northeast-flora-and-fauna

Meet an Eastern Calligrapher , an insect I probably haven't shown you before. (At least I hope it's an Eastern Calligrapher; some of its relatives look similar.) Eastern Calligraphers are part of a very large group of insects sometimes called hover flies (the males will hover around, either defending a territory from other males or just hoping to get the attention of a female), sometimes called flower flies (the adults feed off of the nectar and pollen of flowering plants), and sometimes called  syrphid flies (pronounced SUR-fid, which appears to come from Greek and Latin words loosely meaning "descended from gnats"). These flies have a waspy look, are considered wasp mimics, and since they can't sting, they're a good example of Batesian mimicry . Notice though that as flies, they have only 1 pair of wings whereas wasps, bees, and most flying insects have 2 pairs of wings.  They're considered pollinators , though they're probably not as effective as

Though these were all taken within 15 minutes of one another, it shows Monarch butterflies with various stages of wing health. First there's this individual, with perfect wings and vibrant colors. It's likely this is a relatively young individual. July 25, 2021 at Duke Farms Photo 148653086, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC) The next Monarch seems to have intact wings, but has a more faded look. Butterfly wings have little scales on them, and when some of these are lost through normal wear and tear, their color fades. July 25, 2021 at Duke Farms Photo 148652861, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC) Sometimes there's more tear than wear evident on butterfly wings. This individual not only looks a little faded, but has lost part of its wings. (While I long assumed the wings got torn while escaping from a predator, some butterfly watchers have said they suspect the wings are more likely torn while navigating through prickly plants.) July 25, 2021 at

Here are a couple American Goldfinch pictures. These are males wearing their vibrant yellow-and-black plumage. Females, juveniles, and non-breeding males all have more subdued coloring. I've occasionally heard of people reporting an American Goldfinch sighting as a "escaped canary", and the Domestic Canary is somewhat related. I suspect that some people just don't think that such a colorful bird would be flying around in the wild in NJ (selectively forgetting about birds like Northern Cardinals ). These birds are considered one of the strictest vegetarians in the passerine world. While many passerines preferentially eat insects, and most will at least supplement their diet with insects, for American Goldfinches it's all about seeds. One consequence of this is that they're seldom a victim of brood parasitism by Brown-headed Cowbirds , since the cowbird nestlings can't survive on the American Goldfinch's non-insect diet. July 25, 2021 at Duke Farms Ph

I kind of like this picture of a Widow Skimmer . Most of my dragonfly pictures are from the rear (where you get a good look at the wings and abdomen) or the side (where you get a good side view of the abdomen-to-head but the wings sometimes disappear). In this one the dragonfly is showing the wings well yet we can also get a look at the face. Of course, this does have its limitations; the white pruinose is impossible to see. If only dragonflies were vainer, perhaps they'd let me get pictures from multiple angles. July 24, 2021 at Duke Farms Photo 148594470, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

I suspect I took this picture of a Sleepy Orange butterfly that was moving around a lot. It wasn't until I got around to getting a close look at the picture that I think I see something interesting about it. First, the leaves look like the Wild Senna that's fairly common at Duke Farms. And Wild Senna is one of the legumes that Sleepy Oranges (and some other sulphur butterflies ) use as host plants. And finally, the butterfly seems to be positioned a little unusually with the end of the abdomen touching the underside of a leaf. Put all these together, and I'm fairly sure this was a female Sleepy Orange laying eggs on the Wild Senna plants. If this culminated in an adult butterfly (predation is a challenge for most species), I suspect it'd have migrated south since Sleepy Oranges aren't believed to be able to overwinter here in NJ. (Note that some of its relatives like the Orange Sulphur and Clouded Sulphur can overwinter up here.) July 24, 2021 at Duke Farms Photo

In case you're thinking that the Plainsboro Preserve is all about the dragonflies I've been posting, there was also some butterfly action there too. First I met a Monarch butterfly getting a sip of nectar from what looks like Wild Bergamot , a very popular drinking spot for the pollinator community. July 23, 2021 at the Plainsboro Preserve And a little afterwards, I met this Eastern Tiger Swallowtail at another pollinator "watering hole", one of the Joe Pye Weeds . July 23, 2021 at the Plainsboro Preserve Photo 148594293, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC) That pretty much wrapped up this trip to the Plainsboro Preserve, where I got lots of dragonfly pictures, a few butterfly pictures, and also got a slightly uncommon bird.

