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I never quite catch the moment when spring slides into summer. But now that Memorial Day is a week and a half behind us, I guess the time has arrived.

The prairie smoke, wild columbine, and bellwort – all spring flowers – are now working on seeds.

two seedheads in the middle, with one on the left and two on the right yet to open

about 10 spiky sections of green seed pods

one three-segmented seed pod hanging in the middle of large green leaves

Some of the summer flowers are underway.

false indigo

bumblebee with its head in a purple false indigo blossom

Golden Alexanders

small bright-yellow flowers on several umbels

spiderwort

two open purple flowers and a couple of buds above and below

festiva maxima peony has already come and gone

a white bud and an open white flower with bright pink streaks in the center

But most are not yet flowering. Just wait until all of these are in bloom!

bee balm is a giant bush

crowded group of tall green stems, not yet budding

cup plant is collecting water

closeup of the large toothed leaves that are joined at the middle to form a cup, which has a little water

joe-pye weed is spreading

short group of six purple stems with green leaves

pearly everlasting looks awful, which is a good thing because…

a couple dozen light-green plants that appear to be covered in fungus

…these are protective webs for the American Lady butterfly’s caterpillars

closeup of one plant, with a large spiky black caterpillar inside a web formed between two leaves

tall sunflower and purple giant hyssop have spread so much that there is no more room to walk through that section of the garden

lots of skinny green plants in the background, a dozen green plants with toothed leaves in the foreground

yellow coneflower is a jungle

jagged green leaves of dozens of plants, filling the photo frame

common milkweed is budding

large green leaves with a large bumpy group of buds in the center

and the damselflies are back in the yarrow

one dark damselfly perched on an about-to-flower yarrow stem

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Insects aren’t the only living creatures in our yard. We also saw animals – or evidence of animals – all last summer, though without a zoom lens, it’s hard to get good pictures.

I never get too upset when I see cute baby rabbits, as long as I don’t remember that they will grow up to eat so much of our garden. I startled this tiny one (no bigger than my hand) by moving a flowerpot he was hiding behind. He hunkered down in the grass for a minute and then in his haste to find safety, he crashed straight into my foot.

small rabbit hunkered down low in the grass

Rabbit sampling a pot of flowers:

rabbit sniffing moss roses, with zinnias and ornamental kale in the same pot

If only they would stick to eating the dandelions!

rabbit with a long dandelion stem hanging from its mouth

I was endlessly entertained by watching them first pick the dandelions at the ground, then chew from the bottom up.

A hawk – which is in our neighbor’s tree, but it hangs over our yard:

large mostly brown bird facing away, on a thin branch

It made such an interesting sound:

Evidence of some kind of altercation:

five large dark feathers and many small gray feathers

Even pesky squirrels have to eat:

squirrel hanging upside-down from a birdfeeder that is cracked open from the strain

Mole damage in the backyard:

four dirt patches in the grass

A mole making its way underground:

Vole? Shrew?

small gray animal mostly hidden behind calendula leaves

Birds in the vegetables:

two birds in the kale, one bird on a short fence next to lettuce

Whew! Finished this bugs-and-beyond series before spring truly got underway, though plants are already sprouting. Now I am ready to start looking at the 2016 garden.

More bugs and critters:

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A number of bugs from last summer’s garden don’t fit into any category I’ve used so far. I’m not making any judgments about whether these are “good bugs” or “bad bugs.”

candy-striped leafhopper:

skinny red and baby blue bug with yellow face and legs

lacewings:

skinny green bug with long antennae and two big clear wings, obvious on a butterflyweed

same bug, nearly invisible on a milkweed leaf

sawfly larva (and hollyhock leaves they’ve damaged), and sawfly adult:

three light green caterpillars on a leaf with the top layer removed in several spots; short and stout black fly with an orange head

inchworm:

small gray worm crawling down the cone of a black-eyed susan

grasshopper – every time I see this photo, at first I wonder why I took a picture of woodchips:

large grasshopper that nearly perfectly matches the grayish color of the woodchips he's standing on

evidence of a spittlebug:

pile of tiny bubbles holding two goldenrod leaves together

slugs (not bugs, but I’m including them here anyway):

damaged squash vine with the top half curled back in both directions, and two slugs sitting on the bottom half

mayfly:

skinny bug with a big head and two tails, longer than the body, nearly forming a 90-degree angle, on a window screen

four-lined plant bug, and its damage:

short bug with black and fluorescent green stripes and a black hind end, and leaves of a black-eyed susan with dozens of small black spots

