August, 2019: Describe your walk by adding a comment below

Each time you go out and make observations for this project, describe your walk by adding a comment to this post. Include the date, distance walked, and categories that you used for this walk.

Suggested format:
Date. Place. Distance walked today. Total distance for this project.
Categories.
Brief description of the area, what you saw, what you learned, who was with you, or any other details you care to share.

Publicado el agosto 1, 2019 10:47 MAÑANA por erikamitchell erikamitchell

Comentarios

8-2-19 Tullo Rd., Martinsville, NJ. 0.25 miles today, 520.75 miles total
Categories: blooming, insects

I was home and back on duty today so walked at the nearest park. It's right along a brook and very overgrown, which I think is perfect. I found three kinds of mountain mint and three kinds of milkweed, I can't even count how many smartweeds. lots of dragonflies, red spotted purple and monarch butterflies. And a garter snake in a bush! I've seen water and black rat snakes do that before but not garters.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-3-19. Black River, Clinton, NJ and Swartswood State Park, Stillwater, NJ. 1.5 miles today 522.25 miles total
Categories: blooming, insects, unusual

I drove up to get my daughter from camp this morning and stopped several places on the way: the edge of a field in Black River park, a rest stop (simply because I'd never stopped there before), a ballfield with a meadowy edge, and the dam and woods at the end of Swartswood Lake.

Interesting finds included marginal wood fern, sweet cicely, pointed leaved tick trefoil, pickerelweed, an unknown pondweed, a skinny and unlobed arrowhead (maybe grass leaved?), lizard's tail, sanicle, downy yellow violet, whorled wood aster, hairy Solomon's seal, lopseed, dog vomit slime mold, a groundhog, and what looked like amur honeysuckle but had a third leaf at each node. Odd.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-11-19 Walkill River National Wildlife Refuge, Wantage, NJ. 0.5 miles today, 522.75 miles total
Categories: interesting plants, insects

Today I dropped my daughter at camp and then began my vacation, stopping altogether about 40 times and making my way to my parents house (and back) as Monday and Tuesday were their 75th birthdays. I had all my children in camp (or truck driving) and so got to stop where ever I wanted. This was the first.

This was a boardwalk to a canoe launch on a river through a wildlife reserve. I was talking to my sister on the phone as I strolled along so probably missed some things, but I found: a monarch 3 dragonflies and a damselfly, a scorpionfly (I think), a handsome trig, a comma butterfly, a cabbage white and several bees.

Unusual (for me) plants included stinging nettle, yellowcress, choke cherry, bigtooth aspen, cocklebur, rough cinquefoil, false pimpernel, mile a minute, and swamp milkweed.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-11-19 Appalachian Trail Parking, Warwick, NY 0.25 miles today, 523 miles total
Categories: insects, interesting plants

The AT crosses the road here and it made a nice place to stretch my legs. I was surprised at the variety of species in a little patch of woods, and the edge of a gravel lot.

My favorite find were a pair of primrose moths, snuggled down inside some mostly-closed evening primrose flowers. But the moths are bright pink so were easy to find.

Otherwise I found two leafminers and a goldenrod bunch gall.

Unusual (for me) plants included fox sedge, glossy buckthorn, and an unfamiliar smartweed.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-11-19 Stirling Forest State Park, Tuxedo, NY. 0.5 miles today, 523.5 miles total
Categories: interesting plants, insects

I stopped in three places here but really only the powerline cut was interesting. There I found a sunflower, partridge pea, whitetop, lots of ferns, marsh bellflower (I think a new one to me), brown eyed susan, lance-leaved coreopsis, milkweed stem weevil, phantom cranefly, showy tick trefoil, and brown knapweed.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-11-19 Harriman State Park, Tuxedo, NY 0.25 miles today, 523.75 miles total
Categories: interesting plants, lichen, insects

This was just a pull-off for trail access near a very swampy pond but also some rocky hillsides. Insects were mostly a ton of grasshoppers, one of which was running away in front of me but banging into a parked car. It finally jumped over the car, only to bang into the next one, poor thing!

unusual plants for me were broom, striped maple, whorled loosestrife, teaberry, maple viburnum, common sow thistle (not common by me!), sarsaparilla, sweetfern, wild licorice, deerberry, pearly everlasting, marginal woodfern, and coltsfoot, plus two I can't figure out. I also saw a pixie cup lichen and toadskin lichen and lot of rock lichen I don't know.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-11-19 Old Silver Mine, Stony Point, NY 0.5 miles today, 524.25 miles total
Categories: insects, interesting plants