After yesterday interrupted my dragonfly posts, let's resume with this Blue Dasher picture. This was the 3rd species of blue dragonfly that I saw on this trip, after the Eastern Pondhawks and Slaty Skimmers . Though I saw only one of these guys compared to around 7 EPs and 2 Slaties, Blue Dashers are far from rare around here. At a glance, I can usually distinguish them from the male EPs because of the black tip at the end of their abdomen. Though both species develop a similar light blue pruinose, the pruinose starts forming at the end of the EP abdomen, so even if the was an immature EP, the non-pruinose part of the abdomen would be in the wrong place. And the pruinose color is also a little different; while the EPs usually look baby blue, the Blue Dasher has more of a bluish-white look. The Blue Dasher's jade eyes and white face also differentiate it from the EPs.  The Slaties are even easier to differentiate from the Blue Dasher, with a much darker blue pruinose and their

Sorry dragonfly fans, but today I've got a bird for you. Here's my second Great Crested Flycatcher picture of the season. (Here's the first one .) This is probably a coincidence, though both my pictures of the Great Crested Flycatcher were at NJ Audubon-related locations, Scherman-Hoffman Wildlife Sanctuary (first) and the Plainsboro Preserve (second). As you might have guessed, a bird with "flycatcher" in its name probably isn't going to winter in NJ where/when flies and other insects are rare. Though they're not strict insectivores, they're better off migrating to where the insects reside during the winter months. Hopefully this fella is currently enjoying a mosquito snack in the Caribbean, southern Central America, or northern South America. July 23, 2021 at the Plainsboro Preserve Photo 148592878, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

On this trip the most frequently seen dragonfly out and about were the Eastern Pondhawks . I showed a female I encountered early, but I got pictures of 7 males later (and probably missed pictures of more of them). I'll show 3 of the handsomest individuals today. These guys all started life with the green-and-black abdomens of the females, but each of these has the blue pruinose of adult males. Their green faces and lighter coloring usually make it easy to differentiate them from the Slaty Skimmers that are sometimes in the same area.  All dragonflies are predators; Eastern Pondhawks are considered fiercer than most. And while the females use their fierceness mostly on prey, the males also need to guard a territory near/over water from their male rivals. July 23, 2021 at the Plainsboro Preserve Photo 148592324, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC) July 23, 2021 at the Plainsboro Preserve Photo 148592587, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC) July 23, 2021 at th

Not surprisingly in a dragonfly-rich environment, I met a couple Common Whitetails . Similar to the Slaty Skimmers, they are widespread because they're fairly flexible regarding habitat. I'm assuming the ones at my apartment complex use the Raritan River (about a mile away) for breeding. The adult males are pretty distinctive, with the spots on their wings and the sometimes vibrantly white pruinose on their abdomens. July 23, 2021 at the Plainsboro Preserve Photo 148592162, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC) The females aren't as easy to identify. Apparently they look very similar to Twelve-spotted Skimmer females, with the main difference being the Common Whitetails have light yellow spots on the side of the abdominal segments while a Twelve-spotted Skimmer would have about the same color but it'd show up as a continuous line. July 23, 2021 at the Plainsboro Preserve Photo 148594024, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

Back in July, I noticed a couple  Slaty Skimmers  among the many blue dragonflies out there. Most of the light blue ones were Eastern Pondhawk, while the dark blue ones tended to be Slaty Skimmers. I'm a little surprised I haven't done a post on these before. Slaty Skimmers are fairly common around here, partly because they're relatively flexible about habitat. And they're apparently expanding their range into places like Wisconsin . Some have described these guys as "curious" since they'll sometimes hover in front of you, though I'm thinking this is just the dragonfly doing a "threat assessment" on you. July 23, 2021 at the Plainsboro Preserve Photo 148592711, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC) July 23, 2021 at the Plainsboro Preserve Photo 148592691, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

