Wild child

I recall receiving a greeting card at my high school graduation, with the introduction, "For someone outstanding in their field," only to open it and find a sketch of a small person standing neck deep in grass under a wide sky. How I chuckled.
But, I find myself out, standing in my field, a lot these days--as the summer brings on the next wave of wildlife--the moths and butterflies.


While not too many insects can tolerate the toxic and sticky latex of the milkweed, caterpillars of the Milkweed Tussock moth have made a meal of it. These social eaters move from leaf to leaf as a group, leaving nothing but the skeletonized remains.


In days, they'll begin to resemble these tufted black and orange caterpillars of last summer.





Such a wild child, slipping into the unnoticed life of a drab adult--a silvery brown moth I've never seen.







So many others become more striking.

Common Buckeye

Little Wood-Satyr

Spicebush Swallowtail

Great Spangled Fritillary

Silver-Spotted Skipper

I never realized, years ago, how much truth was hidden behind the humor in that verse.
How, almost every day, it would be there, that my greatest satisfaction would be found.
Out, standing in my field.

Great Spangled Fritillary

Click photos to enlarge

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