Northern Cardinal teenager

This is one of the juvenile cardinal from the spring brood, a male judging from the abundance of reddish-orange feathers coming in on his breast.  And you'll notice that his bill is also starting to lighten up - at fledge, their beaks are blackish-gray and their overall color is quite muted.  By the end of summer, he'll look just like his dad - bright red and handsome.  Anyway, thought he'd make a nice blip subject today.

I did a bit of a macro safari around the yard, too and turned up some fun things.  Three shots on Flickr,  starting HERE with a long-tongued bee

In keeping with the tradition of grilling on Independence Day, we are having some pork and corn on the cob from the grill.  We finally got our drip system up and running in the back gardens today - hot work, but satisfying to get it done, especially with the warm weather forecast for the upcoming week.

To all my friends in the US, Happy Independence Day - and to everyone else, Happy Monday!

Cheers.