This is the shallow end of a man made pond, along with a mowed field and a bit of brushy woods edge. There was a yellow rectangle glue trap that had lots of interesting flies and a few beetles. I found NY and marsh ferns, watershield, a pondweed, what I think were both variegated yellow water lily and spatterdock, fragrant water lily, and, unfortunately, water chestnut. There was Virginia St. John's wort, whirlygig beetles, black swallowtail, and hoary alyssum, as well.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-11-19 Bear Mountain State Park, Tompkins Cove, NY, 0.25 miles today, 524.5 miles total
Category: roadside weeds

There was some event going on in very-heavily-used Bear Mountain Park and so parking was nearly non-existent. I pulled over on a shoulder of the road to see what was about, and was pleased to find a few somewhat unusual (if invasive) species: wild yam, angelica tree, swallowwort, hempvine, and horsebalm.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-11-19 Fahnestock State Park, Phllipstown, NY. 0.25 miles today, 524.75 miles total
Category: roadside weeds

It was getting dark, but I stopped at a trailhead and looked around briefly. I found hairy solomon's seal, common sowthistle, intermediate wood fern (I think), striped maple, and a leafminer in jewelweed.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-11-19 Canopus Lake, Cold Spring, NY. 0.5 miles today, 525.25 miles total
Categories: interesting plants, leafminers, galls

Though the sun was setting there was a parking area near a pond and the lack of trees made things lighter. I found a spotted orbweaver, hog peanut in flower, an agrimony that was not (for once) swamp, pointed leaved tick trefoil, sarsaparilla, finged loosestrife, whitetop, dodder, and burdock and poison ivy leafminers.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-12-19 Farrington Pond, Danbury, CT 0.25 miles today, 525.5 miles total.
Category: interesting plants

The road I was on passed a lovely wooded pond just after sunrise, and I stopped to take some photos. My favorite finds were groundnut in flower and some lovely galls on a dogwood leaf. Mostly, it was just a lovely spot.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-12-19 Bent of the River Audubon Sanctuary, Southbury, CT 1.5 miles today, 527 miles total
Categories: insects, interesting plants

I only walked a tiny portion of this sanctuary, but I covered a big meadow, a chunk of rocky woods, another small meadow, a shady road cut, and a swampy area, so lots of variety. It was, botanically, my favorite stop of the day.

Unusual (for me) things I found included: giant ragweed, senna, cupplant with leaf galls, a sunflower, polished lady beetle, delicate cycnia caterpillar, an ambersnail, a monaarch, ergot on two different grasses, a skipper, a dragonfly, poison ivy leaf galls, tall meadow rue, tall blue lettuce, a clubmoss, a weird caterpillar eating a mushroom, rosy sedge, pale jewelweed, a bittercress (early in the season for it), goutweed in fruit and asparagus. I also saw 12 ferns (though probably only 6-8 species), 11 fungi, 5 lichens, and 6 mosses.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-12-19 Castle Craig, Meriden, CT. 0.25 miles today 527.25 miles total
Categories: plants, insects

This is a lookout tower on the top of a hill. There are rocks on the cliff top (with signs warning you about falling to your death) with a few interesting plants growing in the cracks, mostly oaks, birches, and some carolina rose. I also found moonseed and herb robert, soapwort, a sunflower. Insect-wise there were carolina grasshoppers everywhere and a widow skimmer, plus rough oak bullet galls and a Stigmella sp. leafmine in the rose.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-12-19 Rhododendron State Park, Fitzwilliam, NH. 1 mile today, 528.25 miles total
categories: plants, fungi, insects

This park must be lovely a month or so before I visited when the great rhododendron are blooming. There was mountain laurel as well. I was excited to see striped maple and spruces, whorled wood aster, starflower, what I think was american fly-honeysuckle, and my first ever shinleaf and maybe Viburnum nudum (which would also be a first for me if it's right). I also found interrupted, intermediate wood, and hay scented ferns and two kinds of clubmosses.

Fungi included a webcap, the blusher, and chicken fat mushroom.

Insects were just a red spotted purple butterfly and a Phytomyza fly mining sarsaparilla.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-12-19 Peterson State WMA, Dublin, NH. 0.5 miles today, 528.75 miles total
Category: interesting plants

This is a big pond that my mother refers to as "mud pond" and thinks is an enormous eyesore. "there are always people painting or taking photographs there and I just don't see why". Well, it was one of my favorite spots of the whole trip. Lots of interesting plants, and I'm not even a birder (I bet it gets plenty of waterbirds in season, too).

