Large Milkweed Bug Nymphs

These pictures area few weeks old because I haven't had time to share them and I really haven't felt like it until now. I'm trying to conquer a bit of fall fatigue I get every year about this time. I really planned on making this a nice big complicated post, but let's just see if I can keep it a bit simpler than that.

What you are looking at here are Large Milkweed Bug Nymphs (young ones). I've seen small milkweed bugs before, but this is the first time I've ever seen the large kind. A simple search on this site can find some very interesting, and an even somewhat scientific post about the small ones.

I'm not going to bore you with too many details about these bugs here, but you can find plenty of information with a simple web search. You should do it simply because your fingers need the extra exercise. Go on, it's good for you.

This picture above gives you a pretty good view of these bugs. Bugs can look kind of disgusting to the human eye sometimes if you're not prepared for them. Don't you think? Especially when they're all huddled together like these.

Here's one boring its head into a milkweed pod. They're one of the few kinds of creatures that eat these plants. If you look closely you can see that those big black parts on its back aren't all the way attached. Can you guess why? You're smart so I'll let you figure it out.

Even though they are on more than one pod, most of these bugs huddle together with each other.

It's kind of interesting how I found these bugs. You wouldn't guess it, but I was driving along and I spotted them from my truck. The picture above is just about what I saw that made me stop. It's amazing what you can find when you are looking.

I posted this last picture just because I wanted to give you one last look at them. I'm fascinated by these bugs. Bugs can be disgusting, but they are also very interesting. There were ladybugs and boxelder bugs all over my garage this fall, like every year, but I neglected to get any pictures. Now I wish I would have gotten a few.

Most people like ladybugs, but I've noticed in the past several years that we have a new kind that bite. It only hurts a little bit, but it doesn't feel pleasant. I've written about them in the past and they are a new different kind than from long ago years past.

So anyway, I'll try to begin posting more often again soon, but I'm not promising anything just yet. I still need to find some inspiration to shake off this fall depression. It will happen, but I'm not sure when yet. and with that last negative note, I'll talk to you later...

Scenes From Broken Kettle Grasslands

I have some good scenery from Broken Kettle Grasslands for you today because I think you'll like to see it. I like looking at it so I think you'll like it too. Even so, there's nothing like being there yourself. You should also find a good nature place near you to visit.

See that helicopter in the top right of the picture above? You might have to click on the picture to see it better. You may have already guessed that it's not really a helicopter. It's a really a dragonfly. There were lots of them flying around when I took this picture. Fun stuff.

Here's a zoomed out view of a soybean field with the Loess Hills in the background. The Loess Hills here don't look as impressive in my pictures as they do in real life. I can't figure out why that happens.

This place in my first two pictures isn't really part of Broken Kettle Grasslands. It's right on the edge of that place. But I take pictures here every time I pass. I just like the look of this particular place so much for some reason.

And finally, we get to Broken Kettle. You can see fence posts in the front. This fence is electrified, and it's there to keep the bison from getting out and roaming the highways. A car might not do very well in a fight with one of these huge animals.

I noticed the electric tower in the background after reviewing my pictures. It seems out of place in this place of nature at first, but it also makes the picture slightly more interesting. These towers hold up the power lines that supply electricity to the surrounding area.

This last one is from the top of the Loess Hills at Broken Kettle. The green in the distance is the tops of trees. A picture makes it difficult to see height in a picture for some reason, but these hills are very high up there.

If you want to see more scenery from Broken Kettle Grasslands I have several other posts that show similar scenes. Some are better and some are not. But I have them. But this is the end of what I have today. I'll talk to you later.

Roadside Wildflowers

I decided to take a drive around the countryside yesterday. The beauty of living around here is that you don't have to go to a nature park to find nature. Nature is all around me. So I decided to look around at some of that nature, and I found these wildflowers on the roadsides of the country.

You have to really explore sometimes to find flowers around here, and I got lucky to find all of these on just one trip. I'm not sure why wildflowers are so rare, but it's maybe only because I haven't searched enough until now. I'll have to keep looking to see if that's right.

The first thing I did this time was to find the dirtiest of dirt roads. Sure it's easy to just go up and down the main highways, but it's best to really get out into what some might call the middle of nowhere to find the best of nature.

I found this little bee walking around in this wild rose. It didn't seem to mind that I was there so I took a few pictures of it. Now the bee and the flower are both famous. They'll be seen by people from all over the world. And they thought they were just there for South Dakota people.

