First Chard Pick of the Season!

Going on the burgers tonight in lieu of the cabbage that is going bad.

Pot o' Pintos

Caterpillar Looking to Pupate

I relocated this one back into the yard to avoid pupating on my patio somewhere.

Anole on a Bay

Fat Lizard Rescue

I'll be glad when summer is over so I'll no longer need to be on constant lizard patrol. Sweet Pea loves to catch them and bring them to the patio and usually they only have a small bloody wound, if even that much. But if I don't intervene it gets worse.

This poor guy lucked out. And what a fat little whopper he is!

Emerging Cicada

Thursday Night Cicada Blogging

Oven-Ready

Casserole with home-grown cherry tomatoes ready to enter the oven.

Bagworm

Click to embiggen.

And there's more! Fifty seconds of video so you can see it move a couple of times.

Hairy Legs (& Lots of 'Em)

Just saw a small tarantula on the kitchen patio as I went to pull the muffins out of the oven.

Tuesday Toad

I think he or she knows there's a good chance of rain. By the way, how do you distinguish the he-toads from the she-toads?

Summer Harvest

Unnamed Family Member

I swear I need to name her, but I don't really want to bond much more than we already have or else she'll be sleeping in my bed.

Txrad Goes Shopping

Rooftop Raccoon

He SHE was following us around on the patio earlier. When we didn't feed him HER, he SHE decided to torment us from the roof.

Tarantula Hawk?

We've never seen one of these before. It's very fast moving and seems to stay on the ground searching for something, despite the orange wings.

From what I've researched, it might be a tarantula hawk. Does anyone know?

Snail on Stone

Heavy rain last night brought out even more critters this morning!

Evening Raccoon, Morning Toad

First toad sighting of the year. Summer is here!

Outside Looking In

Red Bird

The yard has been FULL of them this year. And noisy ones too!

Friday Texas Coral

Yep, that's red on yellow and I don't need this kind of drama today. Bastard was on our back patio.

Veiny Chard

Beautiful chard from the garden to dress up our burgers!

Spring at Kona Ranch!

photo credit: txrad

Tree Trunk Cleverly Disguised As Cat

Fresh Herbs

Despite a low of 10° last weekend, it didn't faze our oregano plant. Sheldon just picked some for our chili mac dish tonight.

There's also some rosemary in that shot.

A Cure for the Dark & Wet Winter Day Blues

Bright yellow orbs bring joy.

Jami Ward brought these over freshly-picked from her trees near Houston. We have some delicious juice on hand.