My favorites included: field milkwort (a whole field of it), bulbet bearing water hemlock, a possible Englemann's arrowhead, a beak sedge, black chokeberry, what I think was marsh bedstraw, watershield, a pipewort, a spikerush, orange hawkweed and flat-topped aster. None of which I see regularly at home.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-14-19 Chesterfield Gorge Natural Area, Chesterfield, NH. 0.75 miles today, 529.5 miles total

categories: ferns, insects, fungi, interesting plants

This is a park and ride lot that also has a lovely hemlock gorge behind it. I found a green russula, an amanita and a birch polypore mushroom, indian pipes, a trillium, and lots of ferns: polypody, ostrich, sensitive, christmas and a dryoptera

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-14-19 Molly Stark State Park, Wilmington, VT. 1 mile today, 530.5 miles total

categories: interesting plants, ferns, leafminers, galls

Lots of interesting plants at this rather expensive state park: a monkshood that looked wild but I think must have been planted, mountain and striped maples, what I think was European raspberry, a possible heartleaved foamflower, alternate leaved dogwood, fan and Hickeys tree clubmosses, goldthread, Viola tricolor, a hempnettle, and spreading dogbane.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-14-19 Natural Bridge State Park, North Adams, MA. 1.0 mile today, 531.5 miles total
categories: interesting plants, critters

This was my favorite stop of the trip. The bridge is made of marble, so the whole place is calcareous, at least much more so than the clay I live on. There was a very wide variety of plants, and several that I'd never seen before, including: round leaved dogwood, bulbet fern, and I think tall thimbleweed, along with a leafminer I'd never seen, a very cool one: aspen serpentine leafminer moth.

Other things I rarely see were alternate leaved dogwood, thyme, a verbena, golden alexanders, a calligrapher beetle, shrubby cinquefoil, spikenard, wild cucumber, ostrich fern, lady and new york ferns, and sumac apple aphid galls. And I think I spotted trout in the river.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-14-19 Kinderhook Creek, Nassau, NY. 0.25 miles today, 531.75 miles total
categories: flowering, fruiting, insects

I stopped at the side of the road at this creek/ swimming hole (there was an abandoned towel on the bank and signs saying no swimming) simply to stretch and see what I could find.

Plants I don't often see included: nodding spurge, cinnamon fern, marsh bedstraw, false pimpernel, and wild parsnip. There were also lots of mating goldenrod soldier beetles. Mostly it was just a lovely place to rest.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-14-19 Schodack Island State Park, Coeymans, NY. 1.25 miles today, 533 miles total.
Categories: flowering, fruiting, animals

This was the last real stop on my vacation. I was expecting to be able to walk in some swampy wetland but simply couldn't get access to most of it. The main part of this park is very heavily used. But toward the back there were some more interesting species including germander, lopseed, wood nettle, ostrich fern, nodding spurge, and soapwort. I also saw a butterfly that was maybe a comma, maybe a question mark. And a cottontail rabbit.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-18-19 Shohola Falls, Shohola, PA 1.0 miles today, 534 miles total
Categories: interesting plants, insects

This is Becca's favorite spot on the way home from camp, and as this was her last year there we had to stop. I found lots of neat stuff, especially ferns: sensitive, marginal wood, and intermediate wood, but also long beech, a fragile fern of some kind, silvery glade fern, and maidenhair spleenwort.

I also found red baneberry, smooth carrionflower, motherwort, blooming rattlesnake root, snakewort liverwort, great rhododendron, purple flowering raspberry, and gray dogwood with midge galls.

Insect-wise there was also a yellow legged mud dauber, a tachiniid fly, a male and a female eastern pondhawk, a jagged ambush bug, mating goldenrod soldier beetles, and a double banded scoliid wasp.

Becca checked out the bottom of the waterfall and in the backwater there spotted a forgotten flip flop, and then another and another. In the end she had 9 shoes, all different, 5 right foot and 4 left. She strung them on a stick like a catch of fish on a line.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-24-19 Mountain Park, Liberty Corner, NJ 0.25 miles today, 534.25 miles total
Category: what caught Molly's eye.

I walked briefly with Molly who wanted to work on learning fall plants. I've walked here dozens and dozens of times before, but this was the first that I remember noticing some Eleocharis sp. sedges or a leaf gall on pin oak. We also found sunburst lichen that I may not have seen here before, plus a red spotted purple butterfly and two lucerne moths.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-26-19 Plainsboro Audubon Center, Plainsboro, NJ. 0.5 miles today, 534.75 miles total

Categories: interesting plants, insects.

