Charlotte's Web

"I saw a spider sign her web today."

That's the line that's been singing in my head ever since yesterday morning, when I was allowed to witness a black and gold garden spider rebuild the center of her web.

I first noticed that she'd come to share our home last week, when I saw her in the remains of her web, hanging outside our kitchen sliding door. As I went in and out, she scuttled away to hide in the grill cover that was lying nearby.

When I came down to the kitchen the next morning, her graceful web was spread all the way across the moving side of the sliding door, with the center at nose height. I debated moving her, then decided to let her stay. It's been a little inconvenient, since we can't use that door for now, but being able to watch her daily activivies has been enjoyable. Another up-close-and-personal learning experience for me.

Besides, just seeing her there makes me smile.

As usual, I've done some web research to augment what little knowledge I had about garden spiders. Most of that I'll share in a later post. For now I just wanted to share these photos. The one above is of her weaving the signature into her web. (I was a little surprised - the silk of her signature is spun as multiple strands at once, so making the zigziag actually took her very little time.)

The photo to the left was taken immediately after she finished her daily masterpiece, having "assumed the position" in which she spends her time waiting for her next meal to present itself.

Oh, and by the way.... In my web research, I learned that another common name for this species is writing spider. There could hardly be a more appropriate name. Perhaps I should name our housemate, Charlotte.

Dueling Texters - A Tragicomedic Modern Event

Our nearby little community of Clearwater, Kansas, had its annual Fall Festival a couple weeks ago. The weather was lousy, but turnout seemed better than I expected. As usual, I've at least glanced at articles about the event in the local paper, not really expecting to find out anything useful, but curious to keep learning about our newly adopted hometown.

A photo of 4 teenagers standing under a picnic pavilion roof, intently focused on something in their hands while rain poured down in the background, caught my eye in last week's hometown paper. Reading the article, I don't know whether to laugh or cry....

It seems that attendance at the Fall Festival has been traditionally good for the elementary age and younger set, as well as for the adult crowd, but attendance by the middle school and high school age group has been declining for many years now. In a move of sheer brilliance, the game organizer changed the venue to include lots of different video games and...(wait for it!)...text messaging competitions. The local phone company donated 5 cell phones - one for the judge and 4 for the contestants, preset with judge's phone number. The first of each round of 4 contestants' to text the message, "Let Bygones Be Bygones.", to the judge's phone won. After those "qualifying rounds", there were texting duels in a bracket tournament.

I am in awe of this inspiration for increasing young adult attendance at the Fall Festival. I am also LMAO (to quote my son) at the picture of intense teenaged concentration captured by the paper photographer. At the same time, I'm deeply saddened - is this what our young folks are most entranced by? At the peak of their physical prowess, as they are developing neural pathways that have to stand them in good stead for the rest of their adult lives, it is video games and cell phone texting that draw them into competition and some semblance of communication and participation in community life.

The next few decades could be very interesting. I just wish I were observing from the outside, not roped in as an automatically involved participant in this large scale human development experiment.

Sunny Days

Well, we've gone and done it again. Our household has increased by one - this time a sweetheart of a little English setter puppy whom we've named Sunny.

There's not a lot to say, except that Prairiewolf and I are like kids in a candy shop when it comes to cats and dogs. We never seem to be able to get enough!

Becker's being a great "big brother" and taking little Sunny under his wing...that is, unless she tries to eat his food or take one of his precious sticks! Then she gets told in no uncertain terms that she's the new kid on the block and not approved for those privileges as of yet.

The cats are less than pleased with the new addition. Ranger isn't scared, but he expresses his displeasure by standing at the door to Sunny's crate and growling at her. Of course, he also curls up to sleep in Prairiewolf's lap while Sunny sleeps 6" away on his chest!

It will take us a while, but life will settle back down to its (new) normal rhythm soon.

And I'm taking a sacred vow to myself to stay away from animal shelters, litters of puppies and other areas of temptation...for at least another 6 weeks or so!

Putting Experience in Perspective

I don't normally write about political stuff in my blog, but I have to put up some interesting comparisons tonight.

Sarah Palin, McCain's pick for vice presidential candidate, was the mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, for several years and has been the governor of the state of Alaska for less than 2 years. This is the sum total of her major political experience.

Compared to Kansas, according to the Rand-McNally atlas that I have (which lists 2000 census numbers)....

City Populations:

Wasilla, Alaska: 5,469

Mulvane, Kansas: 5,155
Abilene, Kansas: 6,543
Pratt, Kansas: 6,570
Augusta, Kansas: 8,423
Haysville, Kansas: 8,502
Wellington, Kansas: 8,647

So Abilene, Pratt, Augusta, Haysville, and Wellington are all bigger than Wasilla, Alaska. That gives me some perspective on her mayoral experience.