Here is, I believe, a pair of Basilica Orbweaver spiders. (At least one arthropod professional endorsed this identification, so that's what I'm going with.) These spiders start life (spiderlings) building fairly conventional orb webs that we usually associate with spiders, but as they mature they begin building webs that are more complicated and somewhat domed, thus giving them the basilica part of their common name. Both males and females build these webs, frequently near one another. Like with many spiders, the females are larger, though at best they're only going to be about a centimeter in size. (I suspect that if spiders were a little bigger, I'd have more pictures for you, and I'd be better at identifying them.) They typically take down their webs at night and mostly rebuild them fresh the next day, but this species is also known to protect their egg sacs by wrapping the old web around them. I'm not certain that that's an egg sac in the picture; usual

On my July trip to the Plainsboro Preserve, I found a great degree of gold. Or more specifically, I found Great Golden Digger Wasps . (I've talked about these wasps before.) Many people are down on wasps, and certainly some of them can be aggressive stingers of people. But many wasps are mellower than that, rarely sting people, and can be beneficial to farms/gardens. The Great Golden Digger Wasp is one of these. The main goal of the females is to dig holes in loose soil to provide nests for her offspring, and I wouldn't be at all surprised if that's what the wasp in the first picture is about to do. She'll dig a mail hole down about half a foot, and then dig 5-6 nest holes within it. If all goes according to plan, she'll fill each nest hole with an insect (grasshoppers, katydids, or crickets) that she's paralyzed with her sting, and then she'll lay an egg on each of those insects. Once that's done, she'll cover up the hole, and (maybe after a very s

Today I've got both a Halloween Pennant and a Calico Pennant for you. Pennants are a genus of dragonflies that by being colorful and (frequently) perching on blades of blowing grass blades somewhat resemble pennants . This first one is a female Calico Pennant, holding onto one of those forementioned blades of grass. She's got large black-and-yellow basal spots on the hind wings, smaller black spots on the tips of the wings and partial spots closer to the abdomen. She'll be looking for a male, who has basically similar markings except he'll be red where she's yellow. July 23, 2021 at the Plainsboro Preserve Photo 148592226, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC) The second one is a Halloween Pennant. In comparison to the Calicos, they tend to have complete dark bands on their wings rather than spots. There's supposed to be a slightly orangish tinge to the translucent parts of the wing, and as orange is a Halloween color they are named after that holi

Let's show you 3 Widow Skimmers today, all taken on the same day at the same place. The first picture is almost certainly a female; there's no trace of white bordering the basal black of the wings, and no sign of pruinose on the abdomen. (Apparently some females develop some pruinose later in life, though I'm not sure I've encountered one like that.) July 23, 2021 at the Plainsboro Preserve Photo 148592086, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC) The second picture is clearly a male. You can see the white that basically borders the basal black on the wings, and the abdomen has enough pruinose that it looks nothing like the female abdomen. Many times I see even more white on the abdomen, so this guy may be on the young side but is at least a young adult. July 23, 2021 at the Plainsboro Preserve Photo 148592166, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC) The third picture is of a younger male. You can see the white bordering the basal black of the wings, but

Okay, I have to admit this identification is a little shaky, but someone on iNaturalist suggested the Bar-winged Skimmer , and that looks like a reasonable choice. (I suspect this picture suffered through poor lighting, making some details like the stigmas and the wing bars difficult to see.) This is the first picture of this species I've taken. They like to live near sunny, shallow pools of water, which limits their habitat since shallow water in full sunlight has the potential to dry out on them. Though this is probably the main reason they're not a common dragonfly to spot, it is a niche that they fill and most other competing dragonflies don't care for. Sometimes finding a niche like this is a pathway to evolutionary success. (On the other hand, it wasn't living too far from Calico Pennants, Widow Skimmers, Slaty Skimmers, and Eastern Pondhawks that I saw on this trip.) One thing that I'm a little surprised about is that I don't have many pictures of dragonf

Here's an Eastern Pondhawk staring right at me. Most insects seem to either flee from us or ignore us, but odonates (and mantises) will sometimes look right at you. Though they may appear to be curious, I suspect they're actually engaging in some sort of threat assessment when they look at us. (Though Eastern Pondhawks are considered voracious predators, and will attack larger prey than most odonates, I'm confident that they realize I'm way too big to eat.) Though this one was on some sort of stick, these dragonflies are more comfortable on the ground than most odonates.  July 23, 2021 at the Plainsboro Preserve Photo 148591900, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

