Interesting Flora Migration

All of the wildflowers I have photographed are in the area just beyond the South pond berm. Some are familiar, but they are heartier this year (several years of high yearly precipitation averages). Others are new - appeared during the past couple of years, or very new - I have never seen them before. All are nice in their own way.

Maybe I'll take a few

There is almost an invastion of Bullock's orioles

but the are too fast for me. The pond is beautiful, but I'm not going to take any pictures until we get it mowed and trimmed. It looks infested right now.

Early Morning Pond Attire

What a little explorer.

Perfect early this morning

4/10 inch of rain last night and another storm is building now

Interesting wildflowers.

Great Storm just now.

Intense rain; cold, refreshing wind; tremendous lightning and thunder. It was wonderful but the inevitable green is so disconcerting.

Introspective yet Uneventful Sunday

I didn't go to the pond today. No reason. Really.
Instead, here are a couple of pictures from the first years.

"Serenity Now"

The good news is, the pond is beautiful, the sun has appeared intermittently throughout the day so it's gotten a breath of air, and, so far only two fish have died. The bad news is, Bill just spent the day dragging two more ratty junked cars from his shop in town out to the pond. I keep reminding myself that it is not my yard, but I hate seeing him trash such a nice place with that worthless crap and am currently so angry about it that it's hard to even think in sentences. Mainly I'm seeing red splotches and lightning and keep thinking the word "destroy" over and over.
Just what are the horrible life experiences that leave a person trapped in this mental illness of stacking wrecked, rusting, and depressingly ugly automobile carcases in the back yard?

Still Waiting

Still no sun, but no sign of overwhelming stress. The pond is full so I had to shut off the waterfall, but still have the sprinkler running. The place actually looks nice considering what lurks nearby (the looming oxygen crisis).

It sprinkled all night (two-tenths inch), and -

lots of drizzle today but no sun. Only one fish has died so far but the others are worried. I can't do anything worthwhile about the situation (have the waterfall and sprinkler on already), but still, this is minor compared to previous years when I walked out and found thousands of fish on the surface, gasping for air.

Still Cloudy

but no great damage to the fish yet. The koi (which are first responders to diminished oxygen levels) were still close to the surface when I last looked, but not freaking out. I ran the waterfall and sprinkler all day and some kind of balance was established but that will end tonight and there will be hundreds of fish gasping for air by morning. I hate the oxygen inversion situation times of year, but we have learned how to manage it better each year. As my sister said, I'm so glad we convinced Bill to stop the feeding and supplemental oxygenation. (If only we could convince him to stop what appears to be some kind of weird geriatric lawn mower madness. He uses the mower all day long to move himself and his projects around his yard and shop which is a good idea, but several times a week he also lowers the blades and spends an hour or so plowing up parts of the yard, and shredding water hoses, electrical cord, toys and trash. He absolutely refuses to lift the blades so that they only mow the grass. It's just weird.)

It's raining right now and I hope the sun comes out tomorrow.

The fish were stressed this morning.

I forgot to remember that a couple of days without sunshine leads to a breakdown in pond respiration. This is the third day of clouds and the pond surface was covered with fish at 6 AM. I started the waterfall and a sprinkler and that seems to be enough for now but if it stays cloudy and doesn't rain, they will be in a serious bind by tomorrow.

They Seem to Spend all of Their Time out Here