August 14: Night sky

I can step out the front door at night and see the Milky Way and the Perseids.


By Mila Zinkova, Wikimedia Commons


It's so much better here than in the city. For a lot of reasons, but that's a nice one.

August 15: Green June beetle

While spending an hour in the dog yard with a hose yesterday, I saw a lot of dirt, a lot of rocks, and quite a few pieces of old glass and pottery shards. And once during that hour, I saw a glint of metallic green. I stepped back and the glint disappeared. Stepped back and there it was again. I noted the position in the yard in relation to a fencepost, the edge of the swingset, and some large stones, and I was able to go back today and retrieve the beetle.

It's a Green June Beetle, and the top is a pretty green with some brown shading on the top of the wing covers on the back. The bottom is the shiniest thing you've ever seen, green and pink tints in the light. I don't know what adaptive purpose is served by the bottom of a beetle being shiny, but it sure is pretty. Its latin name feels like a mantra in your mouth: Cotinis nitida.

These beetles love peaches, and they'll burrow right in and eat holes in the flesh. Sometimes you'll see a peach on the ground, covered with them.