We do get the occasional chitinous creature roaming inside the house, and if the cats don’t get to it, I do try to take it outside. My preferred method is a clear plastic cup (so I can see, plastic is lighter than glass, and if I loose my nerve and drop it, I don’t break anything), and a sheet of card stock. The cup goes over the critter, the card stock slides underneath, and the whole contraption is taken outside.

This grass spider was released near the stock tank garden, promoted to captain of the guardian army, and tasked with ejecting (by whatever means necessary) the unfriendlies that would eat the produce.

My house spiders do not get this treatment, as long as they stay in the upper corners, they are left alone to hunt flies. Did you know the house spider also hunts other spiders? Including the brown recluse. Welcome home, house spider.

Ok, so that is a cool name, even if it is more fitting for a winter fairy than a hummingbird moth. The good folks on iNaturalist provided the ID. I found it before the wings filled out.

The Snowberry Clearwing (yup, going to use the full name every time, ‘cause wow), pupates in leaf litter and one of the host plants for the caterpillar is honeysuckle, so it makes sense that they find our front arbor a good home since it is full of several varieties of honeysuckle and mulched with leaf litter. I have to come clean, I wasn’t the first to spot it. Maybe this blurry photo will give you a clue who did.

I was able to rescue Snowberry Clearwing and help it to perch out of the cat’s reach, much to Sophie’s dismay. I saw the moth again, or maybe another moth but I would like to think it was the rescued Snowberry Clearwing, on the Abelia bushes across the walk.

Fair travels to you, Snowberry Clearwing, may the wind be always at your back.

Since setting up the chicken foot baths to fill automatically, the area around the shallow dishes has been more damp. The little snakes and frogs that move in don’t stand a chance if the chickens see them, but one industrious toad has dug an expansive mansion under the tray, and is big enough that the chickens leave her alone.

Did a trail cam check, saw pictures of two different coyotes where we haven’t seen coyotes before, up in the meadow near the chicken coop. Mostly we see cats, armadillo, raccoon, and opossum, with an occasional fox in this area. Down in the back woods, were there used to be a small trickle of a stream, we would see pictures of deer and bobcat and coyote as well, but not in the meadow.

Saying that it has been dry here doesn’t really cover it. The word drought gets close, but doesn’t have enough soul wrenching connotation to encompass the brittle brown fields, plumes from the wild fires, and the ribs showing through on domestic and wild life.