Depressing heat

This must be the hottest summer on record. I'll be surprised if it isn't. Not much of an exaggeration to say that about the only butterfly I saw today was this Texas Powdered-Skipper floating dead in the tank scum.

I managed to get the trees watered before it reached 107° today. And I also managed to find a couple more common butterflies. Here's an Elada Checkerspot.

I was hating to see the reeds in my dragonfly pond start to die, so I rigged up a little drip in there to help them out. I have enough water as long as I get at least one good monsoonal rain this summer, and if I don't, the water I have won't last until next rainy season anyway, so I may as well enjoy what I have, judiciously, of course. 

July, August, and September are monsoon season. It's one-third over and I've had less than seven-tenths of an inch of rain so far this July. The only year I've had less than that in July was during the drought of 2011. I'm not too worried. I didn't get my monsoonal rain last year until August. And thankfully I caught some runoff this June to tide me over.