Pictorial Monday {Joy}

I did not follow the life of Joy like I did with Charlotte, her possible ancestor. However, I did capture a few moments of her life which seemed mighty short compared to Charlotte’s life.

May 25, 2015

She began to move from her original spot. It had rained and rained and I guess she was tired of getting “drowned”. So, she moved over a period of two or three days to a newer and better spot about five feet away.

June 7, 2015

June 12, 2015

Sometime between May 27 and June 12, a male joined her on her web. She molted again on June 12 and the male took advantage of her.

Not long afterwards (approximately an hour later), I discovered that either she killed the male or he died naturally. And, she feasted on her exoskeleton.

July 14, 2015

July 14, 2015

July 14, 2015

Like Charlotte, she became enormous. Unlike Charlotte, she did not live a long life.

She moved a short distance away and proceeded to lay an egg sac near the end of July. She rested for a full day and disappeared. Joy only had one egg sac compared to Charlotte’s two and possible three sacs.

The Life of Charlotte

One day early back in the spring time, a garden spider showed up near our back door and decided to make her home.

When it was determined that she was there to stay, we named her Charlotte after a fictional character in a book called Charlotte's Web.

She soon attracted male spiders.

And, she made beautiful signatures on rare occasions.

I noticed she did most of her rebuilding of her web in the night.

And, she grew.

I felt privileged to have witnessed the next event. She molted.

{Note: this is not my garden spider; but, that of another nearby. You can see the exoskeleton on the right.}

It was one gruesome event to witness. I did not think to grab my camera as I honestly thought she was dying; but, it turned out that she just grew rapidly and needed out of her exoskeleton. In the course of research, the males provides protection while the female molts. I learned something new.

And, she feasted. And, grew.

The males cautiously got closer. She had three altogether at one point.

And one by one, the males disappeared until only one was left.

He got lucky.

And, she was kind to him as he lived out the rest of his life (two days) on her web.

She grew enormous.

She soon made her first egg sac.

{She was putting on the finishing touches early in the morning and soon went back to her web.}

She laid a total of two egg sacs.

On September 17th, not long after she laid her second egg sac, I discovered she packed up her web and moved.

And, I knew.

Like Charlotte of Charlotte's Web, She was dying.

In my heart of hearts, I wanted to know what happened to her. So, I looked.

I found her temporarily ensconced underneath a pad used for gardening and over a bucket.

And, she moved overnight to her final resting place and spun her last beautiful web.

She was located between the end of our farm table and several pallets.

She died in peace on September 21st. She lived a full life.

And, hopefully the cycle of life will begin anew early next spring via her eggs.

I am so thankful for her bravery (she put up with us) and the privilege of observing her life. I have learned so much about spiders through her.

Feline Friday {Wisdom from Abby Gail}

Take time to hunt down your peoples and spend some time with them. I like to play with my humans and harass my sister Gracie.

Take time to smell the flowers. In other words, enjoy life and do not let the harried world get you down!

Take time for yourself or you will end up utterly crazy! In fact, demand it! I do go crazy if I do not get what I need. After all, my humans call me 'that wild thang' for this very reason.

Take time to say that is enough. I am out of here!

Macro Monday {Fluffy Seeds}

On the first of November, I was outside with Dan messing around. I believe this was during the time work on the garage conversion was halfway done and I was out there taking a few pictures of the progress. In the midst of taking pictures, I looked down and discovered this:

{To see a larger image, go here.}

Needless to say, I was puzzled. I initially thought it was clumps of fur that a dog or some critter had lost due to an injury or such. I called Dan over because I was not sure about exploring what this was and he is braver, much braver, than I. In the meantime, I switched to using my macro (lens).

By the way, I had to shield these from the harsh sun with my own body or otherwise they would look like this:

{To see a larger image, go here.}

I kept this image because I thought it was a cool looking macro in spite of the strands looking like nylon and fake. Anyway, Dan was helping me out by holding seeds for me. This is what the seed really looked like:

{To see a larger image, go here.}

After pawing and digging around in the ground, much to our amazement, this was found underneath the clusters of seeds:

{To see a larger image, go here.}

The fluffy seed dispersal system.

This is fairly big -- about three to four inches in length. I have absolutely no clue to what this plant is. I have already used up my bandwidth allocation for this period; so, I did not go deep into research. Hopefully, someone else can identify this for me.

Once pictures were taken, we put it back in the ground where it was found. I have always been the one who tries to leave nature alone with the exception of the Black Widows.

Edited to Add: Dan found out that they are milkweed seeds. When I learned of this, I immediately went out to see if I can find some seeds to plant and found a total of seven! Hurray! I now will need to seek how and where to plant them here not to mention protecting them. The Monarch Butterflies relies upon these for a source of food AND a place of laying their eggs. To read more about this, go here.

Wordy Wednesday {Gracie and a Critter}

Early in the morning of October 18th, I spied Gracie in the window wanting something very badly. She is our huntress and, as a result, I always pay attention to her behavior. She has found four or five small scorpions so far not to mention spiders galore and a couple geckos since we rescued her. And oh, she adores grasshoppers and hunts them with a passion whenever she is brave enough to go outdoors (with supervision).

Anyway, she would try to get this critter; but, she could not due to the glass between her and the thing. Do you see it? Below is the same picture with a yellow arrow pointing to the critter just in case you do not see it.

So, what was the critter? I went outside and discovered this:

Praying Mantis

I went outside later in the morning in an attempt to take pictures in better lighting; but, the thing moved to a different location. When I started to snap pictures after locating it, it 'flew' away scaring me half to death. I guess the mantis thought I was a predator. Ha!

This is the first time in my life I ever witnessed one of these "fly". I will be more careful in the future when I attempt to take pictures as I would hate to hurt one of these beautiful critters. Yes, I screamed like a girl; but, I managed to remain still while tracking its flight. I have to tell you it was extremely cool watching it "fly". I wish I had the sense to try snapping pictures while it flew. But, I was just too dumbfounded and amazed. Maybe next time if there is a next time.

Wordy Wednesday {The Sock Thief}

While sorting laundry one day, I caught a sock thief in action. The below series of pictures is a reenactment of the actual crime. I was very surprised when I first witnessed her blatantly steal a sock right out of a laundry basket. She made me laugh so hard.

You cannot help but love this mischievous criminal in spite of her being an aficionado of socks. Yes, she adores socks of all kinds and will pick those over most toys she owns.

I slayed it for you. Slurp!

This same criminal will also steal and attack clean sorted socks. Oh for the shame!