More Monarchs

Back in 2006 I wrote about our first adventures with monarchs on the fledgling praire plants in our yard. Those plants have come a long way, and this year our monarch population caught up. I haven't noticed too many caterpillars the past couple of years, but this year has been absolutely insane. We started looking for eggs shortly after learning in early July that many monarch eggs get eaten by ants or earwigs. I always thought it was better to leave nature well enough alone, but I decided to go ahead and 'save' some butterflies and that the ants and earwigs could find plenty of other munchables in the prairie. Our first night out Bird spotted a gigantic caterpillar and we found a couple of eggs. Over the course of the next month we found more and more eggs and started a monarch nursery! It's minimal work but you do need to keep the enclosure clean and make sure that the leaves are fresh. We did have a couple of very tiny caterpillars "disappear" but overall we had really good success with those we brought in. In recent weeks it's gotten to the point that we would have them randomly appearing in the cage, having hitchiked in on some of the fresh milkweed we brought in. I got tired of the constant cleaning and getting fresh leaves so I've been trying to avoid bringing more in, but I can't really avoid it. Today I was getting ready to take out a vase of flowers I picked from the gardens last week, and I spotted some frass and a caterpillar skin--they molt theirs when they go into their chrysalis stage. I poked around and sure enough, there was a chrysalis hanging from a wilting coneflower blossom. We'd had red milkweed in the bouquet and he must have been living there the whole time. Interestingly enough we found the earlier eggs and caterpillars on the regular milkweed that you see in ditches, etc. that we have around the yard. But lately it's been the native red milkweed we planted that's literally crawling with them.

One of the best things about having so many is that we've had a better chance of seeing the "as it happens" moments. We saw a caterpillar just as he molted into his chrysalis a couple of weeks ago. This morning that same little guy emerged from his chrysalis right before our eyes. His chrysalis had turned clear so Bird was keeping a close eye and called us all over just in time to see him burst out. Simply amazing. We've learned a lot and enjoyed feeling like we're playing for the monarch team. I think it's an experience every child should get to enjoy.

You can look for eggs on the underside (sometimes the top) of milkweed leaves. They are a tiny white raised bump. Just before they hatch they will turn dark as the little one emerges. Keep the original leaf fresh by wrapping some wet paper towel around the stem and covering it with foil. You may need to moisten the towel again but don't let it go too wet--you want to avoid mold. After that just make sure that you leave fresh leaves in. They get positively voracious when they're about ready to go into their chrysalis (about the size of the caterpillar in the third picture, but we've noticed they do it at all different sizes--just look at the difference in the sizes of the chrysali on the lid), so be prepared. Our latest caterpillars have preferred red milkweed right on the stem. Don't let the frass build up in the cage. Remember that when they want to build their chrysalis, they go UP, so be sure to have a secure top on the cage that the caterpillars can't crawl out of. We use a terarrium type plastic cage with fine ventilation. Keep an eye on the chrysalis and you'll see it turn clear before the butterfly emerges. Ours have emerged between 8:30-10:30. Let the wings dry for a couple of house before releasing them. Don't release them in the rain or the dark. Release near a food source is ideal. Enjoy the magic of seeing this spectacle of nature up close and personal!

Fiddlehead Fabulosity

Earlier this week I heard an interview with a local, seasonal, slow-food enthusiast. He was singing the praises of the foods that could be foraged locally in this burst of Spring weather. One of the things he mentioned was fiddlehead ferns, so when I saw a package at Whole Foods last night, I snatched them up. I was a bit intimidated by them, but I took it as a challenge to my culinary ingenuity. I found a recipe published in Mother Earth News, by "A Taste of The Mountains" cooking school. After a thorough cleaning the recipe instructed how to lightly sautee the fern heads in olive and sesame oils, with a touch of freshly ground corriander and honey. (If you use this recipe, I'd recommend going light on the pepper at the end.) They were perfectly delightful served over a bed of linguine tossed with a bit of butter and salt. They reminded me very much of asparagus, but with an undertone of earthier flavor. If you have the chance to try this ephemeral Spring delicacy of the Earth, I'd highly advise you to do so. Bon appetite!