Becca and I drove down to take some stuff to Molly at college that she'd forgotten and bring home things she decided she didn't need. We stopped at this Audubon preserve on the way, but Becca stayed in the car.

I only took a brief walk but had a great time and found three species of plant I've never seen before: hyssop leaved and round leaved bonesets, and hairy bush clover. I also found maleberry and a skullcap, both of which are unusual for me, and wooly alder aphids.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-26-19 Amwell Lake, Amwell, NJ. 0.5 miles today, 535.25 total.
Categories: interesting flowers, insects

On the way home from Molly's college Becca and I stopped at this little lake. Once again she stayed in the car. I found lots of stuff I don't usually see: clotbur, swamp milkweed, ailanthus webworm moth, red spotted purple, dwarf st. john's wort, buckeye, ditch stonecrop, shining flatsedge, peppermint, kidney leaved mud plantain.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-27-19 Dealaman and Stranski Parks, Warren, NJ 1.75 miles today 537 miles total

Categories: Interesting plants, insects

We are dog sitting my friend's golden retriever, and I took him for a walk in this local woodland with a small pond and a rather dried-up swamp. It was hot, and I was stupidly wearing capris. And of course the path was once again overgrown with arrowleaved tearthumb, which really should be called tearshin. But we made it through.

I found black cohosh, bloodroot, a spiny assassin bug, golden ragwort, willowherb, monkey flower fruit, and a cranberry viburnum.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-28-19 East Brunswick Recreation Department, East Brunswick, NJ 0.25 miles today, 537.25 miles total.

categories: interesting plants and insects

I stopped at this municipal park in part because it looked on the map as though it was near a pond. Well, sort of. It was an embankment about 30 feet higher than the water level. There were no interesting plants, though many very familiar weeds. I did, however, find an anglewinged katydid, which was very exciting.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-28-19 Jamesburg Park, Jamesburg, NJ, 1.75 miles today, 539 miles total

categories: interesting plants, insects

This is the very closest park to me that is officially in the Pine Barrens. It also has several different sightings of blooming bladderworts. I walked into some dry woods, then along the road, trying to find access to the boggy section, then into the woods again and finally found a side trail past several mosquito monitoring boxes to the actual bog. And so many wonderful plants.

I found my first ever slender bushclover, black huckleberry, Virginia chainfern, maybe my first leatherleaf, humped bladderwort, and round leaved sundew.

Also new to me were a huge mass of Phosphila caterpillars eating Smilax, and a sumac flea beetle.

and unusual plants for me included snakecotton, rice flatsedge, partridge pea, rough buttonweed, sawbrier, deerberry, starflower, swamp loosestrife, round headed bush clover, and purple pitcher plant.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

8-29-19 East County Park, Warren, NJ 0.75 miles today, 539.75 miles total

categories: flowering, critters

I dropped Katie off for the middle school meet-your-teacher visit and walked at this nearby park for half an hour. Basically I walked around two old farm ponds with lots of blooming goldenrod and boneset, with a little jewelweed, vervain, loosestrife, etc.

I found mating clouded sulfurs, a feather legged fly, a sachem and another skipper of some kind, half a dozen paper wasps, a honey bee, goldenrod soldier beetles, both sexes of pondhawk, a buckeye butterfly, ailanthus webworm moth, and willow leaf and Euthamia petiole galls. And a groundhog.

Publicado por srall hace más de 4 años

I loved your stories from this month. That’s cool that your parents’ birthdays are one day apart. It sure makes for a great celebration. My husband’s and my birthdays are also 1 day apart (and 6 years), so we sometimes have blow-out combined parties to celebrate. Stopping 40 times between NJ and NH must have been quite a treat. And identifying mints, smart weeds, bell flowers, and tick trefoils…very challenging! I don’t think I’ve ever seen a snake in a bush, so I enjoyed reading about your bushed garter snake. And the caterpillar eating a mushroom, right out of Alice in Wonderland. I just started looking for leafminers this August after taking a workshop with Charlie Eiseman in Montpelier. It’s great reading about your leafminer finds. I don’t think I’ve seen a jewelweed leafminer yet. That’s one I will need to look for next summer. I also like the idea of checking the insect sticky traps for insects.

It’s fascinating to your read your accounts of the northern parks that you visited. The species you found there are the ones that are familiar to me, like shinleaf, Viburnum nudum, American honeysuckle, striped maple, alternate-leaved dogwood, and sumac apple leaf galls. Your New Jersey species all sound so exotic! I think my husband and I visited Molly Stark State Park once as a rest stop from a long road trip. We didn’t need to pay to get in because we had a special Vermont pass for submitting photos to the parks department (I think they use the photos for promotional material). I don’t remember finding anything interesting in the park when we visited, but I probably wasn’t looking hard enough. Your daughter’s shoe fishing trip sounds fantastic…what a haul!

