Up close

I was spoiled for choices today - somewhat surprising since it rained off and on all day and I had to scramble out between downpours.  However, the various flower patches rewarded me with lots of beautiful and interesting things to point my macro lens towards, including this Great Spangled Fritillary.  Frankly, these are among the easiest of butterflies to photograph because they will usually let you get quite close and they like to feed with wings open, making for lovely images.  My second choice for TinyTuesday is posted in Extras - a very interesting looking fly of some sort.  

The avian nursery was in full form today with baby titmice, woodpeckers and catbirds flitting around and begging non-stop.  I always forget what a delightful sound that is - the insistent chipping that reaches full frenzy when an adult approaches.  Music to my ear.  I posted eight other photos, starting with a juvenile woodpecker, starting HERE on Flickr.

The swallows still appear to be incubating eggs.  I waited until Mama left the nest box today and then stuck my phone in to try to get a photo and an egg count - unfortunately, they have done a great job lining the entire nest and the sides of the box with soft white feathers so you can't see a darned thing!  And in wren news, I think that maybe they've started hatching - seems to be more activity around their box at the moment.  

I had a lovely long talk with my parents this morning - it is not quite as good as being there in person, but still good.  They just returned from a big geo-caching event in eastern Washington state where the temps were pushing 115 F - yikes!  Back in Portland now where it's a "cool" 100...

Thanks to Walking Wombat for hosting the TinyTuesday macro challenge - very fun and many, many great photos to enjoy.  

I'm going to go power down my computer now - lots of thunder and lightening and the lights have flickered several times...

TTFN, people.