Sometimes nature does frightening things.

[littlewolfteeth]

I haven't been landscaping lately unless it's a very nice and dry day. I tried to just let my body sweat through it but nah, that's not happening. I'm sensitive to the heat and I just don't tolerate humidity very well at all.

Anyways! Look at that bug!!!!!!! I did not know this was a bug until it moved. I'm used to weird and horrifying insects in this state. I did not know caterpillars could purposely look like bird droppings! I just now checked on my orange tree and I haven't done that in a while because, well, it's been storming so I just kept pushing that off. Big mistake on my part. Apparently all those little orange balls I found stuck to my leaves late at night (I went checking because I noticed a few nibbles here and there and I wanted to catch the intruder - Google told me slugs come out at night) were the eggs of a swallowtail butterfly. I did not crush them all either. It was dark, I saw a couple and thought, "Huh. Must be some type of egg. I'll find the rest later." *squish* and then went back inside.

I thought a bird got mad at me and just used my tree for target practice. I almost walked away but then I saw one of their heads move. I stuffed them all into a water bottle. All eight of them. I was fascinated. I wanted to know what these things are. They also stick appendages out too when confronted. I didn't like that. I'm going to take these guys way down the road and set them free. I love butterflies too much to kill them. I just don't want them eating my orange tree. I don't have the heart to kill them. Oh well. Now I know to get rid of the eggs before they hatch. D:

Seriously though!!! HOW does a butterfly know what bird droppings look like and then mimic that in their evolution??? These questions keep me up late at night. Same for that snake that has a tail that looks like a spider to lure in birds.



They uh... ate a good chunk of leaves off of my tree. Luckily, my tree has been growing more branches in light of all the rain storms. Which tells me I need to water her more often. However, the leaves are growing rather big and look a bit on the lighter side. I don't know why it would be doing that. The spot it sits in currently has full sun for at least six hours of the day. I guess that's not enough though? Something is happening. I don't know though. I can't move it again because the spot I have it in has the best option for sunlight. Maybe I need to cut down more trees.

I put in a fertilizer spike for citrus fruit as per the directions of the package. Maybe I should give it a liquid fertilizer boost? Then again, that can't fix the sunlight problem. Either way. If it is the sunlight, it just wants to be blasted in full sun like a sunflower at this point.



At least there is good news. I'm the proud new parent of a tiny avocado tree. ^^; I just... need to er, quickly figure out where I'm going to put it. I didn't think they would grow that fast. It's going to be transplanted in a couple of weeks to a much bigger container. I'm not sticking into the ground until it's about the size of my orange tree so it won't get trampled or anything. I still have time to make a plot for it.



I did have a nice little friend nestled in my orange tree a few weeks ago when we were having that unending dry spell that was AMAZING for me might I add.



I have been still landscaping the weeds out here and there. I've drastically cut back and like I said, I don't do this every day if I do it at all. It needs to not feel like I'm going to immediately have heat sickness upon being outside longer than a few minutes. I keep finding these... vines? I don't know what they are and they aren't connected to the normal invasive jungle vines I have crawling all over my trees. I thought maybe wisteria but I couldn't find it connected to the one wisteria vine I do have. I don't know. That sucker was longer than twelve feet.

So overall, I have sort of halted my gardening for the most part. I can't do anything at the apex of our summer unless it's just quickly watering them and getting back inside. Unfortunately, I don't have the time to do anything in the mornings either.