Spider on the Milkweed!

It is my custom to check the milkweed plants every morning to see how the monarch caterpillars are doing. We have them in every size now, and the cats are hungry and active. It is a joy to watch them. Soon they will become butterflies. It's a miracle; one of the many, everyday, taken-for-granted miracles of life. So easy to miss if you don't stop and LOOK.

It is late summer heading into fall, and the time of the web spider has come. You can see the webs everywhere covered in morning dew; it's better to see one first, rather than to walk through it. They are orb weavers, many of them, but I will be the first to admit that I'm no expert on spiders.

I spied a spider in a web draped across the milkweed on this morning: a big, colorful, shapely specimen. You may see it above. The milkweed plants attract all kinds of insects, and I can see there would be good eating there. I cannot identify it but I knew instantly that the spider couldn't stay near my vulnerable little cats.

So I got a jar and - gently, and with all apologies - removed the pretty spider to a better place on the other side of the hedge, far from the milkweed. I felt like I was a hero, in a very small way, to my tiny monarch caterpillar friends. And no harm done to the spider!

The soundtrack: Enrique Iglesias, Hero.