-
My Lady’s Slippers
In a white pine, hemlock, and oak woods in New Hampshire, we searched for lady slipper orchids, Cypripedium acaule. They had been reported there earlier in the week. We didn’t find any there, but based on a tip we found four at a nearby intersection. From the US Forest Service: “In order to survive and…
-
Beetle & Bug
A green immigrant leaf weevil, Polydrusus sericeus, as ID’ed by the good people at Bug Guide. I found this one on the grounds of the Stevens-Coolidge Place, in North Andover, MA. A stink bug, Banasa dimiata, found on Nantucket, MA. Not a beetle, it’s a “true bug.” Confused? While “bug” is commonly used for just…
-
We know the enemy
Back when Earth Day was young and the word “ecology” (from the Greek root for home) was on some lips, Walt Kelly’s Pogo captured the moment. Kelly’s diffident possum is pictured amongst the litter of the swamp, swamped in pollution. “We have met the enemy and he is us,” he says. Of course, some things…
-
Night Flyers
A sampling of the children of the night, all pulled to the lights of Bradford, MA during my recent week away from NYC. This last is a giant crane fly of some kind. I only noticed this detail upon examining the image: the two club-like structures beneath the wings. Then I stumbled across what they…
-
Out at Jamaica Bay
“You must take the A train” — if you want to see the prickly pear cactus in bloom. Personally, I’d drop everything to go see it. It’s the only cactus in the region, Opuntia humifusa, and it loves the sandy Mid-Atlantic Plain, the outer lands, (of which portions of Brooklyn and Queens are included). Bumble…
-
Red Squirrel
This red squirrel, Tamiasciurus hudsonicus, was chasing, or being chased — in a circle it’s hard to tell who’s on first — by a gray squirrel, Sciurus carolinensis, on a big ash tree in Bradford, MA. Meanwhile, a neighborhood cat was patrolling the nearby fence, hoping for a loser. We chased the cat off. I’ve…
-
Walt Whitman Sunday
“I find I incorporate gneiss and coal and long-threaded moss and fruits and grains and esculent roots,/And am stucco’d with quadrupeds and birds all over.”
-
May beetles
There are some 300 species of May beetles, genus Phyllophaga, in the U.S. and Canada east of the Rockies. We also call them “June bugs.” The first three photos are all of the same species, night visitors to Nantucket, MA, last week. They are rather cumbersome fliers. This one still has a bit of wing…
-
Maize Field
“This used to be a parking lot/Now it’s all covered in flowers.” — David Byrne. And before it was a parking lot? It was covered in flowers then, too. And if not flowers, then the three sisters: corn, beans, and squash. At Bergen & Smith Streets, the three sisters grow in Brooklyn, thanks to Christina…
-
Subscribe
Subscribed
Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
Backyard and Beyond 