A walk around the yard

I took a walk around the yard this evening, to see what I could find.

A praying mantis egg sac! I'm so glad...we got to watch about 100 baby mantis's hatch last year. I have to say, baby mantis's are the cutest bugs ever.

I don't know what this is. Thistle, maybe? I remember dumping old seed out here.

The woods across Rt. 48 behind our house. I like to think that "our" owl, woodpeckers and mammal visitors live in these woods.

And the moon rises over Williams manor...

This deer skull has rested here for 2 years. The deer was hit by a car, died under one of our trees, and Nellie was good enough to alert us. Geoff went to look, then came in the house and said, "Honey, there's a dead deer over the fence. And there's a watermelon next to it. "

Well, I knew what he was seeing, and tried to break it gently to my city-slicker husband. The deer's stomach had swollen with gas and protruded through the abdominal wall and skin, and would for all the world, look just like a watermelon.

Well, Geoff turned as green as the "watermelon".

I predicted that the stomach would blow in a day or two, and it did...we left the carcass where it was and all that is left is the skull, a few leg bones and the vertebrae.

Ah, life in the country.