Below Williams Loop

 I'm trying to catch up.  So many new species begin to bloom each day at this time of year that I find myself wanting to take several camera outings each day and have trouble saving time to download and edit the resulting photos.  Today's group were taken last Tuesday on the same trip that gave me the recently-posted group of Larkspur photos.  They were mostly taken along a short service road about a mile downstream from the pond inside Williams Loop.  This road leaves Highway 70 near the bottom of a steep grade, the one that is usually icy in the winter.  One must be careful in slowing to exit as large vehicles come barreling down the grade at speeds above the posted limit.

My great find on this side road was the first abundance of the Goldenrod Crab Spider that I've seen this year.  The top photo is of a female, pretty-well camouflaged in the petals of a daisy.  At this time of year, where there is one there will be others.  So I inspected every daisy in a fairly large patch.

 The next exciting find was the first male of the species that I've ever seen.  As typical for spiders, the male is much smaller than the female.  This one was on a neighboring flower to the female in the top photo.  I wondered if they were about to meet.  I figured they probably hadn't met yet or they would have mated and the female would have eaten the male.

 It was a cool and damp afternoon, so I figured there could be more bugs hiding beneath the petals of the daisies.  Sure enough, the first one I turned over had a female underneath.

 Along the road cuts in this area there was lots of freshly-blooming Paintbrush.  The red literally glowed.  Hard to keep my eyes on the road.

 On some of the same road cuts there were patches of Buckwheat of which there are several local species.  And below is a close-up.

 Another new bloomer on the road cuts is the Purple Milkweed or Heart-leaved Milkweed.  This has one of the most elegant blossoms I know of.  Every year I find myself taking more photos of it in hopes of getting better ones each time.

 All three plant species featured here today play host to a great variety of insects and spiders.  And the season for these little ecosystems is just beginning.  I think maybe this coming week all five local species of milkweeds will be blooming.  I'll be looking.