Surprises

Tonight my nightly garden walk had nothing to do with deer, instead it was much smaller creatures! Moving a branch of my climbing rose so it draped on the brick wall I discovered this...Looking at all of those spines, the message was clear, DON'T TOUCH! To protect it from birds, I un-draped the rose so it was hidden again.

This proud Mama was in the crawl space. Note the newborns

leaving the egg.

Pulling up some stray liriope in the driveway bed I discovered this guy hunkered down in the mulch. Something about the expression on his face reminds me of the toad from Pan's Labyrinth, a testimony to the special effects folks.

Finally, just when I'd decided it was getting too late to see anything else, this spider was on my front stoop. Simon says those are babies on her back!