Hunter

Variegated Fritillary

Check out this neat butterfly I saw last week.  First time I've seen this.

The larval host plants include mayapples, violets, and stonecrops.  Check out the gorgeous caterpillar and chrysalis and learn more here.

Camouflage?

Queen Honeybee

Check out the queen honeybee amidst the workers. She's a bit bigger and frequently dips her abdomen into a honeycomb cell to deposit an egg. The hive is busy with winter preparations at Nixon County Park, York, PA.

Monarch Butterflies

You’ve probably heard that Monarch butterflies travel all the way to Mexico in the fall.  Did you know everyday citizens are tagging the monarchs to help scientists research this magnificent journey?  Do you know how to tell a male from a female Monarch or how to spot a Monarch look-alike?  
Monarch butterflies have adapted a remarkable and complicated life cycle.  Just like many migratory birds, Monarchs complete part of their life stages in the Eastern United States, and part of their life stages in Mexico.  Why would they evolve to travel so far?
Monarchs begin to migrate south as soon as the weather starts to get cold, usually in October.  In Mexico each year the new generation of Monarchs finds Oyamel Fir Trees to rest on all winter long.  In the Spring, they have to return to the Eastern United States (as far North as Canada!) to lay eggs where their larval host plant, milkweed, is plentiful.  Here a new crop of caterpillars turns into butterflies and prepares to migrate south once again.

If you’re paying special attention to the butterflies in your yard, attempt to differentiate the Viceroy, a Monarch mimic, from a real Monarch.  Monarchs are poisonous to birds because the caterpillars feast on poisonous milkweeds.  Their orange and black coloration serves as a warning to predators.  Once birds taste one Monarch, they remember that coloration and never go near it again.  Other butterfly species take advantage of their fellow butterfly’s defenses by evolving a very similar coloration.  A careful observer can tell the difference between a Viceroy and a Monarch butterfly by looking for a black line across the bottom of the lower two wings.  If it has a line, it’s a Viceroy.  Other orange and black butterflies that are found on the east coast include the Baltimore Checkerspot, the Queen, and the Red Admiral- of which the Queen is also poisonous.  

You can follow the migration of Monarch butterflies back to the Eastern United States on the website MonarchWatch.org, where citizens send reports when they spot their first Monarch of the season.  

Doug Tallamy June 19th!

Come hear Doug Tallamy on June 19th in York!  Get tickets and learn more: here.

Lacewing Larvae

I'm admiring the gorgeous bark of a tree and looking at the ants running up and down the bark terrain when I notice a tiny lump of lichen.  Moving.  

The poor thing took a vacation from it's tree for my team of naturalists to stare at it under a microscope, take a thousand pictures, and throw out random theories of what this could possibly be.

When scared they curl up like pill bugs. 

After a while, I just google lichen covered insect and figure out it's a lacewing larvae.  Some do even cuter things than this one!  Like attach mini snail shells and ant body parts to their debris pile!  If you are having a cute attack, we should be friends, if we're not already.  Cutest insect I've ever seen. 

Flashback to Summer!

Black Swallowtail Caterpillars munching on fennel.

Pickering Creek Audubon Center

Chesapeake Bay Herb Society Herb Garden

Easton, MD

Monarch Caterpillars

Exploring the milkweed...

Lots of monarch caterpillars nibbling...

Ahhh the beauty of evolution... allowing this zebra striped caterpillar to consume the poisonous milky white juices of the milkweed plant causing the toxins to ooze through its squishy body and keep predators at bay!

17 year Cicadas

The periodical (17 year) cicadas are emerging in Centre County, PA this year! This morning I saw some emerging. Some were still light colored and soft- fresh out of their exoskeletons. Can you believe these awesome looking alien insects have been living under the soil drinking juice from tree roots for 17 years?! What a life!

For more cicada info check out these fun websites: http://magicicada.org/magicicada.php, http://www.cicadamania.com/broodxivmap.html.