Walking along the bicycle path in Polson one April afternoon, I was surprised to see a thumb-sized lump of coal lumbering with great purpose across the pavement. Insect-starved just as much as I was sun-starved from a long winter, I rushed over and squatted down to find a black insect with an iridescent-blue sheen, its head and thorax built like a husky ant, and its abdomen fat yet sleek like a huge, black clove of garlic.