The leaves of this wildflower were interesting to me so I decided to show them to you too. The camera seemed to like them too because it focused on them instead of the flower.

If you'd like to find out what kind of flowers all of these are then here's a nice flower identification tool I found just for you: MyWildflowers.com

Here's one of these with all of the leaves showing too. Flowers are good, but the rest of the plant is good too.

These wildflowers are very small. I just zoomed in really close with my camera. I recently found out my phone camera has an 8X zoom on it. That's much better than I thought a phone could do. The camera also focuses on small stuff better than my big camera can.

As you can see, I have lots of pictures today. I didn't want to split these wildflowers up into several different posts. It would seem like the same post over and over with slightly different pictures. So I just decided to give you one big post. You probably like it better this way anyway because there are lots of flower pictures.

Right now I have so many pictures from my everyday adventures that I'm not sure I can keep up with them here. I'm posting as fast as I can, but I'll have to see if I can go even faster. I used to have a post every day, but I'm not sure I'm fast enough to do that anymore. I guess we'll see what happens. I'll talk to you later.

Swarmed By Butterflies

I went to Dorothy Pecaut Nature Center yesterday, which is an indoor and outdoor nature park. This is probably the best nature park around, and the most similar to my parks from back in Michigan. I love this place.

The only problem, which I've told you about many times, is that it is built on the side of the hills. Even with the hard to walk hills, I go here as often as I can. But there are so many nature parks around here that I try to split time between them all. But this time I went here.

So what happened on this trip? The title should give you a good hint. I was swarmed by butterflies! And I don't think my pictures or story can fully demonstrate this event as it happened. I'll try though. I'll try.

When I first got there I saw several butterflies around the concrete steps to get down to the park. I took many pictures because I figured those were the only butterflies. I'm not sharing the pictures because they're kind of unremarkable.

Then I got to the start of the trail. This is a dirt and gravel trail with wooden steps to get down to the lower part of the park. The park goes down a hill then back up even higher than you started. This is the place where the butterflies really were.

There must have been millions of butterflies here on the ground and flying around. These pictures show lots of butterflies, but they are nothing compared to the sheer number I saw when I got there. The butterflies in the pictures are just the ones that didn't leap into the air when I got close.

I had to walk through this butterfly swarm to get to the rest of the park. When I walked into the swarm there were butterflies bouncing off of me and landing all over me. You don't think it would be with butterflies, but it was really kind of disturbing.

I kept trying to gently brush the butterflies off of me, but I wasn't really fast enough. I didn't want to hurt any of them, so I was as careful as I could be. I really felt the need to get away, but I never really did. They were everywhere in the park.

I wanted to take video, but the light was at such an angle that I was having too much trouble seeing my camera screen to hit the right button. I decided that I would do it once I got down into the forest where there was some shade and then come back. But when I came back there seemed to be almost as many people as there were butterflies, so I don't have video for you.

When I finally went back to my truck to cool off and rest my back I took this picture of a butterfly on my window. It's probably my best picture of the day. I had to edit the first picture a bit to fix the lighting so you could see the butterfly better.

So that's my most recent adventure. Right now I have too many pictures and stories from my everyday adventures to share them all. I'm just not fast enough. I'll do my best though. I love when this happens. It means I'm having fun. I'll be back as fast as I can. And I'll talk to you later.

Advice From A Caterpillar

I'm a little short on adventures lately so I decided to introduce you to an old friend. I often found myself oddly in Wonderland with my little friend along. It was a kind of joy seeing a little kid love nature so much. I'll revisit some of our adventures whenever I get the chance between my newer ones. This one is from back in the summer of 2008.

"Who are you?" said the Caterpillar.

Alice replied, rather shyly, "I-I hardly know, sir, just at present-at least I know who I was when I got up this morning, but I think I must have changed several times since then."

"What do you mean by that?" said the Caterpillar, sternly. "Explain yourself!"

"I can't explain myself, I'm afraid, sir," said Alice, "because I'm not myself, you see-being so many different sizes in a day is very confusing." She drew herself up and said very gravely, "I think you ought to tell me who you are, first."

- Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

I thought this blue caterpillar reminded me of something. The top picture is the size we saw it when we first arrived. In the bottom picture it got just a little bit bigger. You can see all the little details, even it's legs clinging to the leaf. Maybe you're thinking, "Here's the blue caterpillar, but where's Alice?"

Of course the blue caterpillar is in these two pictures. You can't see Alice because she's standing just to my left, trying to get her own picture of the caterpillar. She probably doesn't know that she's Alice, but I can see by the look on her face that she does know that she's standing right in the middle of Wonderland.

