Rain, rain, go away…

Sheesh, it’s been raining pretty steadily all day, so far, but there was a little gap just after sunrise, during which I did try to sneak into Estabrook Park. Needless to say, I only captured a couple of very dark, very grainy pictures, and I got soaked, too boot. Oof!

Luckily for you, however, the month of May has been otherwise so fruitful, that I still have some pictures that I don’t believe I’ve shown you yet.

Here’s one of the great horned owls on last Tuesday, another rainy day, and almost directly overhead, so definitely on our side of the river.

Here’s another look at that Baltimore oriole from Saturday, a cloudy and breezy day, who uncharacteristically posed and eventually sang for me.

Here’s an indigo bunting from the same day.

Here’s another look at that common yellowthroat on last Thursday, the cloudy day, who was far more interested in that worm he was smashing into submission to pay any attention to me.

Finally, here’s a tiny bee from Saturday, who is barely bigger than a single garlic mustard blossom, and iNaturalist suggests that it might be a Carlin’s mining bee (Andrena carlini).

Don’t worry. I patiently waited until the bee was done mining all the nectar and pollen it wanted, and then I carefully pulled up the garlic mustard, to get the taproot, pulled off the flowers and crushed them so they can’t go to seed even once the plant is pulled, and tossed it all on the paved path to be further ground by foot traffic. If that sounds a little harsh, perhaps you haven’t yet seen how garlic mustard choaks out all the native plants in its path and leaves nothing but a field of dried stalks full of seeds by mid-July.

Yes, buckthorn is bad, too, of course, but at least I see birds use it for cover all the time and eat its fruits all winter. On the other hand, this is the first time I’ve ever seen a critter get anything out of garlic mustard.

Anyway, your blossom of the day, about which I hope you can be glad, if iNaturalist’s identification is correct, is this pretty, native smooth yellow violet (Viola eriocarpa).