After mowing and string trimming last night, the light was amazing and everything was very healthy and green, so, as I often do in the evening, I grabbed a camera. The setting sun was being particularly playful with the morning glory and the maple leaves.

I poked around in the garden and back yard for a few, where I found some nice mimosa blossoms. I then moved around to the driveway, where I saw a dozen or more bumblebees harvesting from the Rose-of-Sharon flowers. As I photographer them, I saw one that appeared dead, and only upon closer examination was I able to see that it was being consumed by a wheel bug.

According to the Wikipedia page, “Wheel bugs are highly regarded by organic gardeners because they consume a variety of insects and their presence indicates a healthy, pesticide-free ecosystem. ‘They’re the lion or the eagle of your food web,’ Dr. Michael J. Raupp, an entomologist at the University of Maryland, notes. ‘They sit on top. When you have these big, ferocious predators in your landscape, that tells me that this is a very healthy landscape, because all these other levels in your food web are intact.’ ”

As sad as it was to see one of my favorite insects, the bumblebee, get killed, it was edifying to see nature’s way.