The population of Alaska is listed in this atlas as 626,932 people. The comparable figure for Kansas is 2,688,418. So Kansas has roughly 4 times as many people as Alaska. And she's been the governor of Alaska for less than 2 years.

Oh, by the way, Alaska may be the biggest state in terms of land mass, but it is Number 48 in the 2000 census in terms of population.

Based on the response being reported in the national news media, obviously this "vast" experience on Sarah Palin's part has many Republicans thrilled beyond measure, but the thought that this level of experience would be guiding us in the White House should John McCain become incapacitated scares me immensely.

And this choice of a running mate is supposed to give me confidence in John McCain's ability to lead this country competently?

What's That Gold Stuff Tickling My Nose?

It's allergy season. There's pollen everywhere.

The goldenrod is blooming....

But WAIT!!!!

Is it really goldenrod that is causing the problem? It gets blamed all the time. Even my father refuses to have goldenrod in the garden because it "causes his hayfever."

The flower color is gold, but aren't flower colors designed to attract insects for pollination? Why would goldenrod put out the energy to grow golden flowers if it was scattering its pollen to the wind for pollination?

The truth is that goldenrod pollen is too heavy to be carried by the wind. Goldenrod DOES rely on insects for pollination. Instead of producing huge quantities of pollen to scatter widely, goldenrod spends its energy producing flowers that attract those insects.

On the other hand, there are basic green plants growing all around, usually in disturbed areas, that are busy producing green flowers right now. Those unobtrusive green flowers (that I'd be willing to bet you've never noticed) are putting out massive quantities of pollen, because insects don't notice them either.

What are these drab green plants? We know them by the name "ragweed," if we know them at all. They don't care if we know them, and they don't care if anyone notices them. The wind takes care of their pollination needs, and our noses and sinuses are often our only awareness that they exist.

Here's a closeup of giant ragweed flowers beginning to bloom. I've really become rather intrigued by their exotic "Japanese-pagoda-goes-green" looks.

Part of the reason I'm noticing them so much these days is that we have a bumper crop of giant ragweed in the Beyond. It towers a foot or more above my head as I walk the paths, and I've taken many interesting pictures of insects hiding in its foliage.

Luckily I'm not allergic to ragweed pollen. In fact, as I watch the flowers form, ripen and eventually morph into ragweed seed, I'm smiling. Ragweed seed is very high in protein and an excellent wildlife food. Our gourmet breakfast bar for wildlife will be open and wellstocked when winter's cold comes calling in a few months.

Sometimes I Just Feel So Lucky....

Sometimes I just feel so lucky to be who I am, living where I am, and today is one of those days. (At least, it is now that I've gotten over my early morning funk...and the guy is here fixing the blinds!)

We live in Kansas on just 10 acres, which seems "ordinary" enough, but here are a couple views from our little homestead....

The path, through a nice stand of big bluestem and other prairie grasses, from the house to the draw and the Beyond.

The path through the draw and into the Beyond.

The bottomlands in the draw. The brown area in the foreground is the remnant of one of the poison ivy stands that Prairiewolf has been trying to fight back.

The Back of Beyond, otherwise known as the Back Five. This photo was taken in early July, looking back towards the draw, and it shows the silver bluestem catching the light.

Yes, our land is fairly flat. Yes, our land has more grass than trees...and maybe more "weeds" than grass. And, yes, at least half of our land is overgrazed pasture. But it fascinates me and anchors me and challenges me and grounds me.

Sometimes I just feel so lucky....

The Painful Price of Not Paying Attention

I've let myself be lulled by cooler than normal temperatures. How can something so pleasant have led to potential disaster?

See, because of the cooler temperatures and days of overcast skies, I haven't been paying enough attention to how little rain we've actually been getting. My front bed, composed primarily of more established prairie wildflowers, has been looking great (at least as far as water stress goes!). That's what I pass by closely on my way in and out of the house several times a day...and I haven't been looking nearly as closely at my new backyard bed.

After all, it looked fine from the kitchen window. When I actually walked out to it yesterday, however, I was appalled to see that several plants had dried up and disappeared and several others looked like limp caricatures of themselves. Whoops.

I hate it when I fail to follow my own advice! "You can generally plant containerized plants at any time in the growing season, but be sure you keep them well watered for the first year or two, especially if you're trying to get them established during the summer."

