August 15, 2012

Notes and changes since last report:

• 77°F, partly cloudy and calm at 13:30 AM, turning cloudy and breezy.
• It was a day of one thing leading to another.
• One butterfly today was a first of the season for me.
• Another was new to my list for Cary.

The Trails

• Right at the edge of the Gifford House parking lot was a hickory tussock moth caterpillar. Handsome and common every year.
• The goldenrods that were starting in the front Old Hayfield last week were cranking up this week.
• A pair of American goldfinch was in the spotted knapweed and allowed me to get fairly close.
• Dark clumps of goldenrod leaves dotted the field. We're used to galls being extra plant growth promoted by a larva within. Here the goldenrod midge inhibits stem growth between the leaves, which continue to form normally but bunched together to form a nursery.
• As I was leaving this field, something too large and fast caught my eye. A common buckeye! They were indeed common last year and I'd hoped to see a few this year. Til now there'd only been a report of one on the grounds a couple weeks ago.
• While chasing that for a photo, I was interrupted by two skippers arguing. I'd noted the Peck's before, but the new comer had a bit more yellow than the zabulon I first took it for... it was a fiery skipper, male. This is a southern species that has been reported in the area for a couple years now. This was a new one for my list at Cary.
• After chasing that for a while I continued on to the Sedge Meadow Trail where a lacewing posed very obligingly. I'd just noticed its stalk mounted eggs when it came into view. Its larva resembles that of the ladybug - a little alligator famous for eating aphids.
• Behind the Sedge Meadow, a male zabulon skipper perched in a patch of sun right in front of me. I couldn't refuse. And now we can go back and compare the fiery skipper...
• White snakeroot was beginning to bloom. This "enthusiastic" native doesn't seem quite as dense as usual this year.
• In the Old Pasture, gray dogwood berries were ripening. I remember these fondly (now...) as ammunition at the school bus stop.
• Along the Wappinger Creek Trail, another tussock moth caterpillar stood out against the truck of a tree: the definite tussock moth. The female moth is wingless. The young caterpillars, like some spiders, sail away on a strand of silk.
• Fungi were popping up in small numbers in many places.
• A pair of carolina wrens challenged me as I went through the flood plain.
• At the Fern Glen pond, ostrich fern gave a tropical look.
• I zoomed in on the painted turtle and bull frog on the mat of hornwort.
• Along the edge of the pond, elderberry was ripening.
• And bottle gentian was blooming - yes, that's it.
• Also present was Virginia knotweed or jumpseed - referring to the vigorous departure of the little seeds when brushed against.
• Sneezeweed was now in full bloom at the back of the pond. At first I didn't recognize a red cultivated variety in a friend's garden until its elegant name, Helenium, started to ring a bell.
• Then I became aware that all around it spicebush berries were beginning to turn.
• And in the middle of all of them I noticed our almost forgotten wahoo - a native Euonymous.
• "Why are those leaves stuck together?" I wondered, "There on the left..." A silver-spotted skipper caterpillar was in there!
• All the way at the back of the pond were more red berries - Jack-in-the-pulpit. And with one of the stink bug nymphs that we have been seeing in such numbers this year.
• On the other side of the pond, great lobelia was lining the path...
• ...the path out and back home.