True Nature Stories: A Walk In The Park

This was an especially brightly colored mosaic darner, even among others of its own kind. Guessing this is a blue-eyed darner.

I'd spent the morning commiserating with my wife about last night's saddest presidential debate ever, and needed to shake it off with a walk down to Strybing Arboretum. I'd hoped to photograph some interesting birds, but as soon as I got in there I realized it was insect season more than bird season.

There was an almost wild lushness and haphazard disarray among the late-June garden paths, although the paths themselves were neat and in many cases fairly newly paved. I don't mean disarray in any pejorative sense. I liked it that way, and spent a couple of hours just poking around in, and near, the California Garden.

[UPDATE] I just learned that a child was bitten by a coyote in the garden yesterday (Friday, 6/28). The bite required stitches and must have happened after I left since the incident created quite a commotion that resulted in evacuation of the park. There was an unusually large number of young children in the garden for some kind of special camper gathering.

When I'd entered that morning I asked the ticket lady where the coyote was since there were warning signs up. She said someone had seen a big one earlier in the day in the general area of where I was heading. I didn't see it despite looking for it and listening for birds possibly scolding a skulking predator.

The western half of the garden (including the Children's Garden) is closed today (Saturday, 6/29). I had been half-heartedly heading for that part of the garden to look for birds on Friday when I saw the gardeners stringing closure tape across a main trail. I'd assumed they were about to do gardening work until I learned of the coyote attack, which happened around 11:15 a.m. Makes me wonder if all those little campers had their lunches with them, the smell of which might have attracted the coyote.

Here's a somewhat dustier darner compared with the one at the top of the post.

Sunshine Gilding The Lily

This cardinal meadowhawk let me approach to within inches. Only when I had to move the branch with my hand to walk past it did the dragonfly take off.

Habitat shot of the dragonfly and lily pond.

Leaf Map

Satyr Anglewing

Cabbage White

California Buckeye with Bushtit

Pipevine Swallowtail

A shaky shot of a bushtit with a small caterpillar.

Matilija Poppies

Mission Blue
(I love that the striped "pants" on its legs match its antennae.)

I could hear a hummingbird sounding off as they often do from the tops of branches. I looked and looked for it, only to realize it was only about five feet above me, nowhere near the top of the buckeye.