Late Summer Pictures

One of the nice things about spending time outdoors is that you start to really notice the change of seasons. Not just the big seasonal changes, like the difference between spring and winter, but the little changes, like the differences between early summer, mid summer, and late summer.

Late summer means the beginning of the end for the dragonflies. Midsummer was their time, and they were everywhere, little green, blue, brown, and red beauties, not to mention their larger white and black cousins. They zipped every which way, filling the skies, thrilling me with their escapades. Sometimes they landed on me when I hoped they would, and other times they scared me half to death because I wasn’t expecting such a large bug to alight on me! But they’re almost gone now. Late summer is the time of the hopping insects—crickets and grasshoppers. This year saw some of the fattest crickets ever!

Fat cricket sitting on Marshall’s arm.

And then their are the jumpers–warty toads and sleek frogs. They in turn feed the slitherers. In late summer and early autumn you can’t walk up the hill to the side yard without disturbing at least one garter snake, usually a young one. They’re adorable. I often chase after them until they disappear into a hole or thick tuft of grass, because I love to watch them move. I don’t worry about them biting me, even when my feet are bare, as they usually are. I have never been bitten by a garter snake in my life, not even the ones I harassed as a child. Alas, they do not stay still so that I can get good pictures of them.

The bees are still working as hard as ever in late summer, but there is feeling of desperation in their industriousness. They know the season is coming to an end. The jewel weed is back, and the only thing more fun that popping the seed pods is watching bumblebees burrow into the flowers and then back themselves out again. Just as they did back in April when they were pollinating the violets, the bumblebees remind me of my black cat, Mojo, who is fat and always trying to get into spaces much too small for him.

Mushrooms grow fast and rank on old wood mulch, sprouting on and around trees, following the paths of old, decomposing tree roots.

Mushrooms are no fun to walk through with bare feet. Yuck! And if we leave them in the yard, they eventually turn into an ugly black mush, so my husband usually removes them. So that is one of his late summer and early autumn tasks—shroom shoveling!

I took a walk in the woods during the late summer season, something I rarely do, so expect to see some more pictures soon!