I thought this was an earwig, but now I’m not sure whether those are pincers at the top:

a medium-length black bug head-down at the base of a leaf, with two spikes sticking out of the tail end

wee harlequin bug:

two shiny shield-shaped black-and-garnet bugs, connected at the tail end, in a pasqueflower seedhead

ants on a peony:

17 small dark-brown ants on a closed peony bud

one small ant in the middle of an open white peony blossom with bright pink streaks

ants on the move:

More bugs and critters:

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Finally continuing the bee retrospective, after honeybees and bumblebees last week; I have a tentative ID for more of these than I thought.

Ground-nesting bee throwing a dandelion seed out of the way before getting back to business:

Video link

 

Entrance to a ground nest:

small hole in a the dirt/woodchips

Bee on yellow coneflower:

possibly honeybee covered in pollen, at the top of the cone heading down to the right

Resin bee on bee balm:

very small black bee at the edge of the center

Resin bees on autumn joy sedum:

Video link

 

Some kind of metallic bee on tiny monster geranium:

small, shiny green bee

Paper wasps on stiff goldenrod:

many paper wasps, and one hoverfly, on smooth goldenrod

Video

 

Great black wasp, skittish and way bigger than the honeybees that were also climbing this culver’s root. This photo is in shade; it looked iridescent blue in the sunshine:

very big wasp with its wings folded behind, holding tightly to culver's root

Wasp on stiff goldenrod:

smaller black wasp with its wings stretched out

Wasp on baptisia:

possibly paper wasp climbing up the stem of baptisia

Weevil wasp on pearly everlasting:

wasp with black-and-yellow stripes curved on top of a small white flower

There were four green sweat bees crammed inside this hollyhock blossom. One bee decided to sleep between two petal “sheets” instead:

bee with a green head looking at the camera between two outer petals of a light pink flower

Megachile centuncularis on baptisia:

bee from behind with its head in a flower, abdomen covered in pollen, feet dangling below

same bee from the side, about to climb into a blossom

Bee in a squash blossom:

small orange bee standing on the stigma

Unknown on golden alexanders:

small black-and-white bee climbing toward the camera

 

More bugs and critters:

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I took so many bee and wasp photos in 2015 that I’ve decided to split them up. But since I am not an entomologist, I expect to get some of these wrong. As I’m learning more about ground-nesting bees in particular, I’m realizing that what I assume are honeybees and bumblebees might not be.

bachelor’s button:

honeybee in the center of a blue flower

coreopsis:

honeybee standing on the disk floret

caught in a milkweed blossom:

honeybee hanging by its middle right leg

fighting hard to get free:

same bee holding on to the flower with its wings blurred in a circle

butterfly weed:

dark honeybee on a bright orange flower

baptisia:

light orange honeybee with its hind legs standing on baptisia and its head in the blossom

sleeping on purple coneflower:

bumblebee lying in the middle of a pink petal

under a milkweed leaf:

upside-down bumblebee looking into the camera

sleeping in a sunflower:

bumblebee hanging upside-down from the lower right side of a disk floret

bee balm:

big bumblebee with a yellow abdominal band on the right side of a bee balm blossom

a different bumblebee on bee balm:

yellow on top, black on bottom, on the left side of a bee balm blossom

stiff goldenrod:

four bumblebees close together, with a barely visible green bee between them

competing over a hollyhock:

a bumblebee in the center of a light pink hollyhock blossom, with another bumblebee further inside

climbing into turtlehead:

bumblebee at an angle, with its right two hind legs still outside

orange-belted, or tricolored, bumblebee, on baptisia:

out-of-focus bumblebee, yellow on top and orange on bottom, on baptisia

golden alexanders:

small bumblebee on the edge of small yellow flowers

yellow coneflower:

yellow bumblebee looking into the camera while holding onto the cone

spiderwort:

Video link

More bugs and critters: