Monarch Caterpillar
It seems to be the time of summer for monarch caterpillars. In just a short span yesterday, we found 4 plump ones like this on both butterflyweed and common milkweed. These are some of the best-known caterpillars, famous for the terrible taste they get from eating the sticky white sap of their host plants. After their final instar, they will create a jewel-like chrysalis, a shimmery green with gold and black dots. I would love love love to find one of those one day. I have seen them, even seen them in the wild (as opposed to a butterfly house)... but I've never found one. I looked on all the chewed milkweed plants I saw that didn't have a caterpillar on them, but to no avail...
Flowering spurge (I think).
Yucca flowers beginning to open yesterday at Illinois Beach.
Female 12-spotted skimmer. The male of this species was a previous dragonfly of the day; the female has brighter yellow on her abdomen.
Ruby
meadowhawk, male. (Also previously shown, but, oh well.)
Last Friday -- yes, a full week ago, we went to the beach... and now, I am finally catching up on writing a little about it. Here are some of the flowers that grow there that we don't see too many other places... Flowering spurge, a diminutive flower atop a green leafy plant... you'd miss it if you weren't looking.
Prickly pear would be hard to miss.
Hoary puccoon.
And, at school, a very early rudbeckia shows its colors...