The Mystery Of The Blood Red Bugs

I took pictures of some milkweed plants while I was out on another everyday adventure back some years ago. I saw milkweed plants before that, and have talked about them here in the past many times. I wanted a small update for myself because I've always liked milkweed.

When I got back home and examined the pictures from the day, I got a little surprise. That seems to happen to me a lot. I was checking out the pictures of these milkweed plants, when I saw these little blood red bugs crawling all over some of them.

I examined the pictures very closely. I zoomed in to see as much as I could. You can see the discoloration of the pod that they're on in the last picture. I'm assuming it's either dead or dying. In one place to the top of the group of bugs, one bug is seen boring right into the side of the seed pod. A little on the lower end there is a bug already embedded in the pod.

What were these bugs? I was fascinated by them. I was, and still am, a little repulsed. They're feeding on, and even destroying my beloved milkweed plants! I had to find out what they were. I decided to search everywhere I could, with every resource I had. I think I found the answer!

These bugs are called Small Milkweed Bugs (Lygaeus kalmii). I wasn't at all sure at first, because the pictures I saw didn't look quite the same. The pictures I found showed something that was more orange and black, instead of these blood red things.

As I did further research, I found that these are the only insects that eat from the pods. They like the taste of the seeds apparently. I also found out that the nymphs (young ones) are red just like in my picture above. As they grow older, they grow more orange and develop black areas.

These bugs can be found in large numbers on milkweed plants. They mate right on the plants. They also feed on the seeds late in the season, which would be right around October when I took these pictures that year. They also suck the nectar from the flowers of various herbaceous plants. In the spring they are also reported to be scavengers and predators, since milkweed seeds are scarce.

The only thing that confused me was that these appear to be nymphs. I thought before that I would only see them earlier than now. But I found out more.The adults lay their eggs on the milkweed in the spring, and they have sometimes more than one generation in a year. That would likely solve my nymph mystery.

As to the noticeable red coloring of the small milkweed bugs. This coloration and the fact that they don't seem to move around very quickly, tells us something about them. After feeding on the poisonous milkweed seeds, these bugs have themselves now become poisonous. They are immune to any poisons from the plant, but any potential predator is not. The red coloration is a warning for predators not to eat them.

Well there you go. That explains what these blood red bugs are. This article is now the best place on the internet to find information on Small Milkweed Bugs. I have gathered together more information on them than any other website I have found so far. It's my gift to you. If you can show me otherwise, I'll post new information and give you credit.

Another mystery solved by The Everyday Adventurer. I'm just like Scooby Doo, except with an eye patch. (That last part was for my old friend Alice. I'll have to tell all of you newer readers about her sometime.)

I'll talk to you later.

Surprise Flowers

I have two surprises for you today! The first surprise is these flowers. I keep saying that I almost never see flowers around here. And I really don't, but here are these. When I see them I make sure I get at least a few pictures.

I'm lucky I had my phone this time because these flowers were tiny and the phone zooms right in and gets good focus on small things. My big camera doesn't do quite as well in automatic mode. Now whenever I have something small to share I use the phone.

And you may not have noticed my second surprise. There's a bug in the picture above. I don't know whether I caught him by surprise or he just diesn't move anymore. But I got the bug in the picture too. And it's a nice clear shot. Pretty good for just one picture.

And I found another flower! I said I had two surprises, but does another flower count as a third? This looks to be some kind of thistle, maybe of the Canadian variation, but it's kind of small compared to most. This flower is also tiny, but not as small as the others.

This is a nice lavender colored flower, but you won't want to pick it. It bites. Look at those thorns below the flower. I don't like that part. Such a shame. I wanted to pick this flower to death so much too.

I would have posted more pictures this time, but I only had these two. Like I said, I don't see many flowers around here. Maybe I need to look harder. My next trip might have more flowers or some other interesting plants. I guess we'll find out next time. I'll talk to you later.

Back With An Interesting Bug

Since I haven't been on the internet for a month my writing is a little bit rusty. I'll leave my absence up to your wildest imaginations. But now I'm back and I've brought this interesting bug with me. It's good to be back.

The bug appears to be a moth of some kind, but I'm not really even sure about that. I found it on the front of my house. It was sitting there just looking cool one night so I whipped out my phone and took a picture of it. Having the smartphone with me really is handy.

