Some Intriguing Invertibrates

     July, August and September are thee months of cold-blooded invertebrates here in southeastern Pennsylvania, and many of those little creatures with exoskeletons are exceptionally attractive and interesting.  This September, I've seen some appealing spiders and insects in my home area, making my nature trips more exciting and inspiring.
     I've seen a few strikingly black and yellow female garden spiders in their large orb webs hung among tall grasses or between wooden rails of a pasture fence where they wait for flying insects to become helplessly enmeshed in silk webbing the spiders produce themselves.  These beautiful spiders, that have one-inch bodies and long legs, making them more visible than most spiders, paralyze their insect victims, wrap them in silk and suck out their juices when they are hungry. 
     I've also seen a couple of handsome fishing spiders in the slow-running edges of streams in sunny, grassy meadows.  These spiders are nearly an inch long, are dark brown with two beige stripes on the tops of their thoraxes and abdomens.  These camouflaged spiders use most of their legs to anchor themselves to shoreline vegetation, but each spider extends a couple of legs onto the surface of the slow current to feel for vibrations in the water caused by insects or tiny fish.  Other kinds of spiders feel prey in their webs the same way.  When a fishing spider feels vibrations close by, it runs over the water to snare its victim and paralyzes it for a future meal.  
     American ruby-spot damselflies are about an inch and a half long and live in and around small waterways in sunny pastures.  I first saw these pretty dragonfly relatives this September, which was thrilling to me.  Males of this species have an attractive red spot at the base of each wing, giving this insect beauty, particularly when zipping about in sunlight over a clear stream lined with vegetation.  Those red spots also give this damselfly its common name.  Females spawn eggs into plant tissues at the edges of streams, and the young feed on tiny invertebrates on stream bottoms.  Adults consume flying insects.
     This late summer, into autumn, I have noticed many one-inch-long spotted lantern flies flying about here and there, and blundering onto back decks and vehicles, where they walk about, then take flight again.  These flies are attractive with dark spots on light-gray outer wings, red on each hind wing and yellow on each side of the abdomen, the lantern itself I suppose.  The red and yellow are seen mostly when these slow-flying insects are in flight. 
     These flies in all stages of their lives seem to be alert and ready to quickly leap or fly away from danger.  This species consumes vegetation and is said to be a pest on fruit, especially grapes. 
    Young lantern flies are black with white spots.  Red develops on their wings as they mature.      
    While watching for migrant birds and monarch butterflies, I sometimes see a few green darner dragonflies migrating south to avoid the northern winter.  Green darners are interesting because they zip along so rapidly, sometimes in little groups, catching small flying insects as they go.  They can be spotted almost anywhere, including away from water.
     I have noticed many lovely buckeye butterflies this summer, and into September, more, it seems, than in other years.  I mostly see buckeyes on red clover blossoms in hay fields and along country roads in this area.  But they visit asters and other flowers as well. 
     Buckeyes are attractive with brown and orange wings, with two dark, round spots that look like eyes on each of four wings.  Those fake eyes help discourage birds and other would-be predators from eating buckeye butterflies.    
     I also saw a hickory, horned devil on the ground along the edge of a deciduous woodland.  It was a six-inch, chunky caterpillar, light-green all over, which camouflaged it in the trees, had many dark barbs along its upper body and eight, black-tipped, long, orange barbs just behind its head.  All that armory discourages predators from ingesting this regal moth, also known as royal walnut moth, caterpillar.  Hickory horned devils consume the leaves of hickory and walnut trees and become beautiful gray moths with orange striping and yellow spots on their wings.
     I found an eyed elator, a large kind of click beetle, in a fallen log in a deciduous woods.  This almost two-inch-long, gray beetle has two black ovals that look like eyes on top of its thorax, again to discourage would-be predators from consuming this beetle.  This beetle consumes plant juices and abruptly snaps its body to startle birds and other predators.
     And I have seen a few praying mantises this summer, into September.  But recently I saw one fly.  That flying mantis resembled an other-worldly creature from a horror movie, or a tiny dinosaur.  With their wings and legs extended in flight, mantises appear large and monstrous.  They look like relics of the past, which all insects are.  And mantises are predatory, which adds to their fearsome appearance, especially when in flight.
     All these local invertebrates, and others, are attractive and intriguing, each in its own way.  When out during July, August and September, look for some of these interesting, exciting creatures. 
      
