Wright’s Road was regularly on our itinerary for a couple of years until I started going to a different clinic. Then, recently, we were over that way three times in a row. It was nice to see that these small birds still flock there.
While I tried to get a picture of them, Grant noticed a hawk sitting atop another power pole a little further along, no doubt thinking of his lunch.
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But the hawk noticed us watching and took wing as the flock dispersed.
Only moments before, we’d witnessed another disappointment:
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We’d stopped to admire a giant swallowtail perched on greater burdock, when suddenly a bird shot up through the greenery, lunging for the butterfly – that escaped.
Sad for the bird, glad for the swallowtail. I had the impression that it was a catbird, but as it disappeared, I got only a fleeting glimpse of the frustrated bird.
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Really just a farm track, Wright’s Road is always fun, but August is when it is most alive.
On one side, soybeans. Soy seems to have disappeared from the headlines, so I hope the farmers have a market for it this year.
Two types of corn grow here and now that it is ripe, the difference is plain to see. I love riding along beside a corn field, watching the sun backlighting the leaves, as well as the seed pods of grasses beside the road.
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Plant life is profuse along all our roads and in any uncultivated or unused space.
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Until our first summer here, I had never seen this wonderful display.
It is another delight of being in the country.
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Coming back from the village one day, I asked Grant to pull over so I could take some photos and was somewhat surprised when a local resident rushed up to me:
“Can I help you? What are you doing?”
It seemed to me perfectly obvious what I was doing and I was standing in a public roadway, not on her property. Maybe if you’ve been accustomed to seeing wildflowers all your life it is hard to imagine anything special enough in them to want photograph?
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The landscape is much healthier this year than last summer with its months of drought. We are fortunate. Elsewhere water sources are drying up, while some parts suffer from floods.
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The fields were a lovely sight Wednesday morning, something I am truly thankful for.
Climate deniers say that the planet has always gone through such phases. Yes, indeed and that was before modern mankind threw poison into the atmosphere.
It makes you wonder what sort of catastrophe we are creating. In the end, I believe the human species will be destroyed by its own “cleverness” .
It is unlikely to occur in my lifetime, I daresay. Still, the thought of it is what causes me to treasure every precious moment enjoying the magic of Nature.
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It’s wonderful to see such an intense green in your photos, especially at the end of your summer. We haven’t had good winter rain like in previous years (although we did have that big storm at the start of winter), so the farmers are hoping for late winter rain in September to save their crops. You’d think that because we’re so dependent on the weather, we’d take better care of our planet … but sadly.
I’m glad that you are making the best of it, while it lasts. This summer has made me acutely aware that climate change is happening so much faster than predicted years ago. And though we may both not be around to see the worst of it in the future, we are going to see constant changes that we never expected to experience. I wonder why the resident was upset that you had stopped to photograph wildflowers? There is so much entitlement in modern-day society.
Best wishes, Pete.
Some years later we were told something about that family which would explain the paranoia while not exactly inspiring sympathy. And they badly mistreated their dog 🙁
Thinking of water – I remember reading somewhere that the water on planet Earth is finite. The Earth operates as a closed system for water, meaning the total amount of water on our planet remains constant. The water you drink today is the same water that existed billions of years.
This means that water that lands in one place is not landing somewhere else, and an unusual flood here may mean an unusual drought there.
This also means that the water is being constantly recycled and that the water in your glass could have been the water in Archimedes’s bathtub. Fun thought.
Hm. Now who’s bathtub water would I like to share?!!