud): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NnHIkONxg20
2 Baltimore orioles showed up about 5 minutes after the orchard oriole male arrived. I think they must follow the other species around, hoping that he'll lead them to new food sources? He showed some aggression toward them, but mainly ignored them. They seemed confused as to what he was up to, lol. They left fairly quickly, and did not return.
Between 12:30 and 1, this guy was obsessed with trying to find a way through my windows! He was the twitchiest bird I've seen, yet. I managed to get some photos around 1 PM, though they are sillhouetted due to the angle of the sun. I have no idea why he wanted inside so badly. Perhaps he was fascinated by the spider plant? He was drawn in by the orange slices I put out, but didn't actually touch them--he just wanted through the window. He did a lot of singing as well. When two 'buddies' showed up (Baltimore orioles) he showed a bit of aggression towards them, but mostly ignored them. They weren't sure why he wanted through the window, either, I think they just wanted to see what he was doing, lol.
These are the cutest little things (yes, even for spiders)...I almost kept him, because he was inside the house, but decided to put him out on the porch, instead. Hopefully this spider will find a mate and make more little bold jumping spiders. :)
We saw two very large snappers in the stream along Stream Trail.
The small yellow flower there looks somewhat like a violet. Not entirely sure what it is. Ignore the larger plant obscuring it.
