Small and Large

The day dawned cloudy and hazy and extremely humid but it wasn’t too hot and there was a pleasant breeze. And so I decided to take a longer walk than I’ve taken in over a year and headed to a state game land. Since the Pennsylvania Game Commission (PGC) is responsible for all birds and mammals in the state, I believe the name should be “Pennsylvania Wildlife Commission” – but it’s not and the land the PGC manages are called Game Lands. Those names make it appear that the PGC’s allegiance is only to hunters.

In any case, game lands harbor all sorts of wildlife from tiny insects to bear and elk. This day in mid-summer, when bird song has essentially ended, the only wildlife that’s really active are the hordes of insects of various sizes and lifestyles.

So it’s no wonder that butterflies were some of the first things I photographed that day, especially because many butterflies are quite photogenic, even the very small least skipper.

Some of those butterflies were feeding on nectar in the abundant teasel flowers. Teasels were introduced to North America for use in the textile industry to raise the nap on woolen cloth and make the cloth softer and warmer. While that use has been displaced by machinery, the species remains as an invasive plant in old fields and pastures where its flowers feed butterflies –

Even more abundant were the bright yellow flowers of thin-leaved sunflower –

I was walking a long loop that took me past several wetlands. One of those wetlands had a large assemblage of greater bladderwort in bloom. Greater bladderwort is a small carnivorous plant that lives in shallow water and captures tiny aquatic creatures in inflatable bladders on its roots and stems and has interesting yellow flowers –

Among the other small things to be seen that day were two species of damselflies; first the fragile forktail and later the eastern forktail –

And suddenly the largest critter of the day flushed from a tall white pine – an adult bald eagle –

With that it was but a short walk back to the car.

Hummer

Ruby-throated hummingbirds in the northeastern U.S. feed on the nectar produced by a fairly small suite of wildflowers: cardinal-flower, spotted jewelweed, wild bergamot, trumpet creeper, wild columbine, several milkweeds and a few others. Most of these plants grow in small colonies or as scattered individual plants.

Because their primary food sources are usually either limited or scattered or both, these hummingbirds aggressively defend “their” flowers from other hummingbirds. Those of us who have hummingbird feeders filled with a sugar/water mixture have created new “flowers” that bloom continuously and have an unending supply of “nectar”. But the hummingbirds don’t know that these “flowers” won’t stop blooming in a few days as wildflowers typically do, so they often defend them just as vigorously.

An adult male ruby-throated hummingbird has taken possession of the feeder hanging outside our kitchen window. The bird’s found that a dead branch mere feet from the feeder is an ideal spot from which to watch for interlopers. The branch is the place from which he launches attacks on any hummingbird that approaches the feeder.

It was a cloudy, drizzly, occasionally rainy day when the male hummingbird perched on the dead branch for quite a while. That gave me the opportunity to photograph him as he repeatedly turned his head, displaying the gorget on his throat as its feathers reflected various colors depending on the angle of the light –

The concept of sharing is obviously not part of this hummer's world. 

Soon all the hummingbirds, whether they use our feeders or not, will head south for the winter. Some making a non-stop flight across the Gulf of Mexico, until then the feeders will help them to store energy for the flight ahead. 

Butorflēoge

The word "butterfly" apparently comes from the Old English word butorflēoge, the butterfly; similar words in Old German and Old Dutch lead to the conclusion that the name dates to antiquity. Many believe that the name originated because butterflies were flying in pastures during the spring and summer when the grass was lush, cows gave a lot of milk and the winter’s supply of butter was produced from the abundance of milk.

There are competing theories about the origin of the word butterfly, but wherever and whenever the word originated, few would deny that butterflies are beautiful creatures.

As with many insects, butterflies have a somewhat complex life-cycle. Impregnated females lay their eggs on the food plants that the larvae prefer. When the eggs hatch the larvae feed and go through several stages (instars) as they grow, shedding each time. As the larvae finish their growth they pupate in what’s known as a chrysalis, they then metamorphose and emerge as butterflies.

Many butterfly species spend the winter in the egg stage, some as a chrysalis, some hibernate as adults and others actually migrate. The monarch is the best known, but not the only, species of butterfly that migrates.

Enjoy the beauty of butterflies –

Yes, enjoy the beauty of butterflies for as the weather cools and winter approaches butterflies will disappear from the meadows. Habitat loss from intensive agriculture, manicured lawns and industrial development means there are fewer butterflies each year – enjoy them while you can.

While I Was Gone

If you’re a regular visitor to In Forest and Field you know I was hospitalized for all but a few days of the month of May. All the time I was in the hospital three camera traps on the hill above the house continued capturing the comings and goings of some of the wildlife that inhabits the hillside.

Here are the videos taken during May and June by those camera traps. Videos from each of the three cameras are grouped separately. There's an abundance of videos of white-tail fawns as well as some videos of bucks growing their new antlers.

Last, but far from least, is a video, taken on June 24, of a cinnamon-colored black bear; this is the only video I’ve ever gotten of a bear of that color. Cinnamon-colored black bears are uncommon to rare in Pennsylvania but are much more common in some western states.

Hopefully you’ll enjoy this video –

The camera traps on the hill have often gotten videos of both red and gray fox, but during these two months there was only one appearance by each of the two species.

Morning at the Beaver Pond

It was back in mid-April when I spent a morning sitting beside my favorite beaver pond. The waterfowl migration was tapering off, but a couple of green-winged teal had stopped on their way north and a male wood duck and a female hooded merganser were in residence –

A late migrating fox sparrow stopped on a pond-side shrub –

Great egrets don’t nest this far north, but every year we see a few that have overshot their breeding grounds by many miles. There was one at the beaver pond this morning. It searched for fish and frogs along the edge of the pond –

And then flew up into a dead tree –

As I sat beside the pond and the day warmed up a number of painted turtles clambered up on a dead tree that had fallen into the pond –

Later an early-migrating palm warbler searched for insects among the sedges bordering the pond –

The entire time a number of tree swallows squabbled over a dead snag that had several old woodpecker nest holes –

The swallows didn’t settle their contest over the snag while I was there and the squabbling probably went on for several more days.

There’s always something interesting happening at a beaver pond and it’s always worthwhile spending time sitting along the shore.