It was a warm, partially cloudy day and I spent most of it outdoors, in search of insects, flowers, and such.

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In this opening picture, you can see a bunch of Cistus creticus flowers.

Here you can see a small beetle that was approaching the anthers of one of those flowers.

Oedemera nobilis feeds on pollen and nectar. This is the male with the characteristic thick hind legs.

Cistus creticus is a shrub that grows on the stony terrains here in my area, often close to the sea.

Here you can see a small moth that was feeding on nectar. The name of the species is Scythris knochella. The family is Scythrididae.

I photographed plenty of Cistus creticus flowers on that occasion ...

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... and they were all photographed in the coastal area about four or five kilometers from the village of Shishan ...

... a little less than ten kilometers from where I live.

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This shiny beetle from the Meloidae family ...

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... was photographed in the meadows just outside Medulin - my hometown.

Less than a hundred meters from the last houses in my neighborhood.

In this and the previous photograph, you can see a bit of the scenery in that area.

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When it comes to the iridescent beetle from the Meloidae family, the name of the species is Lytta vesicatoria. After taking quite a few photographs ...

... I left the beetle and continued rambling around that area in search of other insects.

I was also picking the wild asparagus shoots along the way.

At one point, on one of the Asparagus acutifolius plants ...

... I found a small, colorful beetle from the Chrysomelidae family.

This is the Crioceris duodecimpunctata, commonly known as the spotted asparagus beetle.

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Here you can see a scene from the coastal meadows in the area four or five kilometers from the village of Shishan.

Two longhorn bees (Eucera longicornis) were resting on the stem of some pretty tall herbaceous plant.

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Various solitary bees can be seen in the pose shown in this set of four photographs usually in the evening and during the night when they sleep, but sometimes, I come across sleepy bees in the midlle of a cloudy day.

Beetles from the large and varied Cerambycidae family are commonly known as longhorn beetles. Here you can see the Rutpela nigra beetles mating. In the following photograph ...

... you can take a look at the scenery in the coastal area called Marlera, only a couple of kilometers from the village of Liznjan, and five or six kilometers from the small seaside town where I live.

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The longhorn beetles were photographed there.

I also photographed some beautiful iridescent beetles that day in Marlera.

This is the Cryptocephalus aureolus, a species from the Chrysomelidae family. These beetles feed on leaves and petals. In the following photograph ...

... you can see them mating.

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This is the Psilothrix viridicoerulea ...

... a species from the Melyridae family. This beetle was there for the pollen. Both species were found and photographed on the Ranunculus bulbosus flowers.

Here you can see an Oedemera nobilis female. This species was introduced earlier, at the beginning of the post.

These interesting flowers belong to the Solanum dulcamara plant.

I picked some asparagus in Marlere as well. With the following photograph ...

... I'm again in the area just outside my hometown, not far from my neiberhood.

I came across two Podarcis siculus lizards there ...

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... and those lizards were fighting.

Here you can see a very small grasshopper nymph. Can't tell you the name of the species.

You can take a look at the grass & the sky in this shot.

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This is the Arctia villica, a beautiful moth from the Erebidae family.

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In this set of four photographs, you can see the Chrysolina herbacea beetles. They belong to the varied and colorful Chrysomelidae family.

This is the Vanessa cardui, commonly known as the painted lady, a butterfly from the Nymphalidae family. With the following photograph ...

... is time to leave this place on the outskirts of Medulin - the town where I live ...

... and return to the area that started the post, the coastal area about four or five kilometers from the village of Shishan.

In this and the following photograph, you can see the Oxyopes heterophthalmus, a spider from the Oxyopidae family ...

... well-camouflaged on the Orobanche amethystea plant.

Orobanche amethystea has no chlorophyll. It's a parasite that depends on green herbaceous plants for water and nutrients.

This is the Halictus scabiosae, a bee from the Halictidae family.

The bee was feeding on the nectar of the tiny Carduus crispus flowers that form a pretty big flowerhead of this thistle. As you can see in the following photograph ...

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... thistles in bloom attract a wide variety of insects.

This longhorn beetle, the Agapanthia cardui, was also found and photographed on the thistle.

Here you can see a small red detail on one of the fresh young leaves of the evergreen oak (Quercus ilex). The protuberance is a product of the aphid activity on the small, shrub-like tree.

This small butterfly, the Pyrgus carthami, belongs to the Hesperiidae family.

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The small insect in the center of this enlargeable picture is a beetle from the Chrysomelidae family. Sphaeroderma testaceum is the name of the species.