I only have the one good picture so I'll keep the post short. I hope to have more posts starting in a few days. But I don't have any material yet so I'm not sure how soon I'll be back. Hopefully it won't be another month. I'll talk to you later.

My Newest Butterfly

I have to admit right off the bat that I've decided that I'm too lazy to keep searching for the identification of this butterfly. I searched for about thirty minutes with no luck and I'm giving up. The worst thing is that I've seen this type of butterfly many times before and I know that it's very common.

But who really cares anyway. The real thing is that I have pictures of a butterfly today. This plant was just swarming with them until I got kind of close. This one was the only butterfly willing to come back for me. It did good. Now it's famous. I'll call him Benny.

Here you can see Benny Butterfly just sitting there on the strange and possibly alien plant helping the plant plot to take over the world. I'll bet you didn't know that about butterflies. They don't start out evil. But when they get together with these evil alien pod plants they become evil super villains. I guess we can all be glad they're only butterflies. Right?

Now isn't that last little paragraph better than a boring old examination into the type of butterfly and plant we're looking at? You can find all that stuff just about anywhere else. You can always go to Wikipedia if you miss it. Well, if you really want it I'll give you just a little bit. Kind of. Not really.

Here above is a better look at the plant the butterfly is on. It's a kind of milkweed plant. These milkweeds are scattered all over the area. I have several pictures of them. The different kinds of milkweed make up a favorite kind of plant of mine. I may do a post about this particular type in the near future. We'll see.

Alright, I couldn't resist, so I looked a little more for the identity. I'm probably completely wrong, and I don't care, but it looks similar to a Spangled Fritillary. That particular type was the first one I saw when I searched for "Iowa butterflies". Maybe I'm a winner. If not, then ehh.

The one thing I can tell you for sure is that butterflies are special little creatures. So now that I presented a butterfly to you, how can I top it in my next post? I don't know. (Actually I do know), So you'll have to read my next post to find out what is better than a butterfly. I'll talk to you later.

My Newest Dragonfly

Whenever I get a chance to get a picture of a dragonfly I take it. I've had better ones than these, but not recently. These aren't too bad. I got lucky because this little guy stayed on that rock for a long time. I wasn't standing nearly as close to it as it might seem.

As far back as I was standing makes me think of the days when I had my first camera. It was a good little camera, but I had to get up really close to get any good pictures. Looking back at some of my older posts, I'm surprised at some of the pictures of animals I was able to get. I had to be a much better animal stalker and photographer than I am now.

I'm kind of distracted writing this post. My mind is on the future because I have a post coming up of something I never thought I'd see. I don't want to reveal it until that post. I would have posted it this time, but I don't have the video uploaded yet. I'm really excited.

I keep seeing amazing things whenever I go out for long enough. This dragonfly is just one small example. Some people may not think this is very remarkable, but let them try to get these pictures. Taking pictures like these is more fun than a video game. There's nothing better than nature. I'll talk to you later.

Little White Butterflies

I have some more butterflies for you. I told you in my last post that I was chasing butterflies. These pictures aren't nearly as good as those in my last post, but usually I can't get these little butterflies at all because they're so quick.

You'll just have to imagine me running back and forth after these little guys. I felt lucky any time one of them would stay still more than a fraction of a second. I've had better pictures of butterflies, but I don't know if I've ever had more fun getting them.

I sit here right now at my computer thinking that I never see interesting things in nature anymore, but it really seems that every time I go out for a good amount of time I see lots of wonderful little things, like these butterflies.

I guess when I'm home for a little too long I get kind of discouraged. I just imagine that I'll never see anything but endless grassy fields and cow pastures. Those can be interesting, but sometimes monotonous. I forget the forests and rivers and other fascinating things that are only a few miles away from me. I keep trying to tell myself to remember that.

There's still a new little nature park that I discovered a short time ago and I haven't explored yet. It seems like all my time is being taken up by other more unpleasant things lately. I'm trying to mix in more enjoyable things like exploring nature, but it's not working as well as I keep hoping.

I know one of these times everything will clear up and I'll be back out exploring nature all I want. Then I'll get a chance to explore that new place. I hope I'm not disappointed in it. It looks like it has the potential to be like the little parks I used to visit back in Michigan.

But I can find things like these butterflies just about anywhere. That's the beauty of nature. You can just go right outside your door and find something good. that's easy to forget when you've been inside a little too long, so make a point of going pout. I'll talk to you next time.

Chasing Butterflies

The past couple of weeks have been full of dealing with doctors for me. I haven't had much time to think about anything else, and it's not quite over. I'm trying to get at least a few small visits out to nature here and there. I found this butterfly on one of those little visits.