        

Insects on Asters

     For two hours one warm, sunny afternoon in the middle of September in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, I sat in a planted patch of New York aster blooms on three foot stalks to see what kinds of insects were sipping nectar from those beautiful blossoms.  That clump of lovely aster flowers, each bloom being one inch across, with deep-purple petals and yellow centers, is the size of an average bedroom, and on the edge of a lawn in a tree-dotted park.  Blooming since late August, multitudes of New York aster flowers are pretty in themselves, and also attract many insects that help liven flower beds and lawns during September and into October.  And aster blooms of several kinds are the last large source of nectar for insects each autumn in this area.
     The planted patch of asters I studied was swarming with insects in competition for nectar.  Some insects on the blossoms bumped into each other in their quest for nectar, while spreading pollen from flower to flower.  
     Many bumble bees, carpenter bees and honey bees buzzed heavily from bloom to bloom and ingested nectar from each aster blossom they visited, some of the bees right where I was sitting.  But I was not concerned because I knew the bees wouldn't bother me: And they didn't.  In fact, I had the wonderful feeling of being right in the midst of the bees' activities, without disturbing them; and being exceptionally close to the beauties and intrigues of nature.
     The constant fluttering "dancing" of cabbage white butterflies and yellow sulphur butterflies among the lovely aster flowers made those insects the most visible from a bit of a distance.  After a couple of generations of both these species of butterflies that originated in Europe, they are common in this area by late summer, into autumn.  They are particularly abundant in alfalfa and red clover fields when those hay crops go to flower, adding more life and beauty to local croplands, until those hay crops are mowed.
     Hackberry butterflies and least skipper butterflies were the most common kinds of butterflies among those aster blooms.  The abundance of the hackberry butterflies is explained by a couple of hackberry trees in the park.  Hackberry caterpillars fed on the leaves of those trees until they pupated.  Least skipper larvae feed on grass before pupating into butterflies.
     The tiny least skippers are cute little critters darting about among the flowers.  And their big, dark eyes add to their appeal.
     A few each of buckeye butterflies, meadow fritallaries, silver-spotted skippers and monarch butterflies, all of which are quite handsome, sipped nectar from New York aster blossoms.  Their presence on the aster flowers is understandable because the larval foods of them all is nearby.  Buckeye larvae feed on low herbs, some of which grow in lawns.  Fritallary caterpillars eat violet leaves, which also grow in lawns.  The skipper larvae consume soybean leaves, which are in nearby soybean fields.  And monarch young ingest milkweed leaves that grow along country roadsides, in abandoned fields, and in some flower gardens.        
     Buckeyes have pretty wings, brown and orange with two fake, dark eyes on each of four wings.  Those "eyes" frighten away birds and other would-be predators on buckeyes.
     Monarchs are famous for migrating each September to California, Mexico, or Florida to escape the northern winter.  And the next spring those same monarchs start north, mate, spawn and die.  But succeeding generations continue winging north and keeping the species alive.
     While sitting among the multitudes of bees and butterflies on the asters, it occured to me that those insects are part of food chains.  Water, sunlight, soil and air are non-living elements that contribute to the growth of vegetation, including asters.  Bees, butterflies and other kinds of insects ingest the nectar of those flowers, and some of those insects, in turn, are eaten by birds and other kinds of creatures.  And other animals, including mice, bears and people eat the honey of bees.        
     It's amazing how many bees and butterflies are attracted to a patch of asters to sip nectar.  Nature in abundance always attracts me because it is inspiring.  It's then that I feel all is well with the world and there is a Being far greater than ourselves!  There's no better expression of that Being's creativity than wonderful nature, even among the works of people. 