Bird's Nests

The birds all but disappeared this winter. Despite our food stock for them, our goldfinches, sparrows, and house finches were seldom visitors. This week, as Spring arrives (again), we've finally been graced with sweet songs from some of our favorites. Today there was a cheeky little house finch, singing his heart out from a sapling in our front yard. I watched as he flew down to our garden and tore a few pieces of newspaper from a piece of mulch in our garden. He inspired me to provide some more material for our guests.

The kids and I gathered up some used scrap paper, and yarn ends, and set to snipping them into beak-friendly pieces. Four inches is the reccomended length for thread, yarn, etc. While searching for that handy fact, I saw this great article on building a nesting materials site for birds, in Wonder Time. I actually subscribe to this magazine but rarely find time to read it. They suggest using a mesh onion bag to hold the materials. We packed our yarn and paper into an onion bag, pet the dogs for a little more material to add, then the kids snipped small holes around the bag for the birds to be able to poke around in. We tied it together with a piece of yarn at the top, then hung it in a small tree near our feeder.

This was a nice little Earth Day project for the kids--free and simple, and I plan to have it be an ongoing project as we come up with things like dryer lint that we can add to our nesting collection. The kids were thrilled, and are anxiously waiting at the window to see if we get any takers. I'll keep you updated on whether we have success on the bird's end!

It's For the Birds

This year we've decided to put our Winter Holiday emphasis on Solstice. After all, it fits in much more nicely with our belief system, and darn if it doesn't make things less stressful to spread things out. Beo's Mom wants to have a fancy Christmas Dinner on Christmas Eve? No problem, we already had our fancy dinner! We have to travel all day on Christmas? No problem, we already had our special day! You get the idea. I'm hoping this will become a family tradition.

I'm trying to instill in the kids a sense of the magic and wonder of the season. With how little they are, I'm keeping things simple too. Lights, newness, nature, peace and giving--it's all good. One of the fun things we've done is to make Solstice Gifts for the birds. In addition to a traditional garland of popcorn and cranberries which we draped on the bird feeders, we made these fun little numbers. These were a suggestion from a Veggie Boarder who owns a wild bird feeding store. They're totally simple to make. Just hollow out an orange, mix peanut butter with birdseed, and fill. I had everything ready to go so that there was no need for patience or frustration on anyone's part. The actual activity for the kids lasted all of about three minutes, but they loved it, and enjoyed setting them out for the birds. It's a simple way for them to get to honor nature.

Nature Check-In

We are very lucky to be in a nature-filled area, despite the suburban nature of our neighborhood and the proximity of the interstate. We are right on one of the flyways to one of the nation's largest migratory rest stops, which is about an hour north of us. Last week we went up to Horicon Marsh and rented a canoe. We saw blue herons, egrets, white pelicans, and gulls galore. At our own home-sweet-home we get quite a variety of birds too. The lots across the highway have yet to be developed, the river is only about a mile away, and there is a wetlands area to the northeast. Sunrise and sunset bring flocks of Canada Geese on a regular basis, and occasionally we see other unidentified geese and ducks. Only slightly less common than the Canada Geese are the Sandhill Cranes. They are wonderfully majestic animals, and there's usually a pair or two that make our area their home year round, even when the others have moved on.

The past couple of days we've had new visitors. The other day Beo came home and quietly herded us all outside. Lo and behold there were three wild turkeys just on the other side of the fence. I imagine they came wandering down the hill from the lightly forested area on the other side. They didn't seem too worried about us. I'm not sure how much of that was the fence giving us a good blind and how much was just a lack of brightness on the turkey's part, but we were able to get very close to them. (Doesn't the yard look great? It's been cool and rainy, and everything is staying green despite the chill. The no-mow mix seems to love it, and the sycamores are putting on a last burst of growth before fall.)