Publicado por erikamitchell hace más de 3 años

8/1/20. Saint Augustine’s Cemetery, Montpelier, VT, and Railroad Bed East, Marshfield, VT. 2.9 miles today, 1948.4 miles total.
Categories: insects, birds, blooming, fruiting, mushrooms

This morning I met up with one of my bug friends near her house in Montpelier. We walked from there through the woods to Saint Augustine Cemetery to hunt for bugs. We were quite successful, finding honeybee, common eastern bumblebee, tricolored bumblebee, perplexing bumble, Andrena, Wilke’s mining bee, mud dauber, sweat bee, alfalfa leafcutter bee, Therion, Ancistroceris, oblong woolcarder, European wool carder bee, grass-carrying wasp, metallic sweatbee, and ichneumon wasps, clover looper, litter moths, silver-spotted skipper, Viceroy, and monarch butterflies, cluster flies, Holocephala calva robber fly, Rhagio flies, an azure bluet, a meadowhawk, ground cricket, Melanoplus grasshopper nymphs, and two-striped grasshopper, and banded longhorn beetle, Japanese beetle, and ground beetle. I also noted some pokeweed, which we don’t often see in Montpelier, and shot a cardinal and a crow. Blooming today were alfalfa, flat-topped goldenrod, flat-top aster, and ghost pipes, while American ground nut was budding. Road kill along the way were a toad and an unidentifiable bird.

In the afternoon, I went with my husband to Marshfield so he could ride the railroad trail on his unicycle. I took my scooter since I had already been on one walk and didn’t know how long my energy would last. We didn’t get very far, although my husband got further than I did. Parts of the trail were wet and a bit too technical for either the unicycle and the scooter. Along the way, I stopped to shoot a black firefly, monarch caterpillar, scorpionfly, leafhopper, and some litter moths. I found a patch of collared parachute mushrooms and some lobster mushrooms. Fruiting today were white baneberry, red baneberry, American spikenard, and daphne. I also found some leatherwood near the Nasmith Brook Rd crossing.

Publicado por erikamitchell hace más de 3 años

8/4/20. Gorham Pond, Dunbarton, NH. 0.9 miles today, 1949.3 miles total.
This morning I took my mother up to Gorham Pond for a hike along some trails we spotted a few weeks ago. My sister and I had been searching for some alternative swimming holes besides Clough's State Park in order to save money on the admission fees. Gorham Pond is so inviting, but the access appears to be for residents only. Still, while we were looking for access to the pond, we found a parking lot and a trail off into the woods. Today I returned to the trail with my mother to see what we could find.

Publicado por erikamitchell hace más de 3 años

8/6/20. Nichol's Pond, Woodbury, VT. 0.2 miles today, 1949.5 miles total.
Categories: seen from the dock
My husband and I are staying for a few days at a friend's camp on Nichol's Pond. I took it easy today, mostly hanging out by the water with a book. I shot a black-shouldered spiny leg dragonfly on a rock and the eastern hemlock overhead.

Publicado por erikamitchell hace más de 3 años

8/7/20. Nichol’s and Coits Pond, Woodbury, VT. 1.5 miles today, 1951 miles total.
Categories: insects, fruits

This morning my husband and I took the canoe out for a short exploration of the Nichol’s Pond. He paddled while I took photos. For some reason, paddling seems to aggravate my abdominal pain issues. I found black-shouldered spinylegs, litter moths, Japanese beetles, and Tetragnatha spiders. Also, a great blue heron.

Later we went for a short walk down Coits Pond Rd. I found whorled wood aster and helleborine in bloom, and north wind bog orchid, mountain maple, white baneberry in fruit. And lots of caterpillars: monarch caterpillars, Virginia tiger moth, definite tussock moth, and a question mark caterpillar.

Publicado por erikamitchell hace más de 3 años

8/8/19. Nichol’s Ledge, Woodbury, VT. 0.4 miles today, 1951.4 miles total.
Categories: fungi, blooming, insects

This afternoon I took a walk up to Nichol’s Ledge with my husband. To conserve my energy for the climb, we drove to the trail head and walked from there. Nichol’s Ledge is a granite cliff that overlooks the pond from many hundred feet up. It’s a popular hike, but in summer only open after August 1 because it’s a peregrine falcon nesting area. No falcons today, but we found dark-eyed junco, common raven, and hairy woodpecker. Insects were perplexing bumblebee, Astata wasp, a cutworm larva, an Isomira beetle, and a yellow-spotted renia. Blooming today were hairy goldenrod, early goldenrod, and Canada violet. We found plenty of fungi, including Hymenogasraceae, summer oyster, dryad’s saddle, false turkeytail, cinnamon polypore, eyelash cups, orange earthtongue, chanterelles, Arrhenia epichysium, thin-walled maze polypore, Peltigera lichens, and greenshield lichen.