At this point, it will probably be next spring before I know the true extent of the damage I've done. I'll try to think of it as an opportunity to try something new. But, blast it! I didn't really even give these plants an even chance at deciding whether they wanted to grow and thrive here. That's what makes me the most frustrated with myself.

Monday Morning Grump

I'm feeling grinchy this morning.

It was a wonderfully cool morning when I went out to get the paper, but it's starting to heat up a bit. I'd love to have taken a walk-about, but someone is coming any moment now to take in one of our blinds for repair. Since the blinds are still under warranty for 5 1/2 more years, I didn't want to risk screwing them up by prying them out myself, so now I wait on someone else's convenience.

I'm getting positively unpleasant about having my mornings interrupted by outside commitments. My mornings have come to be very precious to me - whether I waste them away by sleeping in... or fritter them away reading the paper and playing on the computer... or delight in them by doing a walk-about... or use them constructively to water the garden or get housework or errands done. I "want what I want when I want it!", by golly - at least on weekday mornings.

I DON'T LIKE HAVING MY MORNINGS MESSED UP BY HAVING TO MARCH TO OTHER PEOPLE'S SCHEDULES.

Okay. Having whined and yelled a bit, I'll try to let my grump dissipate. Even if tomorrow is not as cool, we're heading into fall, and it's a sure bet that one of these upcoming mornings will be nice again. So I'll play around on the computer until Mr. Blind gets out of my way, then move on with the day.

More Milkweed Stuff

I thought that I was pretty much done for the summer with new milkweed finds in our yard...but I find that I was wrong.

Last week I briefly looked into the bottomland area, not expecting to see much except giant ragweed, massive quantities of poison ivy and maybe some smartweed. However, I noticed some 4-6' tall plants with pretty pink puffs of flowers on the top. Way too tall for smartweed. Closer inspection surprised me - they were obviously milkweed blossoms. I had discovered a dozen or so swamp milkweeds (Asclepias incarnata)!

How did I miss that many pretty, fragrant, tall flowering plants last summer?! I'm blaming it on the poison ivy thickets that were viciously guarding the lowlands. Prairiewolf has been working hard to fight them back for the last 2 summers. Obviously he's making some serious progress, and this is one of the benefits of his work.

The next discovery came a few days ago. I was doing a walkabout, not finding much new, when I decided to check out some uninteresting looking white blooms about 20' away from the path. They just looked like nondescript "weeds", but...more milkweeds! At first I thought this was whorled milkweed (Asclepias verticillata), but upon further study, it looks more like plains milkweed (Asclepias pumila). There's not a lot of information on plains milkweed, so I want to look a little farther, but I'm going to tentatively identify it this way for now.

Last of all, yesterday I finally found a monarch caterpillar while I had my camera in hand. He was busy chowing down on smooth milkweed (Asclepias sullivantii). From his size, I would guess that he was close to pupating, and I like to think that he will be one of the monarchs making the long migration down to Mexico this fall.

Many of the milkweeds around the yard are suddenly full of aphids, but they're beginning to look bedraggled in other ways too. Some of their leaves are turning yellow and falling off. A few plants, especially the green antelopehorn, are even dying back. They've bloomed and released their seeds; their work is done for this year. One more sign that summer is coming to a close.

The seasons are whirling by. Next year I'll know that I can chart their course by following the sequential development of the 8 milkweed species (and their associated insect pals) currently calling our 10 acres home. For me, it's a deeply satisfying way of measuring time's passage.

The RangeMan Cometh

We've got a new family member!

His name is Ranger (based on the character from Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum series), he's about 4 months old and, like most young things, he vacillates wildly between being a little sweetheart and a holy terror.

We got Ranger from the animal shelter on the last Sunday of July. They had been having Cat Liberation Weekends, trying desperately to find new homes for the large influx of cats and kittens they'd received over the summer. Prairiewolf and I decided that it was finally time to give T.J., our 4 1/2 year old feline, a companion. The only kittens left Saturday afternoon weren't available to see until Sunday, since they'd just been spayed or neutered, so we went back that next day. Before we left on Saturday, though, I'd noted one friendly, young, black male still under surgical quarantine...and, sure enough, he was the one who chose us the next day.

I've been nervous about adding another cat, since cats can be unpleasantly territorial towards others of their own species, but Ranger has fit right in. There are even times when I think he's a little TOO bold and fearless...like when he, the 4 pound kitten, starts attacking Becker's, the 115 pound German shepherd's, ear! The dogs, however, have been quite indulgent, and T.J. seems to be bemusedly alternating between watching this new little squirt's activity and wrestling wholeheartedly with him.