I don't know that I have much to say about the butterfly. I haven't had time to check and see what kind it is, but it does look familiar. I've posted about these little guys before and I think I've identified those back then. I'll tell you just what it is next time I get one.

I did at least remember to get a little video of the butterfly, done in Super Ratty Shaky Cam mode. If you watch it on Youtube you can view it in whatever quality you want. I'm not sure how good the quality is on here. I'm hoping it's set on low so everyone can see it.

On days like the one with this buttefly encounter I wish I could stay out there forever. I keep quickly remembering that I have other unpleasant things I have to do though. I stood and watched the river behind this butterfly for a long time. It was heaven.

I was chasing butterflies from plant to plant. Most of them were too fast for me. I got the video because the pictures were getting hard. The video did a good job of keeping up though. I'll have to take a look at my other butterfly pictures to see if there's anything that's good enough for another post. I'll have to have at least a small story for it though. I'll talk to you later.

A Damselfly And A Lesson

I haven't taken a picture of a damselfly like this one in a long time until now. I was talking about slowing down and taking a better look at my surroundings in my last post. Even though I'm still feeling a little lost around here, I'll always remember things like damselflies.

I've been out a lot recently so I think I'm getting a good chance to learn about my surroundings pretty fast. One of the still new things for me is hiking with my dog. When I was alone I could focus all of my attention on the nature around me. But with the dog I have to pay attention to her just as much. It's been a little bit of a struggle even when she tries to help me with what I'm supposed to do.

Just yesterday we were out on a nice little nature trail when she began pulling me in a direction I didn't want to go. I had my head down looking at her and becoming a little annoyed. I wanted to continue down the trail, so I tried to pull her with me, but she pulled right back. So I looked up a little bit and told her in a loud voice to come on. It was right then that I saw the deer that she was pulling me towards. It was standing only a little ways away observing us. But when I yelled it ran away. I have to learn to work with the dog a little more.

She was very patient while I was taking the pictures of this damselfly. She stood there waiting and kept some slack on her leash while I got the pictures. She's usually like that. I never believed that a deer would come so close with her there, only things like this damselfly. I still have some things to learn, but at least now I am going out and learning those lessons.

A Closeup Of A Bee

There was a bit of talk about bugs on flowers in my last post, especially bees, so I decided to show off my camera's ability to get good bee closeups. Actually it was only by chance that I got these pictures, but I thought they were nice and timely.

I always thought that you got a good picture if you can get your specific bug, especially bees, to look like a metallic creation of some kind. I've seen many pictures that get that quality. I think these pictures did okay in that sense. You can see the shine on the bees' backs.

Bees are some of the most beautiful bugs in existence. A good closeup always shows that. Their combination of colors seems to be just right to me. And their wings are like fairy wings. I'm not sure how you can get much better than that.

Any time you are taking pictures of plants you have a good chance of catching a bug in a shot or two. That, to me, is one of the most fun parts of taking this kind of picture. I said before that my eye for beautiful flowers may not be that good, but I know what I like when I see a bug.

A good bug can look more alien-like that anything else. That's because they so often make sci-fi aliens look like bugs. I wonder why they do that. Does somebody really think when the aliens come down they will look like bugs? I guess they might.

Aliens. Bugs. Maybe we look liker aliens to bugs. Maybe they think of us as crazed giants. Some of them do seem to get a bit upset by our presence. More of them have defenses against us than we think about. So many of them like to sting and bite. We can smash though, like the crazed giants we are. Talk to you later.

Ladybug Ladybug

I thought it would be fun to share these pictures of a ladybug with you this time. I love ladybugs. Doesn't everybody? These are my favorite kind of little bug, except for those kind that like to bite. Yes, some do bite, but it doesn't really hurt much.

These pictures look like some halfway decent macros, don't they? The only thing is that my macros always go wrong. The real answer is that these pictures aren't really macros. I just stood over these flowers and took the pictures while hoping for the best. I always get my best pictures that way.

These are actually the same pictures I posted last time, but I cropped them in close to the ladybug. That's what's so good about taking such high resolution pictures. If you get them right, you can look in at many tiny details.

I was just told in the last few days that I'll be able to go on my little journeys in a couple of weeks. So I'll be spending the next two weeks planning and preparing for my exciting new adventures. I hope I am able to do some of these things as fast as I want.

