Cop Car's Beat

Insects

During the months of April through October, I offer sugar water (1:4) to hummingbirds. They are a delight to watch. Before the sugar water is 1/2 gone (I normally fill the feeder with about one cup's worth), the ants have congregated and drowned themselves in the lower saucer of the feeder. My thought is that the ants are, to some extent, consumed by the hummingbirds. However, after three or four days, when it is time to refresh the supply of sugar water, this (photo, below) is how the lower saucer of the feeder looks. Lots of ants!

Thursday, when I put out a fresh supply of sugar water (in a freshly washed feeder), I failed to bring the "empty" feeder inside. It was left on the table on the patio. Yesterday (Friday) evening, when I checked the (seed, peanut, and sugar water) feeders, I noted the sugar water feeder on the patio table. It looked a little strange - as if the lower saucer had grown knobby feet. Approaching closer, this (photo, below) is what I saw.

A little closer up, the beetles are really beautiful - with iridescent greens and coppers (photo, below).

A bit of research via Google convinced me that what we have are Japanese beetles - lovely, but in the States, a pest. Now I understand what has been devouring leaves of our poke weed plants. The beetles are ravenous little beasties. Link to article on Wikipedia.

What number do you see?

Here's a little test for you. It tests color perception, for several colors, at three different (increasingly difficult) stages. I missed one in Stage 2 and one in Stage 3 - each testing orangish perception. In addition, I failed to see anything in the final test of Stage 3. It surprised me that I didn't miss more. Hunky Husband missed one in Stage 1, one in Stage 2, and two in Stage 3 - not too different from my results.

 

Assembling blocks on Dudette's quilt

Prior to doing the stitching/cutting on the 33 additional quilt blocks, I decided to actually assemble 9 of the 10 completed quilt blocks. As you can see, below, even after some ripping out and re-stitching, the assembly is not perfect. I'm counting on Dudette's continuing in her role as loving daughter by not demanding perfection.

I'm glad that I did the assembly. It reinforced the knowledge of how crucial it is to sew/cut precisely.

Update 7/20/2018

Update 8/14/2018

Good eating for butterfly larvae

The lace-effect of the heads on dill weed plants always pleases me (although I don't care much for lace on clothing). The Tiger Swallowtail butterfly lays her eggs on the plant, which makes it even more desirable. Some years (17?) ago, I planted a row of dill weed in my then-kitchen garden (between the houses - one of the areas that was sodded this spring). Since then, we've had an abundance of the plants come up, voluntarily, each year. Yay! (I still have seed in the kitchen - harvested that first year.)

In another part of our lot is a bunch of plants that are lacy-leaved much like the dill weed - fennels. In a pinch, the Tiger Swallowtail will also lay her eggs on fennel plants. Note that, in the photo, below, there is a lone dill weed among the fennels. Note, too, that the dill weed plant has been stripped - hopefully by larvae of the swallowtail.

 

Bluebird Nesting Box Report

Although I cannot put my eyes on it/them, just now, you probably recall my postings/comments concerning my disappointment over the lack of bluebirds' nesting in our new bluebird nesting box this Spring. Last Fall, as part of the landscaping re-work we had done, the old nesting box and its supporting 4"x4" post were removed and a new nesting box installed on a new 4"x4" post that was installed a short distance (10'-15') from the previous installation - to keep the nesting box farther away from the crepe myrtle bushes that our next-door neighbor had installed. Bluebirds like open spaces around their nests. However, despite our efforts, for the first time since we installed the old nesting box in 2000, no bluebirds chose to nest in the box.

Six or seven weeks ago, Hunky Husband and I thought we saw bluebirds carrying building materials into the nesting box. (At all times bluebirds, robins, Eastern phoebes, and red-shouldered hawks had favored the top of the nesting box as a place on which to alight and survey their environs.) Checking, there was no nest - and only one or two straws inside the nesting box.

Two or three weeks ago, with continued ins and outs by a bluebird pair, I checked, again. Indeed, there was a nest; but, it didn't have the look of a nest built by experienced parents. I took to ignoring the situation. Last evening, HH noted that the pair were hanging about the nesting box and (at least, once) one of them had gone inside it.

Remembering HH's observation a few minutes ago, I gave the nesting box another inspection. Lo and behold, expecting (at most) to feel a few well-cooked bluebird eggs when I stuck my hand up into the nest, I was shocked to feel nearly-naked little bodies. There were two or three birds in the pin-feather stage, but I beat a hasty retreat (well, I took the time to remove some wasp cells hanging from the ceiling of the nesting box) so as not to disturb the parents too much. When I came inside, I observed each of the parents taking food to the little ones, and the male removing a fecal sac.

Poor little things. I feel for them in the heat! It's in the high 90s, this week - 99 degrees Fahrenheit, yesterday. And, oh yes, the humidity is in the high 80%s.

Dudette's quilt has been started

In early April, I posted Small progress in quilting in which I wrote: "Some years ago (2006 or 2007?) I took Dudette and Bogie to the quilting supplies store that was about one mile from our house (it closed several years ago). There, they were to pick out fabrics and block designs for quilts that I promised to make them. Have I actually made the two quilts? Silly question. Of course I have not - yet!"

Further, I posted a computer-generated graphic (repeated, below) of the design that Dudette had chosen, and lamented about the tedious nature of the work it would take to make the blocks for the quilt top.

 
At that time, I had been experimenting with making the blocks larger, in order to lessen the amount of tedium; however, in the end, I decided that the quilt would be more pleasing to Dudette using 6" square blocks as had been used in the sample quilt that had been on display at the quilting supply store.

Drum roll: I have started. As found in the photo, below, about 10 blocks have been completed (small stack on the right) with 66 more blocks' worth of pieces' being ready for the final stitching/cutting (the two stacks in the middle - a rectangle of fuchsia fabric plus an intermediate part of a block makes two completed blocks). Somehow, I ended up with a single preliminary part of a block (on the left).

Fortunately, in quilting class (back in 2006 or 2007?), I learned not to cut each piece out separately in forming the preliminary parts of a block such as is on the left. Instead, I cut strips of each of the fabrics, sew the strips together along the length of the strips, and then cut the two as a unit to form the preliminary parts of a block. That still leaves a lot of tedious work, but lessens it to a degree.

The photo, below, shows a completed block. Stu's SWMBO will recognize the block as Mary's Triangle Block (at least that's what it's called in the States). For anyone who cares to know how one gets from an intermediate part of a block + fuchsia rectangle to two completed blocks, I'll upload the instructions for making Mary's Triangle Block.

Another thing that lessens the tedium is that nifty triangle in the left foreground of the above photo. I happened across it in a quilt store a couple of months ago while seeking something else. It makes drawing 45-degree angle lines on the backs of the intermediate parts of blocks, as described in the instructions, easier. Those stitching lines must pass through the corner of the blue block, precisely, and be correctly oriented for the completed block to look/be right.

Download Mary's Triangle Block

Hunky Husband's new baby

Well, that's not really his car; but, it looks like it.