The ‘fireworks’ in my yard this evening were from fireflies, although some must have thought it was too hot for flying as they were perched on limbs as they flashed their lights to the croaking of the frogs in the pond. Many Independence Day activities were canceled this year, including firework displays but there were plenty of neighborhood fireworks going off, which had my cat hiding until the booms stopped.
Fireworks on the Fourth
With the start of the holiday weekend and being a hot summer day, water was drawing in people in for different activities. The mist from the waterfall would feel good (but does get the camera lens wet).
A Day By the Falls
The warm summer day at the pond had frogs floating on the water surface and dragonflies darting around. The twelve-spotted skimmer dragonfly has three brown spots on each wing and the males have white spots between the brown spots where the females don’t have the white spots.
Male Twelve-spotted Skimmer
These little primroses look like they are on fire, and today’s heat and humidity matched the hot feel from the blossoms on this first day of July.
Primroses
On a hot summer day, these lambs won’t need a wool coat so it is good that their fleece is still short. But I can’t imagine tree bark being too tasty compared to the green grass.
Lambs in Summer
With flooded streets and washed out bridges from the nine inches of rain that started falling Sunday evening, it is sometimes hard to remember that a short distance away could still be dry. This waterfall, 125 miles to the north of me, could have used some of the water that fell here. I have seen this falls twice before, even once in the autumn, and the water covered most of the face of the rock past where the two little streams are falling. The name of “Now and Then Falls” is fitting as it only flows abundantly when the river level is high and feeds the small branch of the Amnicon River. And this year, the area as been dry so it is barely flowing and one of my relatives called it “Once in a While”.
Almost Dry Waterfall
If you continued downstream from yesterday’s picture, you would find the Big Manitou Falls, the highest waterfall in Wisconsin. And without any references to scale, it might not seem very tall. There is a person wearing a white shirt standing near the level of the top of the waterfall on the left side about a third of the way into the photo. The person looks like a little white dot.
Big Manitou Falls in Summer
A warm summer Saturday may have some people venturing to water to cool off. And while this water looks inviting to wade in, you don’t want to wade too far downstream as the water drops 165 feet as Wisconsin’s tallest waterfall.
Top of Big Manitou Falls
The morning rain showers left a few drops on the buttercup flower blossoms as the sun came out in the afternoon to make the yellow shine.
Sunny Buttercups
On dry summer days, farmers work to get hay up in between the rainy days. And while a majority of the hay may be harvested in large round bales, some hay is still put up as loose hay. The pair of horses pull the hay wagon and hay loader, which picks up the hay from the windrows and conveys the hay up to the wagon where the farmer forks the hay around to level out the load.
Hay Loader