Last week Ranger learned that he could jump straight up into the air, and he spent several days practicing this skill. That morphed into jumping up onto our legs while we're standing up, using all 20 claws to hold on. Or jumping as high as he can onto the window screens and holding on there for dear life. A battle with the blinds led to $75 worth of damage...but we're giving him the benefit of the doubt and assuming the blinds were deficient.

Next he realized that he could reach the kitchen counter, and we are currently battling over whether that's my territory or his. I've had to deploy that dreaded weapon, the squirt bottle. Sad to say, though that makes him scram now when he sees it, he's quite happy to check out the countertop again in just a minute or two.

Life's certainly not dull around here right now!

Numeric Coincidences in the Garden

An interesting day in the vegetable garden.....

For various reasons, I hadn't really been paying much attention to the garden for the last 5 or 6 days, so I thought I'd better get out there this morning to put out any "fires" that had taken hold.

It was immediately obvious that I needed to pick tomatoes. Last week there were no ripe ones and only a few showing a blush of color. This morning I picked 64. From only 7 vines, 5 of them heirloom varieties. I'm actually rather amazed. All of this is totally organic too. (Confession time, though - I had to chuck 13 of the 64 tomatoes into the compost pile immediately, because I'd let them get too ripe...or the insects had claimed them as their own.)

On the down side, a couple weeks of upper 90's and low 100's, followed by cooler temps with rain had caused a lot of cracking. It was interesting to see how the different heirloom varieties responded....

Almost every single ripe German Queen tomato (and there were close to 20 of them, all quite large) was seriously cracked. Also, we've only harvested a couple of these before now and I was amazed to see how many were ripe at one time. If the plant wasn't flowering again, I'd seriously wonder if it was a determinate variety.

The Black Krim plant had produced quite a few tomatoes, but almost all of the ones that were ripe had been cracked and then immediately seriously infested with insects, followed by fungus - much more so than any of the other varieties. I haven't had a chance to taste any yet, but have 2 that survived with little enough damage that I'll try them tomorrow. I went ahead and picked several that were only half ripe, too, to try ripening them off the vine, inside. If they keep their flavor (whatever that is) maybe I can keep a higher percentage of the fruits safe from cracking and insects this way.

The Merced, another variety I haven't gotten to taste yet, had smaller cracks around the top of many of the fruits. Otherwise they looked very good.

The 2 hybrids were their normal, unexciting selves. The Rutgers acts like the hybrids. And the Green Zebra offered 5 fruits, all somewhat scarred and a few cracked (for the first time). The Green Zebras and one of the hybrids are the smallest fruits, on average. I love the look of the Green Zebras; their taste, on the other hand, is okay but not as good as German Queen's.

Meanwhile, the black blister beetles were having quite a field day. Just for curiosity's sake, I decided to keep track of how many I picked off. Including the 3 or 4 gray blister beetles I found too, I found 64 blister beetles and sent them to a watery, if sudsy clean, death.

I found that rather interesting - I harvested 64 tomatoes and 64 blister beetles. And I really tried hard to find more blister beetles!

Other insect counts on the tomatoes included 3 stink bugs (which went the way of the blister beetles) and 2 hornworms. I saw a wood nymph butterfly feeding on the overripe Black Krim tomatoes too.

Last comment: When I see (or rather, don't see) eaten tomato leaves, I can tell what the insect culprit is by the general location of the damage. If the leaves have been chewed near the base of the plant (and have little black frass packets that look like tiny mouse droppings), I know I'm looking for black blister beetles. If the leaves and stems are missing at the tips of branches, especially near the top of the plant, I'm looking for tomato hornworms. Their frass is dark green and almost 1/4" square.

For now, I've decided to let the hornworms live to turn into hummingbird moths. There aren't enough to be a problem yet...in fact, I'm enjoying the fact that the caterillars are basically "pinching out" the tips of the vines for me!

Typical Natural Paradox

After picking another 2 dozen or so black blister beetles off my tomatoes again this morning (the photo to the left has both black blister beetles and gray blister beetles on a "hot spot" on one of my tomato plants), I decided to do a little web research and find out more about their life cycle. What could I look for as far as their larval or pupal stage went? Was there something I could do to interrupt their life cycle at an earlier stage?

Well, I came away with yet more respect for the web of life.

It turns out that the larvae of black blister beetles feed on grasshopper eggs, specifically the eggs of short-horned grasshoppers (family Acrididae). Thus black blister beetles are more common during or after grasshopper outbreaks.