Publicado por erikamitchell hace más de 3 años

8/9/19. Nichols Pond and Coits Pond, 1 mile today, 1952.4 miles total.
Categories: birds, insects, blooming, fruiting
This morning I took a short walk down to the dam from our cabin on Nichol’s Pond. Then we packed up to head home. On the way home, I let my husband off with his unicycle at the top of Coits Pond Rd at the Nichol’s Ledge parking lot. Then I drove down to the Coits Pond boat access area and took a short, slow walk there, trying not to over-do. When my husband arrived on his unicycle, we took the canoe out onto Coits Pond for a quick dip through the weeds. Again, my husband did all the paddling so I could just take photographs. Birds today were loon, wood peewee, and yellow-rumped warbler. Insects were variable dancer, slaty skimmer, black-shouldered spinylegs, bluets, autumn meadowhawk, eastern forktail, and band-winged meadowhawk; yellow-banded bumblebee, two-spotted bumblebee, tricolored bumblebee, common eastern bumblebee, sweat bees, Ectemnius maculosus, and ichneumonid wasps; Japanese beetle and fourteen spotted ladybug; eastern calligrapher, transverse banded flower fly, and Hybomitra fly; monarch (caterpillar), primrose moth, Viceroy, dun skipper, and striped hairstreak; and Podisus and Euschistus bugs. Blooming were swamp aster, wild parsnip, helleborine, water forget-me-not, flat-top white aster, Joe Pye weed, and wall lettuce, and fruiting were chokecherry, red baneberry, white baneberry, spikenard, and striped maple. I found a single dead toad in the road as well.

Out on the pond, we found Donacia beetles, spread-winged damselflies, a blue dasher, a whiteface, an Elophila moth, and a Schizophoran fly, plus a wood duck.

Publicado por erikamitchell hace más de 3 años

8/10/19. Alexander Rd, Dunbarton, NH. 0.5 miles today, 1952.9 miles total.
Categories: insects, birds

This afternoon I took a short walk from my mother’s house up to the end of the road and back looking for insects. I found common eastern bumblebee, brown-belted bumble bee, Pyrobombus, and a Eumelissodes bee, plus a Polistes skipper, a sphinx moth, and a Pennsylvania ambush bug. Birds were cedar waxwing and house sparrow. Road kill was a single red eft.

In the evening, I did some mothing on the front porch of the Bordello. I found some caddisflies, Pero, Macaria, derelict pelochrista, rose hooktip, brown bark carpet moth, common gluphisia, brown scoopwing, and a snout moth.

Publicado por erikamitchell hace más de 3 años

8/11/19. Alexander Rd, and Clough State Park, Dunbarton, NH. 3.1 miles today, 1956 miles total.
This morning I took a bird walk up Alexander Rd before breakfast. After breakfast I took my mother for a car hike through Clough’s State Park visiting some old Weare landmarks. Clough’s was created when the Army Corps of Engineers built the Everett Dam on the Contookook River back in the 1960s. This was a flood control project with the aim of preventing disastrous floods along the river. But to build the dam, they had to empty the town of East Weare, including residences, businesses, churches, and cemeteries. Growing up, my mother lived right on the East Weare line. Today we drove along the main part of town, stopping to visit some of the sites from her childhood: the family church, her aunt and uncle’s house (where we tiptoed through the poison ivy to grab some day lilies from the yard), and the old toy factory. Of course, even the cellar holes of these buildings are gone now, and there are few people like my mother left who can still point out where the buildings were.

Publicado por erikamitchell hace más de 3 años

8/15/19. Hubbard Park, Montpelier, VT. 0.2 miles today, 1956.2 miles total.
Categories: insects

This morning I met up with my two bug friends for a bug walk in Hubbard Park. I had been down and out for a few days, unable to walk at all, but we never walk far during bug walks, so I did OK. We found dun skipper, Peck’s skipper, banded olethreutes moth, plus for caterpillars: fall webworm caterpillar, definite tussock moth, milkweed tussock moth, and hitched arches. We found a Japanese beetle, a Euschistus bug, a tomato bristle fly, a flesh fly, and a jumping spider. Odes were common whitetail, twelve-spotted skimmer, meadowhawks, bluets, eastern forktail. Hymenoptera were tarantula hawk wasp, eastern yellowjacket, blackjacket, honeybee, dark paper wasp, bald-faced hornet, cellophane bee, Amerian pelecinid wasp, and tricolored bumblebee. We found several green frogs in the pond, including some dead ones. Blooming today were Joe Pye weed, blue vervain, and arrowhead.

