Flood Critters

With all the storms and rain we've been getting, the wildlife has changed around here: 

Most of the trees behind our house are gone, so there are less birds. Also, the flood way next to the house has been full of water for a week now, so we're starting to see ducks down there! Yesterday I spotted this little guy clinging to the patio door. Right out of a Telus ad!

Now here's something that had me worried today: I spotted these ants moving their eggs and larvae into our house. I don't care about a few ants in my walls, you can't avoid that here. But the last time I saw ants moving their eggs to higher ground was last saturday, and the next day we got hit with hurricane winds, torrential rain and huge hail. They're preparing for something ... I hope they're over-reacting this time.

Macro fun

After yesterday's events, I just spent a quiet Saturday at home. Macro photography really relaxes me, so I got out my camera and sat in the grass and had a close look at what I could find. 

I'm getting better with manual focus and at controlling the very shallow depth of field this lens produces. Here's some of the cool stuff I found.

This spikey beetle was a great subject, very slow moving and VERY cool looking.

Maybe this young praying mantis is the same one I shot a while back when it was a baby ?

Some vegetation. This is a close-up a bottlebrush flower bud

My rainbow chilies, lookin' fine !