Farmland Insect Flowers

     Early in September, several kinds of flowering plants commonly bloom along roadsides, moist ditches, hedgerows, and in uncultivated corners of fields and pastures and abandoned fields and meadows in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania farmland, as throughout much of the eastern United States.  All these lovely blooms in those human-made habitats draw attractive and interesting insects that sip sugary nectar from the blossoms, pollinating the flowers in the process; a win-win situation, as most of them are in nature.  For over an hour one warm, sunny afternoon in the beginning of this September, I saw several kinds of insects visiting pink red clover flowers and yellow goldenrod and wingstem blossoms in a corner of a field, and orange spotted jewelweed blooms, white boneset flowers, pink ironweed blooms and blue great lobelia blossoms in a moist roadside ditch bordering that field corner.  Those beautiful flowers and intriguing insects represented life in abundance where one doesn't expect to find it.
     Each flower head on red clover plants has several tiny florets in a clump.  Red clovers begin to bloom by the end of May and through summer into autumn.  A variety of pretty butterfly species sip nectar from red clover blooms, particularly cabbage white and yellow sulphur butterflies.
     Multitudes of tiny blooms on pointing goldenrod "fingers" begin to blossom toward the end of August.  Goldenrod flowers attract numerous digger wasps, which have dark heads and thoraxes and rusty-red abdomens.  Digger wasp larvae consume June beetle larvae in the ground, pupate there and emerge from the soil as attractive adult wasps.
     Wingstem stalks grow up to six feet high, have drooping, yellow petals on each bloom and small ridges on their stems.  Bumble, carpenter and honey bees, digger wasps and several kinds of butterflies visit wingstem blossoms.
     Reaching a peak of blooming early in September, the overwhelmingly abundant spotted jewelweed blossoms grow on bush-like plants that reach four feet tall.  Each flower is shaped like a one-inch cornucopia and dangles from a long stem like jewelry.  Jewelweed blossoms are visited mostly by bumble and honey bees that push their way into the blooms to sip nectar.
     Jewelweeds are also called touch-me-nots because their small, green seed pods spring open when touched by animals and people, which shoots their seeds a few feet from the parent plants.  Seeds not eaten by mice and small birds sprout the next spring.
     Each boneset plant bears several flattened clumps of tiny blooms.  Those flowers attract digger wasps, and smaller kinds of butterflies, including skippers and pearl crescents.
     Ironweed grows up to five feet tall and has several blooms in August and September.  A variety of attractive butterflies, including monarchs and tiger swallowtails, flutter among these flowers and land on them to ingest nectar.    
     Great lobelias have blooms on two-foot tall stems.  Bumble bees are the insects most likely to enter them to consume nectar.
     But bees and butterflies that visit the flowers of these plants are not the only members of their vast class of animals to feed on flowering plants in human-made fields and meadows late in summer and into fall.  A small variety of grasshoppers, plus field crickets and mole crickets also get sustenance from those plants.
     While watching the butterflies and bees fluttering and buzzing among the flowers, I also noticed several grasshoppers jumping among the tops of the green foliage of those blooming plants, and grasses.  They were there to ingest that foliage.
     Watching even closer, I saw a few dark field crickets hopping over the ground among the bases of the same plants, where they fed on the living foliage.  And as I watched bees, butterflies, grasshoppers and crickets, I heard the seemingly unending, measured chirping of a mole cricket in his shallow burrow in a damp part of the roadside ditch.  Mole crickets are built like moles with shovel-like front legs and small back legs.  They eat the roots of plants that hang in their tunnels.
     It is always amazing to me how much lovely nature is in human-made habitats created to serve human needs.  Those habitats are quickly populated by adaptable plants and animals, to their benefit in having homes, and our benefit in enjoying the presence of those adaptable, wonderful living beings.   
    