Today when I stepped outside something caught my eye on the corner of the bench on our porch. Do you see it? Don't feel bad if you don't. I'm particularly paranoid about this area because it's where our jumping spiders live, and where we once saw a big ol' wolf spider--sitting right on the underside of the top of the door frame (prime drop-on-your-head real estate, right?). So my eyes do a quick inventory when I walk out, and they rarely betray me. Okay, I usually just go out through the garage, but I'm trying to be braver. Did you find it? Look under the rock by my little green duck. Ooh, it's a tough one. Yeah, in fact from that angle it's virtually impossible to see it. Here he is! After some cursory research, I think he's a Cope's Gray Tree Frog, but I'm not sure. I don't want to lift the rock up and scare him. I think whatever kind of frog or toad he is, it must be good luck to have him there. I'm enjoying the change of the seasons and the different wildlife we're seeing with it.

Monarch Madness

A while back, I posted about finding two monarch caterpillars on the butterfly weed in our new prairie. I wasn't convinced that they were monarchs, because monarch caterpillars are supposed to be on milkweed! I decided to go ahead with our science experiment/miracle (while simultaneously saving our butterfly weed from utter decimation) and bring one inside. (The same one pictured in the previous post, actuall!) I brought in some "ditch milkweed" for it, and when it finished the sprig of butterfly weed we'd brought it in on, it grudgingly started in on the huge milkweed leaf. I could not believe how quickly it ate, or how much it pooped! I've never really thought about caterpillar poop, but for how much they eat, I understand. As soon as it "spun" it's chrysallis, I knew it was a monarch. Their chrysallis is like no other. In my research I learned that they don't actually spin a chrysallis, they just shed their last caterpillar skin and poof--there's the chrysallis. It's incredible. Later in the week, Beo pointed out some native red milkweed to me. It looks very different than what I traditionally think of as milkweed, but it also looked quite a bit like the butterfly weed. Beo did some research and found that sure enough, the plants are closely related and monarchs happily lay their eggs on butterfly weed. It took a little over a week, and the chrysallis turned clear, and then poof again--a butterfly! It really is a magical, amazing, awesome thing. When the monarch first emerges, it's instinct is to cling, and so Sprout and Bird got to experience the magic of having a monarch on their hands. It took it's first drink (while on Sprout's finger) from the big butterfly bush in our front yard. He eventually crawled on to the bush, and about an hour later we saw him take flight for the first time. Amazing, amazing. I can't even explain! We did the whole thing a second time with a second caterpillar. We had well over a dozen caterpillars on our native plants this year. In the weeks since, our butterfly bush, one of the last sources of nectar as fall comes on, has been alive with butterflies of all shapes and sizes. Today when I walked out there was a monarch clinging to a cluster of buds, and I smiled, knowing the likelihood that he went from egg to caterpillar to butterfly in our own yard. We've created a Magical Monarch Machine.

Spiders

I have a strange relationship with spiders. I don't care for spiders. I just don't. Beo likes to roll his eyes at his "Bug-hating-druid-wife", but that's just the way it is. I don't hate them, I just FEAR them. I can look at the whole situation logically and understand that the odds of them hurting me are incredibly small, but then the creeps take over and I just plain freak out. When I was in high school I decided that watching Arachnaphobia would help me confront and overcome my fear, and realize how silly it really was. Wicked bad idea. Didn't work. Our house is relatively spider free. When we first moved in we used to see a few of these strange flattish spiders that had their legs neatly divided into longer front legs and smaller back legs. I swear that I sometimes saw these spiders drop just as movement passed under them. Other than that, we mainly just have the spindly legged, tan, basement variety, and the light green little guys, which don't bother me overly much.

