Roadside Insects

     Several kinds of insects live among the grasses and flowering plants along country roads in Lancaster County, as elsewhere.  Those insects are most abundant and noticeable by rural roadsides during August, September and October.  Those insects, the plants they consume and the predators on those insects make country roadside ecosystems interesting.
     A few kinds of grasses grow along rural roads, including two kinds of foxtail grass, wire grass and purple top grass.  Those taller grasses are decorative, and provide shelter for insects and other small creatures, and food for a variety of grasshoppers, field crickets and a few types of beetles.   
     Some of the grasshoppers in the grasses along country roads are the large, olive-green differential grasshoppers, red-legged grasshoppers, spur-throated grasshoppers, the bright-green meadow grasshoppers and Carolina locusts, which are another kind of grasshopper.  All these species are camouflaged in the grass they eat.  And all can leap and fly from harm as anyone who walks along rural roads in late summer and autumn can tell you.  The Carolina locusts are particularly good at flying on dark, yellow-trimmed wings.
     Field crickets are small, dark and live at the grass roots level.  They chirp through much of the summer and can be spotted scooting under grass to hide when danger threatens.  They eat grass and dried grass on the ground. 
     A few Japanese beetles left over from earlier in summer can be spotted on the plants they eat.  And iridescent green and purple dogbane beetles are seen on dogbane plants where they lay their eggs.  Dogbane larvae ingest only dogbane tissue and sap.
     Red clover, chicory, Queen-Anne's-lace, butter-and-eggs, brown knapweed, goldenrod and other flowering species are some of the plants blooming late in summer and into autumn.  That vegetation, and others, provide nectar for bumble bees, carpenter bees, honey bees, hover flies and a variety of butterflies.  Some of the butterfly species include cabbage whites, yellow sulphers, meadow fritillaries, a few species of skippers, painted ladies, monarchs and others.  Those butterflies flutter from flower to flower to sip nectar, adding to the beauties of the flowers and pollinating them. 
     Monarch caterpillars feed on the leaves of common milkweeds along rural roadsides.  The foliage of the various types of milkweeds are their only food.
     A variety of predators prey on insects in vegetation along country roads.  American kestrels, a kind of hawk, prey on larger grasshoppers in summer and fall.
     American toads, common toads, striped skunks and a variety of small birds, particularly starlings, killdeer plovers and horned larks, feed on roadside insects.  The toads and skunks do so mostly at night, however.   
     Black and yellow, female garden spiders snare insects in their big, orbed webs hung among tall grasses and other plants.  When an insect is caught, the spider paralyzes it with a bite and wraps it in silk.  Later the spider will suck the juices out of its victim.
     Preying mantises, which are an insect themselves, catch insects in their "toothed" front legs and eat their victims alive.  Mantises are mostly green, which camouflages them, and are up to six inches long.  They look like small monsters when they fly.
     Short-tailed shrews, which are small mammals related to moles, but look like mice, also prey on insects along country roads.  Having fast metabolisms, shrews are ever hungry and on the prowl.
     An abundance of small, brown moths of at least a few species fly across rural roads at dusk and into the night during much of summer and into fall.  They visit flowers to sip nectar at night, as butterflies do during the day. 
     These are some of the insects, their foods and their predators, one can experience by walking along country roadsides, especially during August, September and October.  All those living beings, however small, in a human-made habitat, are inspiring.