Wildflower Plantings

I didn't get a chance to visit the health club today, so I took my 2-mile walk up the road instead. Along the way I noticed there was some Stiff Goldenrod growing in the roadside ditch. I've been wanting to get some of this for my backyard for quite a while -- the flowers are an excellent source of nectar and very attractive to butterflies and bees. I dug up at least 8 plants from the ditch. I also dug up some sunflowers -- Woodland Sunflowers, I think. My plan was to put all of these plants out in that wild, unmowed acre of my backyard.

I also found and dug up several of these interesting looking plants. The seed pod on them led me to believe they were some sort of milkweed. When I cracked open one of the seed pods, they definitely looked like milkweed seeds inside. What do you think?

After I got everything planted and came back in to my computer, I went to the MonarchWatch website because they have photos of all the different varieties of milkweeds. To me this plant looked exactly like Plains Milkweed, which supposedly is not found in Minnesota. OK, now I was really curious, so I googled "Plains Milkweed" and here's what I found on the USDA Plants Database website for Plains Milkweed. Check out the range map on this website -- it also shows this plant is not found in Minnesota! I got all 4 plants in the ground and marked so I'll be able to check and see if they make it through the winter. I hope they do because I want to see if it grows and spreads on its own and how attractive it will be for the monarch caterpillars and other butterflies and insects next spring.

Most of the wildflowers I've planted previously in this wild acre haven't survived (the soil is really crappy), but I was happy to see that this plant and another just like it had survived and were thriving. It's one of the hyssops and the leaves have a wonderful sweet minty-licorice scent when you rub them between your fingers.

While I walking through the tall grass searching for spots to plant my new wildflowers, I noticed there were lots of spider webs created and populated by these beautiful Banded Garden Spiders.

The webs were hard to spot in the bright afternoon sunshine and I hope I didn't accidentally destroy any of them.

It was a beautiful afternoon to be outdoors, a light breeze, and about 65 degrees. The only negative thing was the swarms of hungry mosquitoes just waiting for me to walk through the tall grass. Where are those dragonflies when you need them?

Mostly Insects

If you don't like bugs much, you'll want to skip today's post, but for everyone else, I've got a good variety of some insects to share with you that I've seen in the last few days. (Remember, you can click on any of these pictures to get a super-sized look at them!)

Last Thursday, we went out to the woods again to check and move the trail cameras. During our hike through the woods, I almost stepped into this 'foot-sized' hole filled with yellowjackets. YIKES! I was following Mr. Johnson and he must have walked right past it. Of course, I had to stop and try to figure out what these insects were doing. Because I didn't want to get too close, I counted on my zoom for a better look. It appeared that all of these yellowjackets were swarming on something, but I couldn't tell what (poop? a small dead animal?) My insect field guide says that the Eastern Yellowjacket (common in Minnesota) nests underground (usually in abandoned rodent burrows).
I had a short video clip to download also, but Blogger is feeling contrary tonight and I'll have to try that another time.


On our way back to the car, I almost stepped on this spider web right next to the crushed rock road. My insect field guide only has one page of spiders, but I'm guessing this is some sort of garden spider. It was quite large!
The web is quite visible due to the fact that it's coated with dust from all the car traffic kicking up dust on the road.


We went down again yesterday morning to check the cameras and I spotted this Eastern Comma Butterfly basking in the sun on a soybean plant.
Fortunately my patience paid off and I was able to get a wonderful picture of this butterfly with its wings open. I found out from my field guide that this is the "winter form" of coloring for the Eastern Comma. In the summer, their hindwing is almost entirely black.

Mr. Johnson brought me something special from his afternoon walk today. I had Sophie out in the backyard for a walk and I saw him go up on the deck and holler into the house for me. "I'm over here," I yelled back at him from the yard and I could see he had something in his hand. "C'mere, look at what I found for you," he said. I was thinking maybe a toad or something, but he was clutching a handful of leaves with this creature crawling on top.

Know what it is? I didn't but it was pretty huge and gross looking, so I figured maybe it was a caterpillar for a large butterfly or moth. I googled "caterpillar identification" and found the "what's this caterpillar" site that showed pictures of a similar caterpillar for the Pandora Sphinx Moth. Then I googled that name and found out more about the Pandora Sphinx Moth on Wikipedia.
I gotta tell ya, Mr. Johnson never ceases to amaze me......nothin' says "Love" like bringing a giant caterpillar home, does it?