Here are a couple of American Goldfinch pictures from July. The more vibrant yellow/black one is a male, while the other is a female. These guys aren't there to smell the flowers; most birds have a poor sense of smell. They're after seeds. Flowers exist to attract (mostly) insects that pollinate the plant, which should then result in seeds. Though some of these seeds end up growing more plants, some end up providing food for some of our birds. It's not unusual to see birds like goldfinches or chickadees poking around on what used to be flowers, looking to score a meal. July 23, 2021 at the Plainsboro Preserve Photo 148591673, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC) July 23, 2021 at the Plainsboro Preserve Photo 148591699, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

I was thinking recently about all the organisms that benefit from milkweed plants. (Some but not all of these also apply to dogbanes.) Just like trees support insects, birds, squirrels, and lichen as either homes or food, on a smaller scale milkweeds provide similar benefits: Perhaps their most famous connection is to Monarch butterflies, whose caterpillars feed exclusively on milkweeds (mostly leaves). They're not the only lepidopterans whose caterpillars rely on milkweeds; the Milkweed Tussock Moths also eat milkweed (and dogbane). It's not unusual to find aphids on milkweed plants. Some aphids like the Oleander Aphid are invasive, but they are insects that frequently feed on milkweed plants. And if aphids are eating milkweed, this is also likely to attract lady beetles that want to eat the aphids. Finally, the aphid poop is a sweet substance called honeydew that frequently causes Sooty Mold to grow. (I don't recall seeing aphids on dogbane, but they're documented

This was a black morph Eastern Tiger Swallowtail I met last summer. Though all male and most female Eastern Tiger Swallowtails have a yellow-with-black-stripes look, some of the females are mostly black. At a glance the black morph Eastern Tiger Swallowtails may look uniformly black, but if you get a good look at them you can see they have the same black stripes as the yellow ones. They actually have translucent black where their relatives have yellow, and the black stripes stand out pretty well in the right lighting. In my area we have 2 similar swallowtails, the Spicebush Swallowtail and the (slightly smaller) Black Swallowtail , and neither would show black stripes on a "light black" background. (They also have other pattern differences.) July 22, 2021 at Fairview Farm Photo 148401095, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC) July 22, 2021 at Fairview Farm Photo 148401067, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

Here's another dragonfly I hadn't seen before, a Mocha Emerald . Or at least I'm believing the people on iNaturalist regarding this picture .  In the past at Fairview Farm, I had seen large numbers of common odonates, and while I did see some of them on this July trip, I also encountered 2 species for the first time, the Fawn Darner from yesterday's post , and this Mocha Emerald. It's cool to see some new guys once in a while. Not only was this my first Mocha Emerald picture, but it was my first emerald dragonfly of any species. This isn't an easy dragonfly to encounter; my field guide calls them "uncommon", NJ lists them as "imperiled", and Massachusetts considers them to be of "special concern". I don't think it's clear why they would be struggling compared to other odonates, though of course there are always going to be species that are more susceptible to loss of habitat and/or pesticides. They get the emerald part of t

Here's a dragonfly I don't see very often, the Fawn Darner . In fact, while I see skimmer dragonflies (which includes pondhawks and meadowhawks in addition to ones with skimmer in the name), this guy and this Common Green Darner are the only darners I've managed to photograph. Notice the spots on the side of this darner; the Fawn Darner is one of only 2 spotted darners in my area, and they are also the only 2 in all of North America. The Ocellated Darner is the other one; it's spots are a little more ragged looking compared to the relatively smooth spots on the Fawn Darner. Darners are physically large, at least as far as odonates go. July 22, 2021 at Fairview Farm Photo 148400870, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

Here's another Violet Dancer damselfly. I've discussed them before , where I mentioned that they are a subspecies of the Variable Dancer . I do wonder if in 100,000 years or so, the subspecies of Variable Dancers will become different enough that they're considered separate species. I did like this picture. The violet coloring on the green leaves really stand out ... and it sorta looks like he's giving me a big, toothy grin. July 22, 2021 at Fairview Farm Photo 148400697, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

