It's Galling! and More

Hackberry "nipplegall" on the underside of a leaf. 

I know many people consider them ugly, especially given their prevalence on an infected tree... but I really like Hackberry Galls.  This time of year, just before the adult insects emerge from the galls sometime in September, there are these tiny yellow insects inside.  They're not really viable yet but they're big enough to walk around, and they're kind of cute.  (Yes, I recognize that I've essentially killed the one pictured here to photograph it, but they seem like a pretty renewable resource, so to speak.)   

These insects have a fascinating life cycle (similar to many gall-creating critters).  When they come out in a month or so as adults, they will still be small, less than 1/4 inch long.  They look like mini versions of their close relatives, cicadas and leaf hoppers.  They will seek a relatively protected place to overwinter, such as inside cracks in bark, where they will hibernate. In the spring, they will awaken and lay their eggs on the underside of the new leaves of a hackberry tree.  The baby bug causes the tree to start growing around it -- I believe because of an enzyme they secrete when they eat.  The result is a gall, a growth made of plant material that houses the little insect.  In this protected environment, the insects spend the summer sucking on sap until they are full grown and ready to come out and start this process over.  The hackberry trees aren't harmed by the galls, other than in the aesthetic sense.  (I don't think the trees actually care how they look).  

I bit open the gall to study this fellow who was living inside!

Other updates:

My first mistflowers bloomed yesterday; most aren't in flower yet. 

Primroses -- peak bloom.

The American hazels started turning orange just within the last day or two...

White turtlehead blooming. 

We're Back

We're safely back from the UK with loads of pictures... so many that the task of choosing them and blogging them seems terribly daunting. I will get around to it soon, though!

Here, coreopsis and spiderwort are still blooming, and a few foxglove beardtongues, but the primroses seemed to have finished while we were gone. Bergamot is at "almost" and butterfly week and queen of the prairie are just about to get started, too... Puple coneflowers are also flowering.

Munching

This fat fellow -- a black swallowtail caterpillar, is munching on some dill. Delish!

Primrose blossoms are making lovley lemon yellow splotches all over...

It's Good to be Back Home Again!

I have, like, a million... well, that's a slight exaggeration, but many photos to share from the final camping trip of the 2010 spring school trip season, but I haven't the time or energy to share them at this moment. Instead, I'll briefly share a few things from my return. First, the school is wearing its yellow outfit in honor of the last day... while we were gone, coreopsis bloomed and they are everywhere! (Also, some evening primrose bloomed).

And... in an ironic twist... this was my breakfast this morning, harvested from my garden. So delicious. The thing was, we had decided to take out strawberries this year because they really didn't produce a lot last year and it seemed like a waste of space. This haul was probably, in one day, about as much as I got all last year, and from a smaller space (some were already removed), and I did nothing to keep the birds at bay this year. I guess the birds, or the berries, heard my plans and decided to show me what they could really do! (Look at June 12, 2009's entry to read about the strawberry wars of last summer...)

"Winter" Wildflowers V

The pods on the evening primrose plants are fun -- you can almost see them popping open when you see their four sections curling outward. The pictures below focus on one capsule from different angles, but each stem has well over 10, and the numerous seeds spill out if the pods are tipped at all.

An Unearthly Being?

We found this praying mantis this morning, measuring in at about 3 inches long. These things are fascinating to students, and also serve as good proof that those science fiction people? Aren't really that creative after all. It's actually one of those things that boggles my mind... every time you see some fantastic creature or planet in a movie, it's always just an extreme version of something we have here on earth. What could these things be like if we could divorce ourselves from all we know? And are there places in the universe that not only have sprung forth life, but have conditions different enough from ours so as to generate something we can't even imagine?...

In general, I don't spend a lot of time thinking about stuff like that. I'm not a sci fi/fantasy person. There's plenty of fascinating things here on earth, crazy, diverse, unfathomable things... no need to leave earth or reality in search of the amazing.
Primrose in full bloom.
Morning dew on big bluestem.
These white asters (no identification beyond that) have just started to bloom.