Goatweed Leafwing

I was in our edible patch this afternoon when a flicker of crimson silently swooped past me. I was surprised and caught off guard to see a butterfly circling. At first glance I wondered if it was a Gulf Fritillary. However, it didn’t match my mental image of one, and it is winter.

It landed near the fence, and I went over to investigate. At one point, it sensed me. The frail creature played dead and closed its wings to reveal incredible camouflage! It looked just like the fallen leaves around it. I snapped some pictures and took some video to try to identify it before I helped it get airborne again. A quick google search revealed I had encountered a winter form of Goatweed Leafwing, a name that sounds more like random words shouted in charades than a gorgeous and fascinating butterfly. The summer form’s color is a bit more drab orange.

Amazing, eh?! Look at how the Goatweed Leafwing looks just like the oak leaves around it. Its pinnate and reticulate venation pattern game is strong.

Eventually, it landed in an eastern red cedar. And, I leaned over a barbed wire fence and held the camera high to try to get some good detail of the Goatweed Leafwing.

The name describes both its plant host and plant mimicry. Goatweed (aka Croton capitatum) is the larval food source along with Texas croton (Croton texensis) and prairie tea (Croton monanthogynus). That’s it for plant hosts, which made me ponder planting some weedy Croton in my yard. Only for a second, though; it is everywhere along the roadsides. The leafwing part alludes to the underside of the wing resembling fallen foliage.

I spent part of the rest of the afternoon thinking about how in the world does an insect that’s a host on one herbaceous plant evolve to look like a dead tree leaf? Research supports that it occurred step by step in Kallima, another butterfly that resembles a dead leaf. (Here’s the official paper or the National Geographic CliffsNotes version.) That’s likely the case with my new friend. These leafwing mimics evolve a bit to look like a leaf, which decreases the chance they’ll get eaten. And, over time, these changes accumulate. A line that looks like a vein here, a reticulate vein pattern there, and less and less adults get eaten.

Discovering this species today filled me with wonder and helped me better understand the ecological history of this area. It was a fun find for a gray day.

Where the Wood Thrush Sings

It's a sound that will stop me dead in my tracks, and turn my head like dog on point.  The song of the Wood Thrush.  Frozen, I listen waiting for the silence to break, half worried it might just be my imagination.  There it is again, the ethereal notes echoing through the woods and across the yard.

I drop my shovel and make a beeline for the thicket to the east of our house.  I pause and listen.  It is still far off.  The song is a bit choppy.  A few notes here and there.  Maybe it's just warming up.

I follow the fence up to the road and straddle the gravel shoulder.  Slowly I advance afraid I might scare it off, but the dense brush that hides this solitary performer must also obscure me.  

Now the song really picks up, and I am happy to provide an audience. 

My mind drifted back to when we first visited our new property.  I opened the door of the realtor's truck, and as I stepped out I heard the call of the Wood Thrush, one of my favorite (if not my top favorite!) birds.  Just a solitary note.  Nothing more, and since that hot July afternoon I haven't heard a peep.  No surprise there as I know it is a migratory species.  But, I have long wished to live in a place where one could walk outside and hear the trill of this passerine.  And for the past eight months, I've also hoped that first impression of our new property would not be the last.  The ee-oh-lay was certainly a good nudge saying, "This is right", and let's be honest, a small reason why I signed the closing papers.    

I started the short trek back to my planting, and throughout the day I was tickled pink to have it performing a natural oratorio with the ensemble of vireos, bluebirds, and gnatcatchers.  

I'm happy to live on an earth and happy to garden in a place where I can go outside and enjoy all that nature has to offer.  

Happy earth day, gardeners.  

“Whenever a man hears [the Wood Thrush song] he is young, and Nature is in her spring; wherever he hears it, it is a new world and a free country, and the gates of Heaven are not shut against him.”

— Henry David Thoreau

A Frigid Autumnal Fritillary

I love the cool mornings of fall.  They are so invigorating.  Sure, the day may forget that it was ever in the 50's by 2 pm, but I don't.  I revel in them as I'm out and about enjoying this vacation from the heat that's blasted us all summer.  

However, other creatures that depend on ambient temperatures are a bit slower.  

* * *

I remember one of the first cool mornings of fall last year I was out the door before sunrise to enjoy the coolness of the day.  My journal showed it was 54 degrees that morning, and I remember hardly a cloud in the sky.  Brisk and beautiful.

I began tackling my tasks, and inevitably this led to snapping some golden-hour photos.  My subject for the morning was to capture autumn color on my colleague Dawn Stover's ornamental grass collection at SFA.  As I let the shutter fly, a colorful blotch in one of the grasses caught my eye.

"Is that... a BUTTERFLY!?!?" I asked myself quite surprised.  I dashed to get a good photograph as if it were going to fly away, but I needn't rush.  Poor thing couldn't budge since it was so chilly.  It was a Gulf Fritillary. 

I was mesmerized by the idleness.  Butterflies are fleeting moments in the garden, and being able to snap a picture of them is like trying to photograph a ghost.  Yet, here was one frozen in time.  I paused to admire the minutiae that are usually a blur in flight—the autumn-colored regalia, the black-outlined white spots, and the curled proboscis.  

As I walked away, I savored the up close and incredible experience and thought about it being a once in a lifetime encounter.  I began to turn my attention back to the other grasses when I saw a SECOND one!  This time it had fastened itself onto Schizachyrium scoparium 'Standing Ovation' (little bluestem).  

I was really perplexed as I've never seen butterflies roost before, and now I've discovered two in one morning?  A bit of research shows that indeed others have witnessed the phenomenon.  Grasses are a common perch for them overnight, yet another reason to add these stellar perennials to the garden.  

As I walked away, I thought how thankful I am of these chilly mornings that inevitably are winter's pregame.  We all know what comes next—frost and the close of the season.  Therefore, as cooler days descend on us, rise early and look for these little moments that add so much to our gardening life.