They're back!

Got these two photos with my phone a couple of days ago on the Feather River College campus. My first sighting of this year, although they might have been around a week or more and remained unnoticed.  I believe they are on the same branch where i last saw them in the fall of 2018. It's the anticipation of such events that stirs me to want to share nature's beauty that is under our noses yet seldom noticed.  Unlike the phenomenon of the swallows returning, on schedule, to Capistrano every year, the return of the Oak Treehoppers does not make me believe in miracles.  It just rreaffirms my feeling of a deep connection with all that lives.

I've written about the annual cycle of the treehoppers in past posts, going back to the year I first discovered them.  When I saw these on campus last week, I had to inspect the Black Oak trees along my driveway.  Sure enough, this morning, feeling confident, I checked a specific branch on a specific tree, with my camera in hand.  I took the photo below and a few others.  Unfortunately, the lighting was bad, so, for a change, the photos I got with the iPhone were better than the ones I got with my DSLR.  I'll keep trying though.  I never tire of looking at the treehoppers, the two very distinct color patterns of the adults and the unique young whose stripes run perpendicular to their body axis unlike the adults.

My blogging habit has been dormant for too long.  I hope I'll find that this encounter with the treehoppers will energize me to resume my habit.  My early-morning walk today helped.  AS I walked downtown from my house in the brisk air, I was newly aware of the full moon, the olfactory evidence of skunk activity and the dozens of tallk sunflowers and hollyhocks hanging on unmtil the weather gets truly cold.  Enjoy the Fall.