My honeysuckle bush is haltingly attempting a second bloom after the earlier one, in Spring had gone awry due to another infestation of pests. Not often do I declare a living organism a pest but those ugly, mealy, whitish critters that destroy my pretty, red honeysuckle blossoms deserve such an ugly label. The invasions started a few years ago after maybe a quarter century of problem free existence for this honeysuckle bush. I gave ladybugs a try, but instead of feasting on those bugs, they wanted to mate and escape. I tried soaps of various kinds with limited success, alas, the pests came back this year again and mostly destroyed what should have been a glorious offering for all kinds of birds and bugs.
Now mid-summer a few new blooms emerged once more which gave me the pleasure of watching some hummingbirds hovering near, early this morning upon waking, while still in bed. But by mid-day, this gang of Sparrows had descended and flitted in, about and around. So I watched one of those tiny birds pick apart, methodically, gingerly, one petal after another petal from a singular, most beautiful blossom, not to feed on any of them, but to drop them, discard them, let go of them so as to mess up my outdoor living area. While doing so he and his buddies kept staring in one direction, east, checking on, I don't know what. Why pick apart pretty honeysuckle blossoms? I suspect that pretty, tiny bird, no matter how cute and innocent looking, was a hooligan intent on messing things up for the hummingbirds and for me. I cry foul!