Mourning Doves and Canada Geese

     Mourning doves and Canada geese are legal game birds at the start of September each year in Pennsylvania farmland.  And although they are members of different families, these handsome, permanent resident birds have much in common because they share human-made habitats- the innumerable lawns and fields they have adapted to.  They demonstrate convergent evolution. 
     Both these adaptable species feed on vegetation, the abundant doves on seeds and grain in fields, and the numerous geese on short grass on lawns and fields and on grain in fields.  Both raise young on suburban lawns, the doves in flimsy twig and grass platforms in trees and the geese in grassy nurseries on the ground near built ponds, and along streams.  Both species are used to people and their activities and conduct their daily lives around human activities.  Both are exciting to see and hear when they are in flight.  The geese honk excitedly as they fly in long lines or V formations.  And we can hear the whistling of the doves' wings when those birds are in speedy flight.  It's also a pleasure to hear the doves' melancholy cooing during warmer months.  And both species have bright futures because of their adapting to changing conditions.  Today, each one of these game birds has a large population throughout much of North America, in spite of hunting pressure, accidents, and predation on them and their young.  They bring much interesting, attractive life to lawns and fields.
     Mourning doves originally inhabited woodland edges where they nested in trees and fed on weed and grass seeds in bordering clearings.  Canada geese have traditionally raised young on marshy ground in eastern Canada and wintered around the Chesapeake Bay Area.
     However, European settlers in North America long ago cleared away deep forests to create farmland, producing fields that soon became dove habitats.  And in the 1960's, the flight feathers of some breeding pairs of Canada geese were removed so that those geese were forced to raise goslings in meadows and in suburban areas in the Lower 48 States, creating a new population of Canadas whose numbers have grown so much in places that these geese have become pests there, hence the hunting season on them.       
     Mourning doves raise two young in a clutch, and they can raise up to six broods of young during the warmer months of each year; a pair of youngsters a month, on average.  But they usually don't because of crows, raccoons and other predators on eggs and small young, or from wind pushing nest and young out of the trees.
     Doves build grass cradles in trees, particularly coniferous ones that offer better shelter from predators and wind.  And both parents pump a "porridge" of pre-digested seeds into their chicks' mouths until they are able to fly and get their own food in fields.
     Canada geese hatch four to six goslings per pair in grassy nurseries, surrounded by tall vegetation, near ponds and marshes.  But some pairs of Canadas nest in raised bridge supports, crow, heron or hawk cradles of sticks in trees, and in old tires mounted over water especially for the geese.  The goslings, which are fuzzy, wide-eyed and ready to feed themselves on plants soon after birth, must leap from those elevated nesting sites to the ground or water below.  
     Because of their adaptations to human-made habitats and activities, mourning doves and Canada geese are abundant in Pennsylvania and can take hunting pressure.  But they are also interesting, exciting and attractive birds on lawns and fields throughout much of North America where hunters and non-hunters alike can easily see and appreciate them.    
    

Hayfield Critters

     For a few hours one afternoon in the middle of August of this year, I visited a few hay fields of red clover and alfalfa that were blooming together in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania farmland.  Each field was of several acres in size and alive with migrant groups of barn swallows and tree swallows careening overhead after flying insects to grab with their mouths in mid-air and consume.  Meanwhile, swarms of fluttering yellow sulphur butterflies sipped nectar from the innumerable lovely flowers.
     The red clover blooms were pink while those of alfalfa were deep-purple and fragrant.  Those blossoms projected much beauty in themselves.  And the numerous yellow sulphurs added to that loveliness.    
     July, August and September are the months of insects in southeastern Pennsylvania, including butterflies of several kinds.  Besides the numerous "dancing"yellow sulphurs in the hayfields I visited, there were several each of other kinds of pretty butterflies, including least skippers, silver-spotted skippers, meadow fritallaries, buckeyes, cabbage whites, three species of swallowtails, painted ladies and monarchs.  Those types of butterflies were sipping nectar in those red clover and alfalfa fields because as caterpillars they ate other kinds of plants in nearby habitats.  For example, least skipper larvae ingested grasses.  Silver spotted skipper caterpillars ate soybean leaves in neighboring fields.  Fritallary larvae consumed violet leaves while black swallowtail caterpillars ate parsley and wild carrot foliage.  And monarch larvae fed on milkweed leaves. 
     I spotted other kinds of insects in those same hay fields, including a few each of lady bug beetles and Colorado potato beetles, and several each of bumble bees and carpenter bees.  The bees were busily buzzing among the lovely flowers to sip nectar, while lady bug beetles were consuming tiny insects in the hay fields.
     I also noticed several grasshoppers of a few kinds, either leaping out of my way as I walked through the red clover and alfalfa, or flying low on buzzy wings over the vegetation and crash landing among other plants to hide.  Being camouflaged among the hay plants and tall grasses, I didn't see the grasshoppers until they moved.  
     And I saw a few dark field crickets hopping over the ground at the bases of the hay field plants.
I had to look for the crickets by pushing the tall vegetation aside and peering down to the ground.
The related grasshoppers and crickets both consume the grasses and other plants in the hay fields. 
     Many grasshoppers and crickets are food for striped skunks, red foxes and American kestrels that live in Lancaster County cropland.  Some skunks and foxes live in holes dug out by wood chucks in hedgerows and rural roadsides, and then abandoned.  Kestrels live in tree hollows in those same hedgerows and roadsides.
     Wood chucks, white-tailed deer and cottontail rabbits emerge from sheltering hedgerows and woodland edges to munch on red clover and alfalfa in neighboring fields.  Sometimes, I am happy to see more than one individual of each species nibbling plants in those hay fields during lovely summer evenings.
     Try to visit red clover and alfalfa fields while they are in flowers and before they are mowed for hay.  The beauties of the blossoms and the intrigues of the wildlife are rewarding and exciting because those hay fields are human-made habitats that adaptable plants and animals have adjusted to, much to their survival, and our pleasure in experiencing them.
       