Just this afternoon, while I was at the Master Gardener office, we were discussing grasshoppers. Several people in the area are having major trouble with grasshopper outbreaks in their gardens. I was (rather smugly, I'm afraid) noting that I was seeing some, but not any more than usual. It would appear that I may very well owe my "normal" grasshopper population to those same black blister beetles that I've been cussing under my breath as I painstakingly examine my tomato plants to hunt for them.


Other rather interesting facts I learned about black blister beetles (Epicauta pennsylvanica):

* The eggs are laid in the ground or under stones, in clusters of 50-300. The females lay several clusters of eggs throughout their adult life.

* Blister beetles undergo "hypermetamorphosis" - a type of metamorphosis with several different larval forms, rather than the normal single larval form with several "instars" or growth stages. The first larval stage in blister beetles is quite mobile, while the later stages are much less mobile.

* Some of the other blister beetle genuses feed on bee larvae or stored food in bee nests during their larval stage. All blister beetle larvae appear to be predatory.

* Adult blister beetles live about 3 months.

* Blister beetles produce a toxic chemical, cantharidin, in their hemolymph ("blood"). This chemical causes blistering on human skin...so don't crush blister beetles if/when you handle them!

* Cantharidin is very stable and remains toxic even after the beetles die. Horses are particularly susceptible to cantharidin. One of the biggest problems that blister beetles cause is illness or death in horses who eat dead blister beetles in their alfalfa hay.

* The good news is that black blister beetles are one of the least toxic of the blister beetle family.
So now I'm left with the conundrum of "Do I want to minimize the black blister beetle adults that are eating my tomato plant leaves, or do I want to let their populations follow normal fluctuations as their larvae feed on grasshopper eggs in the soil?"

The more I learn, the harder this sort of decision becomes.

Summertime Blues

It's been so busy lately that I haven't been blogging much. For that matter, lately it seems that I'm just not going outside much either.

Of course, temperatures that are consistently in the upper 90's have quite a bit to do with that. I'd have to say that this is one of my least favorite times of year. Heat and I just don't get along well these days.

When I do get outside, I usually spend my time watering, picking blossoms and buds off basil plants, or handpicking pests off my tomato, potato, and squash plants. I'd rather do the latter than spray chemicals - or lose my plants to these voracious eaters - but it's definitely not my favorite garden activity.

Last year my biggest insect issue was squash bugs. This year I read a hint somewhere recommending that you plant potatoes around your squash hills as a way to control these pests. Well, it was too late for that, but I reasoned that tomatoes were in the same family as potatoes, so I planted tomato plants at each corner of that bed, then interplanted basil for good measure.

Results? Not too bad. I've had a few squash bugs, but only a few so far. The squash vines are long, luscious and beginning to set fruit. It's early days to say for sure, but right now I'm definitely going to repeat this planting combination next year.

So this year my chief bugaboo is black blister beetles. Yuck. These guys are relishing the remnants of my potato plants and starting in on the tomatoes. So far I haven't found any natural predators preying on them, but I can always hope. Meanwhile I've started my morning p.b. (jar) and soapy water assault run. If I could remember to wear gloves, I'd probably dread this task less, but I always seem to find myself ready to start with bare hands. Then I'm too lazy to walk back to the house and find the gloves to put them on. (I'm also afraid that if I got back into the air conditioning, I'd find lots of reasons not to brave the heat and humidity again that morning!)

So I steel myself and start handpicking. The little brats are very good at dropping to the ground and quickly diving into the mulch there, so I've developed a routine of holding the jar with its soapy waters of death underneath the bug I'm targetting, then trying to knock it off the plant into the "target zone". My last resort is to actually grab the black beastie between my fingers and carry it to its doom. I manage to zap about 75% of the ones I see by this rather inefficient combination of techniques.

The reason these guys give me such a case of the willies eludes me. They can't bite. Their bodies are soft. Theoretically they emit a liquid that stinks and can cause blisters, but I've never had any problems with either issue. Logic, however, doesn't operate well when it comes to this sort of visceral reaction, so I just grit my teeth and get to the task at hand.

Speaking of which, I've neglected my bug guard duty this morning, and writing about it has given me a good case of guilty conscience. So I guess I'll go grab my trusty peanut butter jar, fill it with fresh soapy water, gird my loins (so to speak), and get it done.

Then, maybe, my halo will dully glow for at least a little while!

Current Favorite Quote

I saw this quote on a stepping stone and it captured my fancy. Unfortunately, the stepping stone was resin, which I dislike, so I didn't get it. Hopefully someday I'll find something more natural with this saying on it....

"We come from the Earth. We return to the Earth. In between, we garden."

