Fireflies

One of the cool things about stepping out on the porch of the Aerie just after dark in the late spring/early summer is the number of lightning bugs or fireflies that can be seen over the lawn and in the tall weeds growing along its edges. Dozens and dozens of them are blinking their yellow-green tails on and off in hopes of attracting another firefly. Most are looking to mate. Some are looking to eat.

eNature lists two fireflies and both can be found in Pennsylvania. They are the Pennsylvania Firefly and the Pyralis Firefly. Its the former (the Pennsylvania Firefly) that will eat its own kind if the mood strikes it. The Pyralis adult doesn't eat at all. Interestingly, it's only the mated females that become cannibalistic. Guess they never heard of divorce lawyers!

When I was much, much younger, I and my cousins would run about and collect as many fireflies as we could. Forty or fifty of the little bugs make a nice--if somewhat flickering and short lived--night light. We would also take one of the bugs and squish its tail across the back of our hands just to see the glow of the phosphorescent chemicals appear and slowly fade. (Yeah, we were a blood thirsty bunch!)

Spring/summer--Well...Trials & Tribulations

Seems like we jumped right back into heat these last couple of afternoons. The thermometer has topped out in the low 80s both days at around 4 PM. Neither the cats nor I are ready for this kind of heat. Terry brushed Chester yesterday with the Furminator (GREAT product, BTW) and came up with enough fur to spin into yarn for a sweater. Got nearly as much off Shadow as well.

Me? No shedding of fur (there's precious little of it on my pate as it is), but even the slightest activity under the afternoon sun and my ball cap and T-shirt are soaked. I need to get some adult beverage(beer: It does a body good) to replenish my metabolites after doing manual labor. That or I better see about hiring Manuel.

Seriously, if I'm working outdoors--cutting the grass or firewood, weeding the garden, moving stones and/or earth about--I have to stop every hour to drink a quart of water or Gatorade. And, if I'm not careful, I'll still get a little woozy from lose of salts. Until I get used to the heat and humidity again, I try to limit myself to a maximum of three hours of physical labor--preferably in the early morning or late afternoon. The 11 AM to 2 PM slot was made for either the basement where its cool or siesta.

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Besides sweating, I really dislike the emergence of black flies in the spring. The females bite into your skin and suck up the blood that emerges. Their saliva contains an anticoagulant to allow the blood to flow freely. That's what produces the reaction in your body. Thankfully, their time on blood patrol is short IF the weather is warm. Hardly saw any today at the Aerie, but Mark said they were out in full force up at the Bolt Hole--which is why I'm at the Aerie. Even in rainy, wet springs, they won't be as troublesome after a couple weeks of warm temperatures. Ya either have to sweat it out, or don a bug hat/suit. And DEET. Lots of DEET.

Deer flies, too, can be a royal pain in the late spring. Buggers swarm around your head and until the buzzing alone drives you nuts. Then, in silence, they land and RIP a chunk of your flesh out. They'll slow down after awhile but some will be present all summer long if the dragonflies and phoebes don't get 'em. I find myself wearing gloves, a hat and a bandana to ward them off. Oh, and DEET. Lots of DEET.

Some people attract members of the opposite sex like moths to a flame. Terry is that way with mosquitoes (and here). She can be outside for five minutes and get as many mosquito bites. That's why we loaded up on Thermacell products (and DEET, lots of DEET) before heading to Alaska last year where, it is rumored, numerous humongous mosquitoes dwell. I've yet to try the Thermacell stuff. Terry got just a half dozen bites when we stopped along the Dalton Highway north of Fairbanks to walk in the tundra, feel the permafrost and pick blueberries. The mosquitoes there were laying in wait to ambush tourists. We ran into precious few insects in either the Yukon or Alaska. Lucky, I guess.

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Another couple of things I dislike about the spring/summer are carpenter ants and carpenter bees. The large black carpenter ants are a problem because they start looking for food and shelter as the colonies awake in the spring. They, somehow, infiltrate the cracks and crevasses of our home and wander about on the hardwood floor and counter tops. They don't really do any damage (I've never caught them eating into the logs or wood trim although I've had them in some boards out in the shed) but they are creepy. I've purchased some spray that's supposed to work on keeping them out and killing any foolish enough to cross the line and applied it to the base of the house. Inside, we baited the area behind the garbage bin and sprayed--with a product safe for indoors--one spot we say where we've seen them emerge from between the floor joist/ceiling beam and the wall log. That's high enough the kitties can't get to it. Since then I've seen far fewer ants in the house.

