Dec 22
Here’s another photo from a recent trip to the Desert Museum in Tucson. This is a Pepsis Wasp which is commonly called a Tarantula Hawk. As the name implies, this wasp will swoop in and kill a Tarantula. I’ve never seen it in action but friends have.
Sep 20
I may have mistakenly relocated a Queen caterpillar the other day. I thought it was looking for food (my Milkweed had been devoured) but my friend Laura M. told me it might just have been ready to morph. If that’s the case, the caterpillar is probably hunkered down on the new plant. I couldn’t find it the other day but will look harder the next time I walk by his new home.
Anyway….I decided to look for two new Milkweed plants and found some healthy 5 gallon specimens at Black Mountain Nursery (Dynamite very near Tatum). As I was getting ready to plant them, I found quite a surprise! One plant has a chrysalis and the other had a caterpillar…both Queens. Yipee! These aren’t the greatest of photos but they will do as a start to documenting their progress. From now on, I’ll use my SLR to get some good detail. My butterfly education continues! Thanks again, Laura 🙂
Sep 16
Sadly, I could not find the Queen caterpillar this morning. This is actually the second time I’ve tried to relocate one of them to another plant with more for them to eat. The first time was in 1999 and I put it on another plant in my yard but in that case too, it didn’t stay. It might have been my imagination but when I relocated this latest one, it seemed disoriented. I had visions of it trying to find its way home! 🙁
Lessons learned. First I’m relocating my Milkweed to a non grub infested area of my yard so they can grow large and full of flowers. Second….I will let nature take it’s course from now on!
Sep 14
One part of my yard has an infestation of turf grubs which have probably come from the nearby golf course. I’ve tried every natural pesticide to no avail. What these grubs do is eat plant roots which doesn’t kill the plant but stunts its growth. For instance, I’ve tried for 5 years to establish some Milkweed (asclepias subulata) but the plants have barely grown in all that time. Even so, I typically end up with at least one caterpillar a year. This year there was only one bloom and very few offshoots so the caterpillar (a Queen) was out of food very quickly. I remembered seeing a good sized Milkweed plant along a path I hike every day so this morining, I decided to cut off the stem my caterpillar was on and relocate him/her. It was about a mile and I’m sure everyone wondered what I was carrying. I found the plant and waited for the caterpillar to start moving and it did crawl over to the other plant. However, it seemed to know it wasn’t home because it moved back and forth, up and down as if to be smelling. I will go back tomorrow morning to see if its still there. I’m hopeful it makes the journey to becoming a Queen Butterfly!
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