Prairie Remnant or Overgrazed Pasture?

I wish I could make up my mind. Some mornings I come back from my walk-about fully energized and excited, sure that I've seen yet another sign that our back 5 acres is a prairie remnant, albeit an overgrazed one.

Then there are mornings (like this morning) when I come back discouraged, sure that all we have is an overgrazed pasture with a few prairie plants in it.

To be perfectly honest, I'm not sure why it makes a difference to me. It's actually just a matter of semantics...and perhaps an indicator of my day's mindset.

On the "overgrazed pasture" side: the predominant grasses are silver bluestem and smooth brome. There are lots of green antelopehorn milkweed, as well as quite a bit of yarrow, wavy-leafed thistle and ironweed. Foreign "invaders" and weedy species include (besides the brome) yellow sweetclover, foxtail, and windmill grass.

On the "overgrazed prairie remnant" side: 5 leadplants, 3 small patches of sideoats grama, quite a bit of buffalograss, 2 showy milkweeds, lots of wild alfalfa, multiple large patches of white prairie clover, a large area with quite a bit of prairie coneflower and black-eyed Susan, and a couple dozen dotted gayfeather plants. I'm not seeing any sign of big or little bluestem, Indian grass, or switchgrass, although it's certainly possible that I'm just missing them because they haven't headed out yet.

In the long run what matters is how the species composition changes. And on the positive side, I'm pretty sure we've had eastern meadowlarks and dickcissels nesting. I know we had a killdeer that nested, and I hear quail calling fairly frequently.

We'll just keep managing it to the best of our ability and see what happens. Meanwhile, maybe I'll start looking at it as my daily "mood-o-meter"!

Hints for Happiness

Reading the paper, believe it or not, makes me happy. Not necessarily the news that I get from reading it, but the simple fact that I have the time to sit down and scan through the articles, the columns, the ads, the comics and the puzzles. On really good days, I have time to do the puzzles, and on excellent days I find something good or funny or useful that I can incorporate into my life to make it richer in some way.

Yesterday was an excellent newspaper day. My find was in a column by Suzanne Perez Tobias, "Happiness: Plan it, do it, remember it." She talked about happiness in her own (and her children's) life, and gave a link to an excellent blog titled "The Happiness Project".

The Happiness Project is the work of Gretchen Rubin, a lawyer turned writer who is taking a year (possibly more?) to personally test every theory she can on what makes people happy. She is blogging about the experience and, concurrently, writing a book to be published in late 2009.

A quote from her blog that I think is particularly interesting, "My research has shown me that a key to happiness is squeezing out as much happiness as possible from a happy event. Unhappy people don’t have fewer happy experiences as happy people, they just think about them less. [Italics added.]"

She goes on to outline 4 stages to increase the happiness you experience from life:
1. Anticipate upcoming events with pleasure,
2. Savor happy moments as you experience them,
3. Express happiness to yourself and others, and
4. Reflect on happy memories of the event or moment.

I really like this idea! It's so simple, but potentially life-changing. Personally, I'm terrible at the first step - when I have an upcoming potentially happy event, I tend to focus on problems that may arise (like focusing on the hassle of getting ready to leave on vacation, rather than on the vacation itself; or focusing on my fears over being inappropriately dressed, rather than on a fun event that we've scheduled). I'm a little better on the other 3 steps, but could certainly do more with each one.

Check into her blog, if you get a chance. It's now happily ensconced on my list of favorites, and I know I'll be checking it with great regularily!

Echinacea vs. Checkerspot Caterpillars Redux

Chock one up to...organic gardening?

...lazy gardening?


...letting nature take the lead?


...all of the above?




About a month ago I noticed a bunch of skeletonized leaves on my 2 young Echinacea plants, which I blogged about here and here. It turned out that the leaves were being eaten by checkerspot caterpillars and, by the time I figured out what they were, their numbers had decreased fairly significantly.

Based on what I observed and learned during this brief incident, the caterpillars were eaten by cardinals, eaten by wheel bug nymphs, and probably dispersed to other plants through their natural life cycle. (Note: I haven't noticed damage on any nearby plants, so if they dispersed, they didn't do any damage that I've noted.)



I thought you might be interested in what the little Echinacea ('Sundown'), shown in my first blog on the subject, looks like now. It has 2 blooms, easy to see in the photo, and another 3 healthy flower buds. You can see the shredded leaves still, but there have been many more healthy leaves added. All in all, the plant looks healthy and happy and is a real asset in our entry garden. It's growing bigger by the day. Predator populations are thriving. I have no idea how many, if any, caterpillars survived and whether they've turned into checkerspot butterflies, but a few certainly could have.