As for the carpenter bees.... Not a welcome sight if you live in a pine home. They don't seem to bother homes made of cedar or covered in cedar shakes but the females seem to like the pine soffit boards despite the stain that was applied. (I've yet to see any boring into the logs but the deck railing--oh, yeah!) As a result, I've been forced to declare war upon the buggers.

The wasp and bee killer sprays with a 20 to 25 foot range are excellent for this with one exception: the very peak of the roof is closer to 30 feet--straight up. The spray can't reach there. So I lay in wait until the bee comes close enough and spray, spray, spray! Gotta watch the wind, though, you don't want to get hit with the back splash. Not unless you want to take a long shower. The stuff is potent. A direct hit will knock the bee out of the sky and put the bee down for good, but stomping on the downed bee is more satisfying. (Besides, if I leave a whole, dead bee laying about, the chipmunk may wander by and gobble it up. Who knows what the spray will do to the poor chippy?) Still there's that one smart a$$ bee w-a-y up there at the peak. I'll have to see about getting another can of spray and get the ladder out. And I'll have to caulk the holes they've already bored in the pine.

Oops! (On the truck.) and At the Bolt Hole

Okay.... So it appears there was nothing wrong with the windshield at all. The winds of Wyoming didn't blow a gasket/molding off the top of the windshield because...well, there never was one there to begin with. It just looked like there should have been a gasket/molding there. I would feel foolish about that except:
1) The servicemen at the dealership didn't catch it either even after A) telling me that they couldn't find that part in the parts manual because B) they seldom have to replace it (How about never?! 'Cause it doesn't exist!
2) The people they spoke to in California (the designers?) didn't catch it either.
3) I got a new windshield gratis. (Terry swears there was a little ding in the old one. Probably right at her eye level. I thought it was tree sap.)

I stopped at the dealer's today on my way to the Bolt Hole and had the fella at the service desk with whom I have been dealing come out to the lot and check the gap at the top of the windshield. We then went over to a new Tundra on the lot and found it had ta-da! the exact same gap. Oh well. Live and learn.
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Meanwhile, I drove east on Route 17 (the new I-86) to Binghamton, NY and then north on Route 12 to Utica and then on to the Bolt Hole from there. This is an older route that I used to take when I came up from NJ and didn't want to deal with the NY Thruway. It's actually shorter than taking either Route 14 up past Seneca Lake or Route 13 through Ithaca and is just as scenic.

Today I saw (and was stopped at the crossing) a positively huge freight train as it crossed Route 12 just south of Chenango Forks. It was easily one of the longest I've seen in the middle of the day here on the east coast. I'd estimate 100-120 cars of carious shapes and sizes. I got there just after the engines cleared (and disappeared around the bend) and sat for about 15 minutes or so.

I managed to just get through Sherburne, NY before they started their Cavalcade of Bands parade. The first Saturday of June they have lots of marching bands compete as they march along a mile or more of Route 12 that runs through town. All kinds of folks were already lining the sides of the highway and I felt like practicing my "parade wave" as I drove by. I did, however, manage to avoid the huge detour/delay that the parade would have presented.

I did see many, many cars suddenly dive for the shoulder of the road (some even made it all the way) when the driver or passenger saw something interesting at one of the many yard/garage sales along the way.

I saw a sign along the way that had me thinking. It said "Night Walkers for Sale." Now, I don't know about your area of the country but I grew up calling the worm used for fish bait a "Night Crawler" and this sign just seemed wrong. That is, unless they were selling zombies. But I didn't see any indication of that.

(I also didn't see Gov. Palin, Rev. Paul. Sorry.)
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Once I refueled the truck and picked up some groceries, I was at the Bolt Hole by just after noon. Bright and sunny, with a fair breeze blowing and grass nearly up to my knees in spots. So I knew what my second task would be. (First was unloading the truck, groceries in the fridge and turning on the water.)

Oh-oh! No gas for the mower! All the cans in the garage were empty--which was a good thing.This ethanol-mix fuel doesn't do well when it sits. Even when you put Sta-Bil in it. So it was back down to the gas Stewards to get some gas. Luckily it's only a 30 mile round trip. /sarc
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Back at the Bolt Hole, I fueled the mower, pushed the primer a couple of times and pulled the cord. There is no sweeter sound than the sound of a Briggs and Straton engine turning over on the first pull after the machine to which it is attached has been sitting idle in the shed since last November.

