Although summer arrived on June 21, we had only needed to use our air conditioner a few days. Then we turned the calendar page to July and a heat wave hit us, with temperatures rising into the double digits for four days straight.

Opposites must attract because Mary Alice does not like the heat, and I thrive on the heat. I love July days when temperatures hover in the 90 degrees and late afternoon rumblings of thunder are heard in the distance, along with lightning streaks across the sky. Next come the rain drops, sometimes pouring so hard the storm drains overflow.

The storm passes quickly, the sun comes out and hopefully we will see a rainbow. Rain drops hang on trees and blades of grass, sparkling like diamonds. After the thunderstorm, the air cools, and as night sets in, the countryside is aglow with lightning bugs.

During the month of July, we celebrate our independence. This year was special because we celebrated our country’s 250th birthday. As usual there were parades, fireworks and picnics. Families went on vacations to the beach, camping in the mountains or touring cities. Mary Alice and I went to the small town of Leroy for their Old Home Days.

Many events were held, including a parade, with tractors pulling floats that were decorated and carried children. Of course, lots of food had been prepared and the church was giving out ice cream cups. We visited with many folks and watched different events. I often looked around the small area with so much going on with smiling faces and I thought to myself that this is America at its finest.

Earlier in the day, I had been watching television and saw all the fly overs and celebrations going on in our nation’s capital and again thought to myself that what is going on here in the small town of Leroy is just as patriotic.

Many family reunions occur in July. These special times give us a chance to meet the new babies, visit older relatives and catch up on the family tree news.

The month of July also brings forth a lot in nature.

The milkweed plants are in bloom, and this means we will see monarch butterflies. The monarch butterfly and the milkweed plant go hand in hand. Find a milkweed plant and you’ll find a monarch. During July, these butterflies are still going north, laying eggs and heading for far off distant places. Later, and it will be hard to determine when, their movement will be in a southward direction as they head back to Mexico. I often wonder how this little butterfly is capable of making that long journey.

The butterflies that left Mexico in the spring will have died on this migration north and the butterflies migrating south to Mexico in the fall will be their offspring. They have never been to Mexico nor had a guide showing them the way; however, the monarchs land on the same trees that their ancestors left in the spring.

July is the month when the flowers of Queen Ann’s lace, mullein and chicory appear. During World War II coffee was rationed and chicory was either added to or substituted for coffee. Years ago, I dug and dried a chicory root to make coffee, and ugh, I’m sure glad coffee is not rationed today.

Cattail heads will begin turning brown, and by the end of the month, the wood phlox will be in blossom. Dame’s rockets are often mistaken for wood phlox. Although they do appear similar, a closer look at the plant will show that dame’s rockets have alternate attached leaves, with toothed margins, while wood phlox have leaves attached opposite each other on the stem and the un-toothed leaves.

July also brings us flowers such as Joe Pye weed, brown-eyed Susan’s, yarrow and cardinal flowers. Also, the elderberry bushes will be foaming with white blossoms. By the end of the month, we will see golden rod in bloom and dock turning to a deep red. The blueberries will begin to ripen, and for many, this means an annual outing to the mountain for picking blueberries.

July will keep me leafing through my wild flower book as more plants begin to bloom. Each year I seem to have a lapse of memory, especially, when it pertains to plant names.

By the end of July, we will begin to see small flocks of birds, especially doves and red-winged blackbirds. Then the red-wings seem to disappear with some folk thinking the birds went south; however, this is not so. During August, the red-winged blackbirds go into swamps and other out of the way places, where they go through a molt. After molting, the red-wings will appear and prepare for their journey south.

The full moon of July is known as the buck moon and will be seen on July 29. This moon will be the eight full moon of the year. One must wonder why the name of buck moon but this is my guess, “at this time, the buck’s antlers are growing at a fast rate.”

The bumblebees, honeybees and other flying, creeping and crawling insects are very active in July. All that flitting, buzzing and humming make for an incredible outdoor concert. In North America, there are about 90,000 species of insects, of which, 27,000 are beetles.

The beetle probably enjoyed the most by adults and children is the lightning bug. We humans are outnumbered billions of times over by insects. To us, the summer is but a short span. However, to most insects, the summer is a whole span of life. Our battles with insects will not be won until the cold hard frost of fall quiets them.

In the fall, they have either left their eggs or retreated into cocoons to insure that their species live on.

As July runs its course and the stars in the heavens seem to rotate, we’ll see Sirius (the dog star) appear, reminding us of dog days and hot weather. Sirius is in the constellation Canis major, which in Latin means great dog.

Whether you are looking up at the heavens or down at the flowers and the creeping, crawling things, our nature’s clock is set on July, a good time to be out in God’s wild garden.

Bill Bower is a retired Pennsylvania Game Commission Wildlife Officer. Read his blog and listen to his podcasts on the outdoors at www.onemaningreen.com.