Good-bye Summer '16

According to the calendar, yesterday was the last day of summer.  Nature's calendar is not always so precise.  But,  while I was looking thru my photos from this past week, I was feeling somewhat nostalgic about saying good-bye to summer.  

Would this be my last photo of a Painted Turtle this year?

Nice little flower, too!

The swamp was looking a bit like fall, even though we haven't had enough cool weather to make the trees and plants really start turning colors yet.

I doubt it will be the last time I'll see a great-blue heron this year, but you never know.  Oh, you didn't see the heron in the photo above?  He's in there!

Our 3 'yard hummingbirds' left, and for several days the garden was very quiet!  Monarchs were flitting around the flowers but they don't make any noise.

Even when they are in competition with bees.

Then on September 17th, I heard a familiar noise and saw a hummingbird.

I figured that one would be my last hummer for the summer.  (You knew I'd get one more photo of a hummingbird on the blog this year, right?!)

This little red squirrel appeared on September 21st to cheer me up from my 'summer's-almost-over blues'.  What a cutie pie!

This red squirrel still has its summer stripe!

And smart, too!  It was a warm day so he ate his end-of-summer picnic in the shade of the bird feeder.

"Thanks for the yummy lunch and cool shade, too!" 

My late-summer walk down by the swamp revealed more changing colors.

These Winterberries will be appreciated by the birds after the weather turns colder.  

Now, there's something to look forward to-- maybe I'll cut some to put by the bird feeder and see a Pileated Woodpecker eat them like last year. (See my post about it here.)

The Winterberry bushes are loaded with berries now.  These shrubs (which are actually deciduous hollies) love wet spots like along the edge of the beaver swamp. 

I'm not sure I like the name Winterberry for them, as they obviously have berries now, and it's just the beginning of Fall.  We'll enjoy Autumn before we think about Winter!  The bright red berries do stand out more in Winter when there is snow on the ground, of course.

Well, that's it for my 'good-bye' to Summer.  However, I do have one more photo to show you.  It's my 'Fall hummingbird'!  After an absence of hummingbirds since the 17th, we had a ruby-throated hummingbird at our feeder on both the last day of Summer AND the first day of Fall.  Now, that's something to enjoy in both seasons!