The thing is, I don't tolerate spiders in the house. I am an animal lover, yes, and a nature lover, definitely, but I don't do spiders in the house. I know some great people just cover them with a glass and take them outside. I am not one of them. I use the vaccuum whenever possible so that I can keep a good distance. Part of my fear just involves having them ON me and not knowing exactly where, so I have trouble approaching them with a shoe. They just freak the heck out of me. I've tried really hard not to pass this fear on to my kiddoes, and try to stay calm about it when they're around. So far, I think Sprout is good. Bird may have picked up some of my wariness.

Now spiders outside are another issue. It's defintely a love-hate thing, and I have to weigh my emotions. This is the second year we've had a family of--good gosh, I don't know--jumping spiders? On our front porch, usually on or around our front door. They're big beefy black buggers with yellow markings and FANGS. I've used the front door as little as possible this summer. Last weekend I saw a hatching of them. Fabulous. Sometimes the tiny ones get inside, and when you approach them they try to fight you. I kid you not.

Then we have the garden spiders. They're not really garden spiders technically, but that's what we call them. Last year they were mostly in the tomatoes, and they started to spread a bit through the back yard as summer wore on. This year I had five in my front gardens. They don't bother me too much because they're relatively large and stationary, so I just avoid them and keep my distance, and am grateful for them keeping the grasshopper population down. Problems arise when I check their web and they're not there. There's the possibility of them having gotten eaten by a bird, but often they've just taken up residence in a different section of the garden. I was happy with them being up front at first, but as they started moving around, I realized that I'd been neglecting my gardens terribly. I would work the perimeter of the bed, but as time wore on and the spiders got bigger, I kept my distance more and more. Now I admit it's to the point where I'm scared to go into my gardens, and that simply won't do. The time for cutting back is almost upon us, and I'll need to wade into those beds. Last year Beo removed them by stick to the back prairie area, but this year they're a lot further away from there. So how I'll handle it remains to be seen. This is definitely one area I haven't figured out how to overcome.

Things Work Out

I've been faced lately with some bad news about my family's health. So while I digest that and struggle internally, I'm just going to talk about garden stuff, and keep my mind outside.

The gardens and their accoutrements have been amazing me lately. The coneflowers and brown eyed susans have been riotous. I have been worrying over some of the beds which don't have much in bloom, and finally realized that I need to put the aforementioned color bursts into those beds. I did a number of splits and transplants. The great thing about these natives is that they tend to reproduce pretty well. Splitting is a little rougher, but it's something I need to work on anyway. It was a bit of a bad time to be doing transplants. The heat was awful and we were in quite a dry spell. I had to water the little guys every morning and evening to keep them from wilting terribly. The amazing thing is that I never had to turn on our water faucet. I deep watered the transplants for a week with only water from the rain barrels. Just when I'd run out, we had a brief but steady cloudburst. Beo hooked up the rain barrels so perfectly that even a small
rain collects a good amount of water. It felt amazing to be able to do all that watering guilt free.

I made a decision earlier on this summer to stop pulling out every errant sunflower that popped up around the birdfeeder. That turned out to be a good decision. We have deleriously happy little goldfinches eating free sunflower seeds on free birdflowers. One little sprout that I left grew into a 4 foot sunflower and nods it's big yellow head right outside our living room window. We had a number of sunny finches visit this flower, and amazingly they would let the kids get right up next to the window, and watch as the finch fed upside-down on the flower.

The prairie we installed has filled out with ox-eye sunflowers gone wild. (Pun intended.) Today I found two monarch caterpillars feasting on our butterfly weed. I know they should be on the milkweed, which we've left in plenty in the yard, but after trying to identify a look-alike, I am still pretty sure they're monarchs. Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong. I'm still contemplating taking one of the little buggers in and seeing if it won't perform it's miracle in front of the kiddo's eyes. Regardless of what kind of 'pillar they are, it's neat to see things that belong in the wild in our gardens. It's been a bit of a rough road getting everything up and running, but it's all working out, and definitely paying off.