It is that time of the year when all around us are signs of the season changing. The leaves are starting to change colors. The birds are getting ready for that long trip south. The squirrels are padding their nests with grass for the cold winter that will be coming. The nights are getting cooler. Fall is definitely on its way. This picture of the squirrel with a mouth full of grass for his nest was actually taken 2 years ago. I used to call him the 10:00 squirrel because you could set your clock by him. Ten am every morning he would be hunting food on our front street. Many of the neighbors would leave nuts out for him and his family. At one point we had about 5 squirrels in the neighborhood, unfortunately most of them including the 10:00 squirrel were killed by a hawk. We were all sad to know they were killed, but I guess the hawk has to eat too. I just wonder if we had not feed them if just maybe they would have been more alert to the hawks over head.
I was taking some photos of the rose bush across the street from my house and I saw something really cute. The picture is a little large, but this is what I saw a bumble bee trying to get every last drop of the pollen from the last remaining flowers of summer. I wish you could all have seen her jumping from bud to bud what made it cute was when she rolled over and rubbed her back inside one flower. It reminded me of how a playful puppy will sometimes roll over on its back, and shake around. I have never before thought of bees as cute, especially after a swarm of this same bread of bee attacked me when I was 5 years old. My older brother had stirred them up by accident, and I ran right into the middle of the swarm. I did not know they were there till it was too late. As bees go bumble bees are some of the more gentle bees. You leave them alone and they will never bother you. They just go on about their business like this little girl was doing. She did not care I was taking her picture, or that I was amused by how cute her style was. All she cared about was gathering as much pollen as possible while the flowers are still blooming.