Cost of insecticide: $0

Hours of shopping, driving, and spraying: 0

End result: Priceless.

These Are a Few of My Favorite Things....

As I went out to empty my coffee grounds this morning (a daily ritual, fertilizing the blueberries or the roses), several small things brought a smile to my face and contentment to my heart. I thought I'd share them....

After pouring the coffee grounds and water onto the waiting bush, I plucked a couple midnight blue berries, lightly frosted with white, and popped them into my mouth, enjoying the mellow explosion of rich flavor.

In the trees by the draw, I heard the throaty drumroll of the yellow-billed cuckoo's call.

Nearby, the mourning doves "hoo-hooed" velvetly and a cardinal "whitted" sweetly but insistently.

The breeze softly swept over my skin, lifting my hair slightly and coolly touching my cheeks.

As I knelt to nip a few small basil flower buds, I inhaled the tangy pungency with delight and noticed the early morning sunlight shining off the bright leaves with pleasure.

Gently righting a few tomato cages that had blown slightly akilter overnight, I brushed against the tomato leaves and felt their roughly cushioned texture while smelling their tart and potent fragrance.

As I left the vegetable garden area, I noticed a ripe strawberry peeking out from underneath the leaves along the edge of the bed. Picking it, I popped it into my mouth, finishing my morning foray with its bright sweetness on my tongue.

It's getting harder and harder to want to venture away from home, when I have so much pleasure right here around me daily.

The Milkweed Insect Tribe, Part I

Because both milkweeds and the insects that inhabit them interest me so much, I tend to take a fair number of photos of all of them. I've shared some of my milkweed plant photos. Now I thought I'd share a few of my milkweed insect photos.

In this first section, I thought I would share photos of some of the insects that depend on milkweeds for all or part of their life cycle.

To the left, this handsome red beetle with white rings on its antennae is the milkweed longhorn beetle, Tetraopes femoratus.

To the right, this look-alike is the red milkweed beetle, Tetraopes tetrophthalmus. Note that it doesn't have white rings on its antennae, and that the spots on its elytra (wing covers) are elongated rather than round. This pair of species takes careful observation to tell apart.

The genus name, Tetraopes, means "4 eyes" and refers to the fact that all beetles in this genus have their compound eyes divided into an upper and a lower eye by the base of their antennae. Effectively, then, they have four eyes. There are 13 Tetraopes species in the United States, and 24 overall in North America. Many of the species in this genus are host specific, meaning they utilize only one species (of milkweed, in this case) in their life cycle.

These two milkweed beetles lay their eggs on milkweed stems near the ground or just below the soil surface. The larvae bore into the stems to eat, and overwinter in the milkweed roots. In the spring the milkweed beetles pupate, emerging as adults in late spring to summer. Adults eat the leaves and flowers of milkweeds.

Another interesting milkweed inhabitant is this fuzzy orange caterpillar. (I hadn't realized there were other caterpillars besides monarchs that ate milkweeds.) It turns out that this guy is the larval form of a white moth with the rather impressive name of orange-margined dogbane moth, Cycnia tenera. These moths eat both milkweed and dogbane plants; interestingly, the caterpillar can be either white or orange, depending on the species it is eating. I've seen them primarily on green antelopehorn, Asclepias viridis. All of the caterpillars I've seen have been orange.

Of course the classic milkweed insect is the monarch butterfly, Danaus plexippus. I've seen quite a few adults feeding at milkweed flowers this year, like this one on common milkweed, Asclepias syriaca, but I've only seen one caterpillar so far. It was on green antelopehorn. Unfortunately, I didn't have my camera with me, so I didn't get a photo. It was large and healthy, though, and probably just about ready to pupate.

The last of the milkweed-obligates that I've been able to photograph so far this year are the large milkweed bugs, Oncopeltus fasciatus. Lately I've seen some of the bright red young, called nymphs, that have recently hatched. They tend to feed in groups, at least at this stage, like the ones I photographed feeding on this green antelopehorn leaf and seed pod.

I've been seeing the adults, like the one to the right on a green antelopehorn bloom, for quite some time now. They seemed to appear shortly after the green antelopehorn started blooming. Again, like almost all of the milkweed specific insects, they are marked with warning colors: black and (in this case) orange.

In doing a little research, I learned that some of the northern dwelling large milkweed bugs actually migrate south far enough to overwinter as adults. Any adults or nymphs left far enough north to freeze during the winter will die. In the spring, the remaining adults start moving north again. Thus, the farther north you live, the later in the summer it will be before you see this species. I don't know whether the first adults I see here each spring spent the winter locally or moved up from more southern areas.