Then it was back and forth at a very slow walk to cut the thick, tall grass. I call it grass because some of it is. It's really more of a pasture mixture of plantain, wild strawberries, clover, hawkweed, daisies, mint, and--heck--even chives left over from a former attempt at gardening. Mixed in the grass were lots of pine cones that kept getting chunked out of the mower's shute and even whapped my shins from under the cowling of the mower a time or two. Twigs got chopped up as well. I avoided killing the one garter snake I saw. A woeful creature that was extremely lethargic and looked like it needed to shed its skin. I also missed the one wood frog that jumpedout of the thickest patch of true grass right in the middle of the vast expanse of the lawn.

Luckily the blackflies were kept at bay by the breeze. Not so the deer flies. All my mowing was done while squashing deer flies. I was usually too late in this action to prevent bodily harm--to me. My reaction was more a response to the stinging bite of blood lapping creatures. Every time I would even come close to a shrub or an over hanging branch, I would attract two or three of them. Working in shortsleeves, even with a liberal application of Deep Woods Off, was not a wise move. My elbows, knuckles and wrists became prime targets. By the time I was through--it took thre hours--I had probably killed a score of deer flies. I say "probably" because I've seen flies that have been pretty well smashed and flung to the ground right themselves, shake their wings and take off for another assault. My arms were dotted with little droplets of blood along with a few smears from flies that were not going to return. If I had any worries about high blood pressure, I would be safe for a couple of days--longer if I venture outside again.

And all the while my Phoebe tenants just sat off to the side and watched. They made no effort at all to come to my aid. Ingrates! Heh, they were probably sated on flies anyway.

Thank goodness that one of the allergy shots I got for four or five years, desensitized me to the bite of these pests. If I hadn't gotten those shots, my forearms would probably swollen enough to be comparable to Popeye's.

Luna Moth at the Aerie

When we arrived home in the wee hours of Sunday morning (2 AM), I noticed a Luna Moth fluttering around the lights outside the garage and front door as we unpacked the truck. It disappeared and i thought nothing of it until Terry called me into the garage this morning. After five days inside the garage, this moth had finally reappeared. It was tangled in some cobwebs and looked considerably worse for wear. It had spiderwebs wrapped around its legs and the tips of its wings and "tail" were shredded and bedraggled. I removed the webs and set it outside on one of the log ends where it promptly got blown about.

It was still alive and moving feebly but it doesn't look like it will survive. Based upon the "fuzziness" of its antennae I am assuming that this is a male. They use scent to track down females and the antennae are their olfactory system.

Luna Moth

These are beautiful moths--among the largest in North America--and it always disturbs me to see one die, but they are far from uncommon or endangered as some think. We had many appear in the shrubs along the edge of the clearing when we were constructing our home. A temporary street light that served as our night protection system early on attracted them to the area and, as to be expected, that brought bats out to feed. Only the wings would remain to tell the tale.

They're Baaack.

A little over a year ago, I wrote this piece about the annual Cluster Fly invasion experienced at the Bolt Hole. Well, they're back in full force. The 10 inches of snow just over a week ago and the warm temperatures this week have brought them out in the hundreds.

These flies, whose larval form are parasites on earthworms, abound here. The large lawn and former pasture/apple orchard that we are trying to return to apple trees has a fairly thick coating of topsoil that the earthworms enjoy and that means lots and lots of Cluster Flies. The cabin is anything but air tight and that means they get inside when the frosts hit hard. They can squeeze through the smallest crack and crevice so they have no problem with the gaping holes around some of the old doors or with getting through the windows. The screens on the windows and sliding doors are for wasps and mosquitoes in the summer. They are no help whatsoever against the Cluster Flies.

Once inside they cluster in the corners and in the barn board siding that serves as paneling and wait. They wait for the first warm day so they can return to the outside but most of them are too stupid to find the cracks to get out so instead they gather on the windows while the sun shines and crawl all over them. Occasionally they go into fits of frenzy and rattle and buzz against the glass. When it gets to raucous, I pull out the vacuum cleaner and suck them up. One spring I hung the bag on a tree and cut a hole in it. It was fast food for the birds and the phoebes and chickadees feasted for a day or two before a heavy rain and wind blew the bag down.

The flies don't eat anything so they aren't a concern as far as leaving food out, but they do seem to like to get into anything wet so I check my coffee cup frequently. At night they also like to gather around the lights. They will rattle against the lamp shade for as long as the light is on and if you're sitting next to a lamp to read you're going to get buzzed.