Mill Creek Life in August

     For a couple of hours in the afternoon of August 14, 2019, I visited one of my favorite nature spots, close to home, in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania's farmland.  The "spot" is an overgrown, quarter-mile long, 20 yards wide strip of young ash-leafed maples, silver maples and black walnuts, red-twigged and gray-twigged dogwood shrubbery, tall grass and flowering plants.  That beautiful, overgrown thicket of vegetation is bisected by a clear, running stream and closely paralleled by a country road. 
     My nature snooping that day became one of summer and fall wild flowers, butterflies and aquatic creatures, all of which are typical here at this time of year.
     Some of the stream-side flowers in bloom that day included lots of orange, cornocopia-shaped blooms on spotted jewelweeds, some great lobelias with dark blue blossoms, pink-flowered swamp milkweeds, the bluish-purple blossoms of blue vervains, the streamside hugging arrowhead plants with white flowers and wild mints with tiny, pale-purple blossoms.  One swamp milkweed plant was especially interesting because up to four monarch butterflies visited it at once to at least sip nectar.  Perhaps a female or two was also laying eggs, one at a time, on the milkweed's leaves.  The branching stems of the blue vervains resembled candlabras.  And several lovely, dark and rusty-red digger wasps were busily sipping nectar from the mint blossoms, pollinating them as well.
      There were other kinds of butterflies visiting those stream-side flowers that day, including spicebush swallowtails, big, yellow and black tiger swallowtails, fritillaries, silver-spotted skippers, least skippers, cabbage whites and yellow suphurs.  Those butterflies, constantly fluttering from bloom to bloom, added lots of beauty and entertainment to the flowering plants along Mill Creek.  
     I soon turned my attention to Mill Creek by sitting in an eight yard "window" composed of short grass in a dense, green wall of young trees and tall shrubbery.  That window of short vegetation allowed a view of Mill Creek. 
     There the creek was shallow, clear and about fourteen feet across.  Using 16 power binoculars, I saw a couple of small schools of banded killifish swimming upstream as they watched for tiny invertebrates to eat.  I also saw three carp, each about a foot long, groveling upstream for plant and invertebrate food in the mud on the bottom of the waterway.  Both kinds of fish blended into the bottom of the stream, which made them hard to see without binoculars, but, of course, that protects them from bald eagles, ospreys, herons and other kinds of predators.     
     While watching the fish with binoculars, I suddenly noticed two submerged mud turtles half-hidden under a leafy limb in a slower-moving part of the creek.  They were walking on the bottom of the waterway, perhaps looking for invertebrate and plant food.  I was surprised to see them because I didn't think they would be in that waterway.  Unfortunately for me, they soon crawled out of sight under the limb.
     Scanning the shoreline of Mill Creek, I spotted two young painted turtles perched on a small log to sun themselves and a big green frog sitting on a narrow, muddy shore under tall grass hanging protectively over that frog.  The paints were beautiful with red and yellow stripes on their necks and front legs and the frog probably was watching for invertebrates it could catch and swallow.
     I also saw two kinds of pretty and charming damselflies fluttering over Mill Creek, and landing on creek-side vegetation.  They were black-winged damselflies, with the males having iridescent-green abdomens and four black wings they hold up at a 45 degree angle when at rest, and bluet damselflies, with males having blue abdomens and clear wings. 
     Each of these types of damselflies were youngsters under stones on the bottom of the creek where they caught and ate tiny invertebrates.  But now as adults, they fly about looking for flying insects to eat and mates to reproduce with.  
     A few male black-winged damselflies "flutter-danced" in the sunlight over the creek, their green abdomens glistening in the sun, to attract females to them for mating.  And one pair of black-wings were spawning eggs into plants in the slow-moving shallows along a shore.
     There are other kinds of critters along this stretch of Mill Creek that I didn't see that day, including muskrats, snapping turtles, northern water snakes, mallard ducks, least sandpipers on exposed gravel bars, belted kingfishers, great blue herons, and an occasional great egret late in summer.  Red-winged blackbirds, eastern kingbirds and willow flycatchers nest in the tall grass and shrubbery along the creek earlier in the summer.  Even after abuse of this creek, and its surrounding cropland, several kinds of wildlife still live in and around it.  Because these plants and animals are adaptable, they will survive indefinitely     
    