I want to do everything all at once, but I know I'll only be able to visit each place as soon as I get near them. One problem is that I already forgot where the nearest waterfalls are. I looked again, and I can only find the ones that are clear across the state. I need to keep looking. I should have saved those websites.

Yet my mind right now keeps going back to this little ladybug. I have to remember to keep looking at the small things. Often in my rush to do things, I forget about the small things. I want to see the little details whenever I'm out. I hope I can remember that. Talk to you later.

Three Of A Dragonfly

I'm back here a little sooner than you thought I'd be, aren't I? I'm trying to get back to posting a little more often again. I'm always in a much better mood when I do. Writing a post, no matter what it's about, gives me the feeling that I've been able to get something off my chest. So let's get to it!

You may have noticed that the three pictures of a dragonfly that I have here today look almost identical. I have to admit that they are the same original picture, and it's hard to tell the difference between them if you just look at them in the post. But they are indeed different. You have to click on the pictures to really see it well.

The difference is in the editing. I edited these pictures in a program called Gimp. It's a free editor in the style of Photoshop or Paint Shop Pro. Do a Google search for it. If you want a good editor you don't have to pay for then you won't be sorry.

Anyway, like I said, I edited these pictures in three different ways. The first one was done with an addon that is supposed to do what's called a simulated HDR effect. It supposedly makes the colors pop out and give the picture almost a 3D realistic effect. This addon is kind of hit or miss. What I liked about it in this picture is that it made the dragonfly pop out a little bit.

The second picture was done with an addon called natgeo. It's supposed to give the pictures a similar quality as the pictures you might often find in National Geographic. I think this one actually works pretty well. It really brings out the details well.

The last one was done with adjustments that I did myself. I adjusted the levels of some of the colors just a bit and I sharpened up the picture to make it easier on the eyes. I think it turned out well. I guess they all show some of the things you can do with an image editor. I like all three, but I can't decide which one is best. Which one do you like best?

Editing pictures is of course not all I've been up to. This took me only a few minutes to do these. I feel that we should have many different interests. It keeps our minds active and sharp. I'm still on my quest to learn more about plants. I haven't learned much so far, but I know that one of these times I'll make a huge leap in my knowledge.

I'm also still trying to get a little better with my photography. Basically, I want to become a little more organized and thoughtful while taking my pictures. I think that can make a huge difference in the number of quality pictures I end up with. I hope the combination of my learning all of this stuff will make some new interesting posts I can share.

And I'm still on a quiet quest to catch a Sasquatch. I plan on keeping him in my basement. Maybe he can learn to play video games or something. I've got big plans. Big plans. You'll find out one of these days.

Spotted Cucumber Beetle

I meant to have this post up a week ago. It seems like there's so much to do around here, but also nothing to do at times. As you can see by the title of the post, my mystery bug is a spotted cucumber beetle.

This bug turns out to be a very destructive little creep. As you may have guessed, it likes to eat things like cucumbers. It also likes watermelon, soybeans, and many other similar plants. They can destroy crops pretty quickly.

It's really a shame because these beetles sure are colorful little guys. That's how I noticed it in the first place. I saw that yellow color in one of my pictures. I immediately ran back outside hoping the little yellow bug was still there. The rest is here in my pictures.

I recently discovered that I'm afraid of heights, or at least afraid of being high up on a ladder. My dog Isabella has a dog run that consists of a cable that runs high up from one tree to another. Her chain comes down from that cable. That way she can move around in a much larger area.

The other day she got her chain stuck on the cable right at one of the two trees. I had to climb up the ladder to unhook it so it would work right again. It all started off just fine. I never anticipated that I would be afraid. But when I got about two steps from my destination I completely froze.

I had no idea I would be afraid, but I ended up having to go back down the ladder to gather myself. The second time up the ladder was a bit slower and shakier, but I finally made it up all the way and unhooked the chain with quite a bit of fear. Being up so high on that narrow ladder was not a fun experience. I'm happy to say that I got the job done though.

My quest of learning about plants was something else that was paused this past week. It's just that I got so busy that I kept putting it off. I need to hurry up and examine a few of the plants around here before they all go away for the winter.

I did get to work on my photography a little bit though. That really consisted of me playing around in the house with taking pictures of Isabella. I didn't get anything very good. I was just getting some practice with the manual focus on the camera. It might help me get clearer pictures. That's a good place to start.

I hope to have a few posts up a little sooner next time and I'm trying to get caught up with reading a few blogs too. Hopefully I won't get busy with other stuff this time. How can all that other outside junk keep getting in the way of my blogging fun? I hate when that happens!