During the winter, I know when the temperature from the wood stoves has reached the optimal level for that's when the flies come out to play. During the day they come out even if there is no fire because of the large windows facing south that collect the sun's warmth. Even if I'm not here, they must come out to rage against their captivity against that glass. I can tell because their little bodies lie upon the floor...or at least their wings do. While I'm away the deer mice and even shrews that get into the cabin have a ready source of protein in the form of fly carcasses.

At least this year there don't seem to be many lady bugs with them. They've taken up residence in the barn. In the fall there were hundreds climbing over the brown painted T-11 siding. I find groups of them among the lumber and old doors leaning against the wall of the barn or in amongst the firewood stacked there. It may not be as warm as the cabin, but at least the lady bugs will have an easier time than the Cluster Flies getting back to the fields come spring.

Fidgitty Frittelaries

Walking about the yard yesterday while snapping pictures, I spotted this one orange butterfly (one of the many frittilaries) sitting upon a flat stone sunning itself--or maybe it was advertising as a streetwalker does.



Moments after I took that picture of the frittilary flapping its wings and posturing upon the stone, a second one showed up and a short and--I imagine--suggestive dance took place with the first leading the second around the stone before taking off for the field of goldenrod and bergamont. It reminded me of the newsreels of Gypsy ROse Lee dancing for LBJ--lots of shaking and wagging and fan/wing waving.



I suppose they went off to make little fritillary caterpillars or something.

Goldenrod and Yellow Jackets

I mentioned that the goldenrod was about to burst into bloom a week or so ago. Well, some of it has.

This is one of the most undeservedly maligned plants out there. Everyone believes it is responsible for the hay fever (runny nose, itchy eyes, etc.) which really begins to affect people about the same time as these yellow flowers appear. In reality, it is not the goldenrod that is the cause. Another plant, one with non-descript green flower that blooms at the same time: ragweed.

I used to be terribly allergic to grass, tree and especially ragweed pollen. From mid-August to October I would be one messed up person. And then it would start all over in mid-April when the trees would start blooming. I have undergone desensitization shots to reduce the problem to almost nothing. Still, when it's time to pull ragweed from the garden up north, I don my long sleeve shirt and leather gloves because if any part of the plant touches bare skin....

I used to be allergic to bee and wasp stings, too, but a long series of shots fixed that problem and I no longer have to face the possibility of sudden death should I run into a yellow jacket (a type of wasp) or fifty.

The goldenrod flower blooms just when many flowers have faded and its many florets supply pollen and nectar for insects well into the fall. In fact, while milkweed plants and flowers may fuel the Monarch Butterfly's caterpillar and young adult, it is the goldenrod in one form or another that sees that it can migrate south in the fall.



These may not be my favorite insects (Yellow Jackets) but this is one of the busier fueling stations in the yard right now.

Invasion!

The Aerie has been invaded!

We've got no cluster flies (too little lawn for the earthworm parasites?), but the Lady Bugs have found their way into the Aerie and are crawling all over the windows. There must be a hundred or more. They seem less active today with the overcast, rainy sky but yesterday they were all over the outside green metal trim of all the doors and windows.

I've no idea how they got inside since everything is caulked tighter than a drum but inside they have come. No doubt they will be here until they die or until spring arrives and they find their way back out. *sigh*

I don’t know...maybe they just need their morning coffee.

Cockroaches Are Morons In The Morning, Geniuses In The Evening
Seriously, the article mentions studies with humans that showed time of day to be a factor in ability to learn. I used to have classes like that when I taught high school. When school starts at 7:30 AM (and some of the kids had to be up by 6 to get read and catch the school bus), there aren’t a lot of bright-eyed and bushy-tailed learners on the other side of the lab bench. (Hell, I wasn’t too bright-eyed and bushy-tailed some mornings either. But that’s what Monday Night Football will do to you.)

Cluster Flies

This past week at the Bolt Hole we first experienced a hard frost with the morning temperature dropping to the upper 20s and then had several days of 75 to 80 degree highs. This resulted in the annual infestation of Cluster Flies.

Now, I’m not sure how wide spread this phenomenon is (but the search I did using Google produced returns from Penn State, U of Kentucky, Iowa State, Virginia Tech, Canada, and Ohio State and that was just on the first page!), I only became aware of it after I had purchased the Bolt Hole and met with several other folks in the Hunter Mountain area of NY. For those of you who do not know what I’m talking about, cluster flies (I’ve also heard them called “buckwheat flies”) look like house flies but they are a dull, drab gray—to-black fly not the iridescent green and blue flies you see feeding at your sugar bowl. In fact, I’m not sure adult cluster flies feed at all.