Wet Meadow Flowers

     By late July and through August, low, wet spots in many sunny meadows in southeastern Pennsylvania, and elsewhere in the eastern United States, are made more lovely and interesting because of the pretty flowers of blue vervains, swamp milkweeds, ironweeds and Joe-Pye weeds.  These native, blooming plants have much in common, including sharing sunny, damp habitats, and blossoming about the same time.   All these tall plants have multitudes of colorful, small blossoms that are well worth seeing in sunny, bottomland meadows in the heat of late summer. 
     Blue vervains and swamp milkweeds bloom together in many of the same damper spots in some of the same meadows.  They are often lovely, floral neighbors.  Each blue vervain plant has a handsome, candalabra-shaped stalk and several tiny, bluish-purple blooms at the top of each stem.  Swamp milkweed plants have pink flowers.  The attractive flower colors of vervains and milkweeds are a pretty combination in certain low, moist meadows.
     Bees, small, but colorful butterflies and other kinds of insects sip sugary nectar from the diminutive blooms of vervains and milkweeds, pollinating those blossoms as they fly from one to another and another.  Meanwhile, caterpillars of monarch butterflies consume the juicy leaves of  milkweeds, grow, pupate, and later each one emerges from a green chrysalis as a striking butterfly.
     The purple-pink blossoms on clumps of ironweed plants in the damper parts of pastures are also beautiful, and attract many bees, pretty butterflies and other types of insects to their nectar.  While sipping nectar, those insects pollinate the ironweed blooms.  And several each of yellow and black tiger swallowtail butterflies, black and orange monarch butterflies, painted ladies, a variety of skippers and other kinds of colorful butterflies add more beauty to those flowers and the moist, sunny meadows that contain them.
     Joe-Pye-weeds, like ironweeds, usually grow in stands of their own in damp spots in pastures, and along moist roadsides in the case of the present species.  Joe-Pye is the tallest of these July and August, wet meadow plants, often growing up to twelve feet high.  This common plant is named after a Native American medicine man called Joe-Pye.
     Each striking Joe-Pye stalk has whorls of lance-shaped leaves at regular intervals along the stem, and bunches of tiny, dusty-pink flowers at the top of each stalk.  Those lovely flowers attract lots of butterflies and other insects to their nectar, again helping make the blooms and the pastures they live in more attractive and interesting.    
     These wet pasture plants' flowers, and the insects they attract, offer more beauty and intrigue to the habitat they inhabit.  The blossoms benefit insects with their ample supplies of nectar and pollen.  The plants are benefitted by the insects' spreading pollen as they fly from bloom to bloom.  And we gain lots of inspiration and joy from seeing the lovely flowers and the pretty, interesting butterflies that visit those various kinds of blossoms.