I got a picture of this Eastern Carpenter Bee that appears to be hugging a plant stem. I have to admit I'm not sure what the bee was doing. I don't think they eat plant stems/leaves, nor does there appear to be damage to the stem. A female might chew holes in wood in which to lay her eggs, this stem clearly lacks the girth (at probably the structural integrity) to fill that sort of need.  While I'd like to think this little fella was an environmentalist among bees, doing something like tree-hugging on a smaller scale, my best guess is that this was just a convenient place to rest between performing its bee-related chores and tasks. July 22, 2021 at Fairview Farm Photo 148400220, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

Here's a Pearl Crescent butterfly I saw hiding in the grass, perhaps also catching some rays. Though I consider them fairly small butterflies, they usually tower over Eastern Tailed-blues, and Spring and Summer Azures. These guys would be a very tough ID if their Northern Crescent cousins lived down here. The 2 butterflies look quite similar, especially when individual variation is considered, but the Northern Crescent would be a bit out of range for the places I go. Somewhat surprisingly, these 2 butterflies generally don't hybridize where their ranges overlap, even though to us they look awfully similar. Another similar butterfly is the Silvery Checkerspot . Though my field guides suggest they could be in my area, the NJ chapter of the North American Butterfly Association's webpage doesn't mention them. Besides possibly being outside my area, the Silvery Checkerspot is a somewhat larger butterfly; I suspect the size alone would alert me that it's not a Pearl Cre

Here's one of our native wildflowers, the Swamp Milkweed . It's flowers might remind you of Purple Milkweed or some of the richer-colored Common Milkweed, but with the Swamp Milkweed the purple flowers are accompanied by narrower lance-shaped leaves.  This one wasn't quite ready to bloom, but they are a fairly showy flower when they do bloom. I suspect that they'd be popular with gardeners if not for a few issues: They're technically poisonous, though I suspect that unless you fall on one and somehow manage to swallow most of it, you won't be poisoned by it. (I'm kind of a spaz, but think this scenario is too clumsy for even me to worry about.) If you're allergic to latex (apparently some people are, since they ask me this every time I donate blood), the milky substance that oozes out when you break a stem or leaf is latex. This particular milkweed does like wet areas, and might not grow well without abundant water. They probably don't stay in bloom

Usually when Monarchs breed, you'd expect princes and princesses to be the result. In the butterfly world, it (if all goes well) results in more butterflies. As adults, Monarch butterflies, aside from predator avoidance, have 2 primary goals: to drink nectar and to breed. This pair seems to be meeting both these goals. They are coupled together in the way they breed, and one of the butterflies appears to be drinking nectar too. I've seen butterflies, including Monarchs, coupled together in flight. It sounds like the males and the females sometimes disagree on how long the breeding should occur, and one (generally the female) may try and get on with their lives by flying away.  July 22, 2021 at Fairview Farm Photo 148400010, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

This Eastern Pondhawk is perched on (probably) a blade of grass, resting but probably keeping an eye out for things to eat. Being green and with no sign of pruinose beginning to appear, this is probably a female, though I have to acknowledge that the juvenile males look basically the same as females. I've discussed these skimmer dragonflies before, though this was one of my better pictures of one. They'll tolerate humans being around more than some insects, but the closer you get the more likely you are to spook them. July 22, 2021 at Fairview Farm Photo 148399947, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

This was one of the first pictures I got this year of the Common Wood-Nymph , and probably the first one I've got of a pair mating. They're also a butterfly I've shown you before . The Common Wood-Nymph is considered one of the satyr butterflies . Lepidopterology is a field of study where you can state that a " nymph is a satyr " without people thinking you don't understand classical mythology. In my area they are pretty distinctive; the eye spots on a yellow patch are unique around here. Apparently in some areas they have the same eye spots and the same overall gray, but lack the yellow patch, making them harder to ID at a glance. July 22, 2021 at Fairview Farm Photo 148400547, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

Here are a couple more of those Hummingbird Clearwing Moths I've shown you before .  Though hummingbirds are small relative to most birds, these moths are small relative to hummingbirds; they're only around half the size of the birds. Similar to hummingbirds, they rarely land on a flower. Instead they'll drink nectar while hovering next to the flower. (I'm not sure what they do on windy days.) Both these moths have the burgundy coloring characteristic of the species, though the first one looks mostly yellow in the front half of the body. That's a little atypical; the olive coloring in the 2nd photo is more common in this species. July 22, 2021 at Fairview Farms July 23, 2021 at the Plainsboro Preserve Photo 148591755, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)