Publicado por erikamitchell hace más de 3 años

8/17/19. Alexander Rd, Dunbarton, NH. 0.5 miles today, 1956.7 miles total.
Categories: insects

This afternoon I took a short walk up the road from my mother’s house, this time in the direction of Mansion Rd. I found a mourning dove, eastern phoebe, cedar waxwing, white-throated sparrow, purple finch. Insects were meadow hawks, spreadwings, white admiral, noctuid moth, Crabroninae wasp, Ichneumon wasp, and a Tachnid fly. Roadkill was a red eft.

Publicado por erikamitchell hace más de 3 años

8/18/19. Clough's State Park, Dunbarton, NH. 3.6 miles today, 1960.3 miles total.
Categories: trees, blooming, fruiting, birds, insects

This morning I drove out to Clough’s for an early morning birdwalk, this time parking at one of the main ATV lots. I was the first one in the lot this morning. Since I haven’t done much iNat-ing here, I looked at trees and plants this morning as well as birds. When I got back to my car, others had begun to arrive, and my little Prius stood out amongst all the redneck trucks with the ATV ramps and trailers. After breakfast I returned with my mother and a shovel to collect some ferns for her yard in Pennsylvania. It seemed a little odd to be openly collecting plants by the roadside, but this is actually an OK place for such an activity. This part of what we call the park isn’t really the park but state lands that are now a giant recreation area for ATVs. They have miles of trails through old East Weare. The old town roads that were left to degrade for years are now maintained enough for ATVers to drive through to get to designated parking areas, maintained well enough that I can easily drive my Prius on them, better than many town roads in Vermont. So the area is a wild Libertarian ATV refuge, much degraded, but left to its own resources. Why would anyone object to someone digging a few ferns from the side of the road here and there? We nabbed some Christmas fern, sensitive fern, marginal wood fern, and New York fern.

While walking, I found elm (dead), white pine, white ash (ailing), trembling aspen, gray birch, red maple, red oak, white oak, basswood, sugar maple, staghorn sumac, bigtooh aspen, Norway spruce. Blooming were silverrod, marsh skullcap, dodders, cardinal flower, purple loosestrife, soapwort, water horehound, and brown knapweed. Fruiting were multiflora rose, buckthorn, beaked hazelnut, and silky dogwood. And of course, there were birds as well, cedar waxwing, goldfinch, northern flicker, kingbird, white-breasted nuthatch, Canada warbler, wood duck, and common yellowthroat. Insects were white pine sawfly, hickory tussock moth, caddisflies, eastern comma, white admiral, honeybee, common eastern bumblebee, thread-waisted wasp, and slaty skimmer.

Publicado por erikamitchell hace más de 3 años

8/20/19. Groton State Park, Groton, VT. 3.2 miles today, 1963.5 miles total.
Categories: trees, flowering, fruiting, insects

This afternoon I was feeling well enough for a real walk. I drove out to Groton and took one of the side roads out from Rt 232, one that heads towards Marshfield. I didn’t get all the way to Marshfield, but I had a grand time looking at plants and searching for insects. Blooming today were goldenrods, turtlehead, pale jewelweed, common jewelweed, pearly everlast, swamp aster, evening primrose, helleborine, burdock, heart-leaved aster, mullein, musk mallow, marsh cudweed. Fruiting were hobblebush, poison ivy, white baneberry, mountain ash, and beaked hazelnut. The trees were the usual suspects: striped maple, red maple, sugar maple, mountain maple, balsam fir, red spruce, paper birch, beech, hop hornbeam, white ash, yellow birch.

I had great luck for insects, finding common eastern bumblebee, Pyrobombus, common aerial yellowjacket, blackjacket, ichneumon wasp, Ectemnius maculosus, thread-waisted sand wasp, and Paracorymbia maculicorn. Leps were green comma, eastern comma, white admiral, and hummingbird clearwing. For beetles, I had red-shouldered pine borer, Trigonarthis beetle, banded longhorn beetle, six-spotted tiger beetle, Japanese beetle, Asian ladybug, and a Nemognatha click beetle. Flies were oblique-banded pond fly, Piconia fly, fungus gnats, and a lovely bald-faced hornet fly. I also found meadowhawks, black-shouldered spineylegs, Carolina grasshopper, and a tarnished plant bug. Roadkill today was a dead frog.

