Tag Archive | Nature Story
The Venomous Caterpillar
During a recent trip to Prospect Mountain in the foothills of the Adirondacks in New York, my grandchildren found black and white fuzzy caterpillars climbing on the rocks near the top of the mountain. I cautioned them not to touch these hickory tussock moth caterpillars because its hairs can attach to your skin and inject […]
How Sheepshead Got Its Name
When I grew up on New York’s Long Island, I knew of a town called Sheepshead Bay. I incorrectly thought it was because the community raised sheep in colonial times, but the town was named for the abundance of an edible fish in the bay there called Sheepshead. The fish got its name because of […]
Gentle Giants
We have seen them at Sea World and at Disney and even in zoological parks and they are impressive animals, but it is thrilling to see the West Indian manatees in the wild here in Florida. Manatees thrive in freshwater springs, salty bays, and river systems throughout Florida eating plants including sea grasses and freshwater […]
Delightful Backyard Butterflies
I planted fire-bush shrubs in our backyard to attract butterflies and hummingbirds with great success. The flowers are a good source of nectar for these creatures. cloudless sulphur butterflies and zebra long-wings are two of the butterflies that frequent these bushes. We see Ruby-throated Hummingbirds too in the early morning and at dusk flying from […]
Cultivating a Future Naturalist
“Hi! Hi!”, I hear my 16-month-old granddaughter say excitedly in our Florida room. Wondering who she was talking to, I look into the room to see her face to face with a young eastern gray squirrel that climbed on the window ledge to peer into our house. The squirrel seemed as enchanted to see my […]
How Milkweed Helped the Tiger Swallowtail!
Monarch butterflies continue to find the milkweed plants in our garden to lay eggs. Soon, there are only green sticks left to our milkweed plants dotted with hungry caterpillars. Anne counts 15 monarch caterpillars of various sizes. We find a small one crawling on our hot concrete driveway looking for more milkweed plants to eat. […]
The Amazing Bug!
As Anne and I enjoy watching butterflies sipping nectar from our milkweed flowers and monarch caterpillars devouring milkweed leaves, we see small orange and black colored insects on the plant’s seed pods. These insects are large milkweed bugs that eat milkweed seeds. This bug has a long proboscis that pierces the seed pods and injects […]
