Butterfly Bonanza

Not much mammalian critter action around the pond this week. Our noisy downstairs neighbor, Chuck, made a stealthy dash from under our porch to an allegedly abandoned drainpipe yesterday. We had labored under the belief that we had two bachelor woodchucks. Chuck and a pipe dwelling stranger at the other end of the yard. But we can now draw only one of two conclusions. Either Chuck has a weekend home in yonder pipe or he has secreted a hidden lover. Didn’t know old Chuck was that much of a dude. Anyway, that’s Chuck’s business. Far be it for us to get involved.

Yesterday a doe and two fawns grazed along what we call the Isthmus. A narrow band of wooded land that separates the back of the pond from a large marshy area beyond. Another beautiful little doe grazed last evening near How’s Bayou an inlet on the south side of the pond. She was still wearing her beautiful rust red summer garb. Summer clings to a last few shreds of September. She’ll soon don a new robe of more restrained gray/brown. The better to hide her from hunters and rutting bucks. Though rutting bucks have laser like vision with regard to comely young does.

The bass and grass carp have been unusually active. Perhaps celebrating the departure of their nemesis, the heron. He has now taken wing for his winter home in the South. The humming birds so far remain. Still dipping into the hanging baskets of tuberous begonias and pansies. They, too, will soon be leaving us for the warm rays of the South. Cool autumn winds in their wake.

The dragon flies are thinning. A contrast to the usual flurry of activity that hovers about three feet above the surface of the pond all summer. And, pretty as they are, they can be brutal in the way they dispatch their food. The little beasts have serrated teeth and terrible table manners. Really. And they’re cannibalistic. They dine on such entomological delicacies as midges, mosquitoes, flies and their own tiny larval children. Talk about child abuse. You don’t wanna know.

Finally, we were recently blessed with one of Mother Nature’s rare and beautiful gifts. A constant stream of monarch butterflies passed us on the way to their winter havens in Central America and Mexico. We’re lucky enough to be on the butterfly migration interstate. The journey involves several generations on the way. Must take some interesting procreative gymnastics. Sex on the wing. Whatever floats your chrysalis.

Time flies.

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