Soldier Beetle ?

Soldier ?, originally uploaded by Ontario Wanderer.

Beetle found on Queen Anne's Lace flower in our west meadow.

Mandala

Mandala, originally uploaded by Ontario Wanderer.

The Mandala is coming into being, more and more everyday. As I look back at Tuesday's photo, I see that there is lot more to the mandala than meets the eye. As wonderful as the mandala is to look at, some patterns of sand, under the top level, are completely hidden.

Visitors

We have Tibetan monks visiting Brantford and making a sand Mandela.



Photo by Églantine.

FBO Outing

Églantine and I were out with the Field Botanists of Ontario yesterday in the area of the Halton Hills. One of our finds was Laetiporus sulphureus. It's common, and more colourful, name is "Chicken of the Woods."

Two Deer

While on our Monday evening wild flower walk, we kept seeing deer. I think we saw at least 12 by the end of the walk and we were only a couple hundred metres from a four-lane highway on two sides and a residential area on the other two in a small bit of meadow and forest.

Odonate Count

Églantine and I went out on an odonate count at the Hamilton/Burlington Royal Botanical Gardens yesterday. We were looking for dragonflies and damselflies.



Some of the dragonfly hunters were more excited about the hunt than others.



I think the official count will come out later this week or maybe next week but we did see quite a few and held some in hand for closer looks and identification. This one was a female Easter Amberwing.

Strange Cloud Formation

Poison Ivy

Poison Ivy comes in several forms and there seems to be some debate over even the Latin name. Some authorities put it in the genus Rhus and some in the genus Toxicodendron. Some stop with the species name radicans while others split it into two varieties or subspecies, negundo or rydbergii. On the ground it may present itself as a creeping vine, a very small ankle high shrub, a taller, hip high shrub, or a vine that climbs high up in trees and sends out "branches" that may be up to a metre (3 feet) long.

Yesterday, on a Field Botanist of Ontario outing, we saw the largest shrub variety of poison ivy that I have ever seen. It was located by the shores of the Niagara River a few hundred metres downstream from the Whirlpool Rapids growing on a large rock. It was large enough that a footpath, used by fishermen I suppose, went under it. (I bet they are puzzled as to how they got poison ivy on their necks.)



Yes, all those wonderfully green leaves across the bottom of the photo and the shrub like branches below them are part of the poison ivy plant.

Time for Morning Walk

Our dog, Calla, is eager to explore the new day.

Sunflower Time

Getting Drier

Eastern Tailed-Blue

We seem to have more butterflies than usual this summer.

Planets

If you look closely, and use some imagination, you can see the rings of Saturn going from upper left to lower right on the planet to the right. Meanwhile, Venus is just too bright to show that it is actually a crescent. Through my telescope I could see the cresent of Venus and the rings of Saturn but my camera just couldn't cope with the telescope and could not quite capture the same scene with it's own telephoto lens.

Oh, they were in the west just after sunset and were quite close together on July 1, 2007.

Skipper on Milkweed

Morning Crow