Publicado por erikamitchell hace más de 3 años

8/22/19. Adamant, VT and Groton State Park, Groton, VT. 3.4 miles today, 1966.9 miles total.
Categories: insects, blooming, fruiting, trees

This morning I met up with my 2 bug friends in Adamant for a walk around the perimeter of a friend’s property. The land owner is very gracious, allowing local folks to traipse about his yard, which runs along the edge of Adamant Pond. It is a magnificent site for bird watching and also for bug catching. We found monarchs, tricolored bumblebee, northern amber bumblebee, common eastern bumblebee, blackjacket, honeybee, aerial yellowjackets, spider wasp, Therion wasp, eastern forktails, meadowhawks, darners, widow skimmer, red-cross shield bug, two-striped grasshopper, Crambid moth, polymorphic pondweed moth, Olethreutes moth, leafroller moth, Japanese beetle, dogbane leaf beetle, spotted lady beetle, Asian ladybug (larva), and swamp milkweed leaf beetle. We found highbush cranberry, and mountain holly in fruit and turtlehead, nodding beggarticks, and flat-top white aster in bloom.

Later in the day I was feeling good, so I took another trip out to Groton, this time starting about the same place as the other day, but walking on a side road the side road. I found American beech, hemlock, yellow birch, white pine, red maple, striped maple, red spruce, white ash, trembling aspen, and balsam fir. Blooming were pearly everlasting, eyebright, broad-leaved goldenrod, early goldenrod, large-leaved aster, Kalm’s lobelia, and evening primrose. Insects were Roessel’s bush cricket, punctured tiger beetle, Asian lady bug, May beetle, dance flies, syrphid flies, blackjacket, Pimpla wasp, Pyrobombus, silver-bordered fritillary, monarchs (caterpillars and crysallis), and some spreadwings.

Publicado por erikamitchell hace más de 3 años

8/23/19. Adamant, VT. 1.5 miles today, 1967.4 miles total.
Categories: insects, birds

This evening I took a walk along Sodom Pond while my husband unicycled after the weekly community barbecue at the co-op. The barbecues run every Friday evening from the 4th of July to September as fund raisers for the co-op. It’s a great chance to dine with neighbors, essentially a potluck that you pay for. Great food, great times. It was great to feel well enough to get a short walk in after dinner. On my walk I found a monarch chysallis, ichneumon wasp, dark paper wasp, Alaska yellowjacket, tricolored bumblebee, common eastern bumblebee, honeybee, agrimony anacampsis moth, least skipper, Japanese beetle, and meadowhawks. Blooming this evening were bur marigold, turtlehead, boneset, and Queen Anne’s lace. Fruiting were black chokecherry, beaked hazelnut, and wild raisin. Birds were pied-billed grebe, black duck, mallard, wood duck, and cedar waxwings. And road kill was a toad, a tomentose burying beetle, and a pine-tree spur-throated grasshopper.

Publicado por erikamitchell hace más de 3 años

8/24/19. Frizzle Mountain, VT. 0.1 miles today, 1967.5 miles total.
Categories: birds
No walk for me today. Instead, I sat on the backsteps and did some birdwatching. The early season migrants are coming through. I saw purple finch, red-breasted nuthatch, goldfinch, black-throated green, magnolia warbler, chestnut-sided warbler, white-throated sparrow, and some hummingbirds.

Publicado por erikamitchell hace más de 3 años

8/25/19. Clough State Park, Dunbarton, NH. 0.2 miles today, 1967.7 miles total.
Categories: birds
This morning I wasn't up for much of a walk. Instead, I drove down to Clough's and parked by the one of the wetlands near the road to watch birds for a bit before breakfast.

Publicado por erikamitchell hace más de 3 años

8/28/19. Frizzle Mountain, Calais, VT. 0.1 miles today, 1967.8 miles total.
Categories: flying things
I had a rough time on my return from NH the other night. Almost bad enough to go to the ER. We were closing the cabin down for the season in NH. I needed to get the Bordello in order, get everything stored so the mice wouldn't eat it over the winter. I was feeling pretty horrible, but I pushed through the fatigue and pain to get the work done. By the time I got home, I was in a pain crisis, shaking uncontrollably. Today I finally felt well enough again to sit on the back porch with my camera. I saw a monarch (freshly eclosed) and a common yellowthroat.

Publicado por erikamitchell hace más de 3 años

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