The transitional times are my favorite parts of the day. Often I walk out of the house just to feel the heat of the sun in the middle of the afternoon, but morning and evening I watch the sky and the movement of birds and insects around the garden. Today the butterflies were out. The only food left for their caterpillars is passionflower vine (for the fritillaries and zebra longwings) and a little bit of butterflyweed (for the monarchs, which are few). The swallowtails have eaten all the fennel and parsley and there is no way I could plant more at this time of year to keep up with their demands. The gardener who told me (an English teacher several years ago) that the swallowtail butterflies couldn't exhaust the fennel had not planted fennel yet. The swallowtail caterpillars chew it down to the stalk, and then they chew the skin off the stalk.
All of this is just to say that I look for excuses to go outside at any time of year, whatever time of day.
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