Just in case this was unclear copepods and isopods ARE crustaceans. So next time you see a wee pillbug just think of it as a land lobster 
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First hummingbird of the season!
I’m going with that term from here on out.
That was an amazing video! Thanks for sharing it with us.
No problem. You might have noticed Martha has this peculiar thing of tending to close her left eye when singing. When I first saw her, I thought she must be missing one eye, but nope. Seems to be just a habit.
When I saw the second picture I thought the coneflower was part of the butterfly. Never saw one like that before!
So true. Even wildlife that will normally tap dance right in front of you will disappear as soon as the camera comes out.
I’m jealous! I have at least a month before mine show up.
I have plenty of robins who I feed raisins on my patio. As soon as they return in the spring they come right up to the French doors and peer into the house until I toss out raisins.
Also, cardinals are back and my red breasted nuthatches have doubled in numbers.
Me, too!
On my lunch break at the moment, having the pleasure of watching a downy woodpecker & a multiplicity of robins.
One robin has softly muted colors - where the others have a dark, almost black head, one is pale dove-grey, with a pinkish belly instead of brick orange.
My friend does that, and it is kinda cute. And a little weird, true.
Great picture! The use of color is truly artistic.
I am glad that is not life sized tho!
I did not know that robins like raisins! They always seem to be looking for worms here.
It’s funny because they eat the raisins right up until they teach their young where to come for them. Then the adults disappear, unless it’s a two brood year.
Between Saturday morning and Sunday evening, two pairs of my husband’s shoes that were left in the garage became birdie nesting boxes. 
Fortunately there aren’t any tiny eggs yet.
Saw three river otters playing in the water this morning. It’s not unheard of around here (Western Puget Sound) but still pretty unusual. They sure do look like they’re having fun.
Buzzard Watch Update!
Just to be clear, this is the bird we’re talking about - big old raptor:
Out on the bike today on a quiet country road, woods to the left of me, open fields to the right, a buzzard appeared from over the fields, opening its wings to air-brake in, as it crossed the road and drifted into the trees. Great, I thought, I should get a fine view - there are not many leaves yet, and the bird had only been ten or twelve feet up. I just had to slide round a bend in the road to the left to see where he had landed and…
… he had landed on top of another buzzard. Aha. Well, it is spring, I guess. But not big on foreplay, buzzards, it seems*.
This video confirms that they’re not birds for standing on ceremony (as it were).
j
* - well, they mate for life.
I get the oddest birds at my feeder.
Used to confuse me as a kid reading stories set in the UK. This is the “buzzard” I grew up with. Absolutely and by far the most ubiquitous raptor where I live. A lot of birders won’t give them a second glance they’re so common, but I’m always on the lookout for the rare (in CA) mimic.
Yeah, @Beckdawrek and I got mutually confused over buzzards in the US and UK - it taught me to be very specific about the use of birds’ names (particularly as I’m telling British stories on a US board).
j
ETA - I can see why you’d be on the lookout for that mimic - cool!
A few days ago, a hawk flew over the road I was driving on and landed near a group of other hawks in an empty field. Two were facing a third, who was standing there with wings outstretched, sort of like a threat display? Or maybe a mating display? We’ve definitely had juvenile hawks cruising around lately; one burst into our screened-in porch (as described in a different thread).
Yesterday, a large, boxy beetle (like a stinkbug) flew loudly past my head–it sounded like a little helicopter–and landed on my desk. He started crawling up the power cord to my tower PC. I went into another room to fetch the handheld vacuum. When I returned, he had vanished. After a brief search, I gave up and returned to my PC. An hour later, he emerged from under the tower, turned toward me, and reared up onto his back legs!
Then he flipped over onto his back and started waving his legs pathetically. I scooped him up in a tissue and put him into the wastebasket. Last seen, he had vigorously thrown the tissue aside and was crawling around in the wastebasket.
My brother! 
“Let my people go…”
A new crop of baby alligators swimming near the culvert under our road. There are four in this picture, the top one being hardest to see.