And just to confirm what a swell guy he is, take a look at this early birthday present he got for me. I have one of those awful birthdays ending in a "ZERO" coming up in a few weeks and he wanted to get me something special that would keep my mind off the actual birthday by distracting me with something I would really enjoy. I didn't even have to hint very much for this.....

Thanks Honey Bunny! You are THE MAN!

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

And for all of you who have placed a bid on my hat for auction (or are still thinking about placing a bid), please click on this link for Kristy's blog and look at all the hats she's received--820!! What a tremendous response.

Butterfly Ranching

A few weeks ago, I chanced upon the first monarch butterfly caterpillar for "Monarch Ranch 2008." It finally hatched last Wednesday (the day I left work early).
It was a pretty female and I released her on the lantana flower blooming on the deck. I like the way her colors coordinate with the blossoms, don't you?
I also have a couple of swallowtail cocoons in a large jar on the kitchen counter. These butterflies take longer than monarchs, but I'm hoping maybe one day this week they will hatch. I think they're probably going to be Black Swallowtails because I found the caterpillars on some wild parsnip I was cutting down.

I like the way their chrysalis is color-camouflaged to match the object it's attached to.
I'm guessing this one is green because that's the generic color? (if it was attached to a plant stem instead of a clear jar)
While I was off on Wednesday afternoon, I took advantage of the time to search for monarch caterpillars and eggs to re-populate the monarch ranch. My personal choice is to start with eggs or very tiny caterpillars because there's less worry about parasitic wasps or flies laying their eggs in the caterpillar.
Here are some eggs (you should almost always find the eggs on the underside of common milkweed leaves).
Here are some more common milkweed leaves with tiny caterpillars and an egg. This gives you an idea of how small these are--you have to look really carefully when scanning underneath the leaves.
Once I bring the leaves in the house, those with caterpillars on them can go directly to the "ranch." The leaves with eggs I put in a separate dish--this guarantees that the eggs don't accidentally get eaten when the larger caterpillars are munching on the milkweed leaves. I monitor the eggs and when they're almost ready to hatch, I cut off the portion of the leaf (with the egg still attached) and place it in the ranch on a fresh milkweed leaf.

I can hear you asking......"but how do you know when the egg's ready to hatch?" and here's a picture to show you:I'm still working on my close-up photography skills, but I think you can tell the egg on the left has gotten really dark on the tip--that's the little caterpillar's head! The egg on the right is still completely white. When they hatch, they're about the size of this letter "I"--soooo tiny! But they grow fast and in a couple of days they've doubled in size.

I'm fortunate to have lots of common milkweed growing in several places in the backyard and if I was a good planner, I would pick a bunch of milkweed leaves and keep them in a baggie in the fridge, but I usually have enough time to pick fresh leaves every morning. I transfer the caterpillars to their new leaves and yesterday's old, dried-out leave goes in the compost bucket.

Once they hatch into monarch butterflies, I release them in the backyard where there are plenty of purple coneflowers blooming for them.
Compared to last year's records, my first monarch (also a female) was released on July 30th, so I'm actually a week ahead this year! I grew and released a total of 19 monarch butterflies last year and right now I have 6 eggs and 3 caterpillars for the ranch. My goal for 2008 is to beat last year's total by 5 (an increase of 25%). I also ordered my monarch tagging kit and a butterfly net from MonarchWatch. Last year I tagged 10 monarchs that I raised and also some wild ones I caught in the backyard (but I can't find that record sheet right now). Watch for future Monarch Ranch updates in the coming weeks.

While I was searching the milkweed patches, I also came upon this little spider in a really lovely web. Does anyone know what kind of spider this is? It was very long and skinny.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

I would also like to wish a "Happy Birthday" to my Sissy, who's enjoying an excellent time in Ely, Minnesota, shopping at the Blueberry Arts Festival and feeding fish guts to bald eagles on beautiful Snowbank Lake. Hopefully she'll bring back some good photos to share on my blog.