It takes the large milkweed bug nymphs about 40 days (and 5 molts) to reach adulthood. Only adults have wings, therefore only adults can fly. Both the nymphs and adults have the defensive habit of dropping to the ground if they are disturbed, which can make it hard to look at them closely. They'll remain still on the ground for several minutes, appearing dead, which is another defensive behavior, since many predators prefer to eat living animals.

In my next milkweed insect post, I'll show some of the other insects I've observed feeding at milkweeds. It's an interesting potpourri.

A Multitude of Milkweeds

For some reason, I'm enamored with milkweeds. It probably started with their cachet as food for the caterpillars of monarch butterflies. All schoolkids learn about monarchs, I think, and most learn to love them. I know I did.

Then I discovered that milkweeds host an entire community of milkweed-specific insects, adapted to eat their poisonous tissues. Because these insects feed on milkweeds, they taste terrible and may even be poisonous in their own right. This means that few animals want to eat them. Not surprisingly, the milkweed eaters boldly advertise their untasty status with bright colors.

The final building block in my love affair with milkweeds was discovering how many of them have extremely fragrant flowers. I'm talking the kind of fragrance you drink in from several feet away, wondering, "What's that lovely smell?" Add in cool seed pods, pretty blooms in many species, and what's not to love?

So it's been fun to discover that we have several species of milkweeds on our property.

The first milkweed species we found was green antelopehorn, Asclepias viridis. Its flowers are neither showy nor fragrant, but the plants possess a certain quiet appeal nonetheless. They increase in overgrazed pastures. We have a lot of them.

Next I realized that we had a plant or two of common milkweed, Asclepias syriaca. Ironically, I've discovered that this species is the least common of the milkweeds that occur on our 10 acres. One of the taller, upright milkweeds, common milkweed has large, pretty pink pom-poms of fragrant flowers. Personally I think it would be a lot more popular with a less "common" common name.

I identified both of these 2 species shortly after we moved in. The third species was visible last year, but I didn't look at it closely enough to realize that it was different from the common milkweed. It's growing on the west banks of the draw in a small, loose colony of about 20 individual plants. (At least I think they're individuals. I haven't uprooted any to see if they are connected by underground rhizomes.) Another upright, pink, fragrant bloomer, it's known as showy milkweed, Asclepias speciosa. Its blooms are composed of fewer flowers than those of common milkweed, and they look "spikier". The leaves also tend to be held a little more upright than those of common milkweed.

About 20 feet away from the showy milkweed colony, back up on flatter land, I noticed a group of upright milkweeds this spring that didn't bloom as soon as the nearby showy milkweed or the further away common milkweed. Sure enough, when they did bloom they were a 4th species called smooth or Sullivan's milkweed, Asclepias sullivantii. Again they are pink and fragrant, but their odor is different, reminding me of cloves. Note that their flowers are not as "spiky" as the showy milkweed's, and their stem is smooth.

Backing up a bit, a month or so ago as the green antelopehorn was starting to bloom, I noticed a few scattered, smaller individual stems of what looked like milkweed, but it wasn't blooming. I marked several of them with orange flags and I've been monitoring them to see what they are. About 2 weeks ago, they started to bloom with odd little clumps of greenish-white flowers. Shown here to the right, the flower is on the lower left, the buds are on the right. I'd never noticed any milkweeds like these before but, in looking them up, I've learned that they are called green milkweed, Asclepias viridiflora. Chalk up another species that "magically appeared" after burning.

Finally, when I was out trying to get a decent photograph of the green milkweed, I noticed a singleton plant with much finer leaves and slightly different flowers. The flowers were still greenish-white, but they weren't as pendulous as those of the green milkweed. The overall effect of the plant was daintier, if taller. This turned out to be narrow-leaved milkweed, Asclepias stenophylla. As closeups of its flowers show, it's probably the least showy of them all (although the green milkweed is a close second), but I'm still glad to find it on our prairie.

I'm still waiting for the prom queen of the milkweeds, the orange-flowered butterfly milkweed or Asclepias tuberosa, to show up, but so far I haven't seen any sign of it. No luck finding swamp milkweed, Asclepias incarnata, or the endangered Mead's milkweed, Asclepias meadii, either. (Not that I think there's the slightest chance of finding the latter on this property, but one can always dream!!!) There are a few other species that are possibilities, but meanwhile I'm enjoying my embarrassment of milkweed riches with the 6 species I have found.