As fall approaches, the angle of the sun in the sky decreases and the nighttime temperatures drop closer and closer to freezing. Then the cluster flies will start to gather on the sun drenched walls of the cabin. The search is on for any nook and cranny that offers itself. They’ll invade your house (or any warm, protected spot) in the fall of the year with the intention of toughing out the winter in the cracks, crevices and corners of your home. Masses of their tiny bodies may huddle together to conserve energy. In an unheated building like a shed or barn, this isn’t a problem.

It’s in a heated building that they become nuisances. Even if the heat source is panes of glass on the south side of the building, it might be enough to rouse them from their winter torpor and make them think spring has arrived. This, in turn, will set them upon a search for an exit to the great outdoors and, not being too bright, they end up buzzing around on the glass windowpanes and doors in huge numbers. When night arrives and things get cool again, they may slip back into any convenient crack. Of course, if you’ve turned up the heat or built a fire in the stove for your personal comfort, they’ll continue to enjoy the warmth, too. But without an exterior source of light to attract them, they’ll start to buzz around the light bulb in the lamb; rattling and smashing into the light shade as they do so. Like a said a nuisance.

Apparently, preventing their entrance into your home is the best bet at control. But it’s not easy. They can squeeze through the tiniest of cracks and any old home will have lots of places for them to get in. There are dusts ad sprays that can be applied before the infestation starts but once it has occurred, it’s best to forget the insecticides. Carpet beetles may feed on the dead bodies and they can do damage to a multitude of fabric materials in your home. No, I find the vacuum cleaner to the best tool at controlling the flies in the winter. On a sunny afternoon, when they gather by the dozens hundreds on the south facing glass, I‘ll just spend a few minutes hoovering them up. They may not die in the vacuum bag but they can’t get out easily either. Especially if I‘ve also vacuumed the spider webs out of the corners and the rug.

In searching for information about cluster flies, I learned that the larval stage is a parasite of earthworms. That is one of the reasons they are so numerous where healthy, moist soils and lawns exist. I’ve got a sizable lawn around the Bolt Hole and an overgrown field across the road. Portions of both are shaded from the sun and stay rather moist from either dew or runoff. The cabin, however, is painted dark brown and portions of it are exposed to sunlight which it absorbs quite well.

On a side note: Last fall, when Terry was living full time at the Bolt Hole we didn’t have a sizable infestation of cluster flies. I don‘t think the three cats had anything to do with that but they did enjoy chasing down the few errant flies that came within their reach. I do know that the lack of any fall infestation meant there were far fewer flies all winter and into the spring.

Learn more here:

From Penn State: CLUSTER FLIES Pollenia rudis (Figures, they’re illegal aliens:

Cluster flies are thought to be native to Europe and may have found their way to North America in the ballast of ships containing soil and the cluster fly host, earthworms.

From Iowa State: Cluster Flies
From Canada: Effective Control of Cluster Flies

From Virginia Tech: Cluster Fly

Isolated houses in the country are especially prone to invasion, since they offer the only warm shelter for miles around.

Fits the Bolt Hole to a T.

I got just one question: Where did they live before man started building homes?

Monarch Butterflies Fueling Up

We walked the road in front of the Bolt Hole to see what damage may have occurred just east of us. We could see quite a few large poplars/aspens partially or completely blown over but what we saw in the field of goldenrod across from our cabin made us stop in awe.

Amongst the bright yellow flower spikes of the goldenrod were dozens and dozens of monarch butterflies. They were obviously feeding and waiting for a favorable tailwind to fly further south on their annual migration. Each butterfly looked like it was just out of its chrysalis as it sported bright colors and unblemished wings.

Click to enlarge and see the orange and black dots that are monarch butterflies.

Just two of the many, many butterflies in the field.

And to think, on the way up, I had commented to Terry about not seeing many monarchs in flight. Guess they’re just fueling up.

Walking Stick

I walked out of the basement this afternoon to work on the raised bed I'm constructing and happened to notice this guy on the stuccoed wall. Now in the woods or field amongst the twigs and weeds you would never notice it, but against the gray wall it stands out like a sore thumb. It measured between six and seven inches in length and was as thin as a pencil lead.



We've seen quite a few of them about on the deck or log walls of the Aerie, but even there they are somewhat camouflaged. Not this one, however.

Well, it wasn't a shutout after all.

I very nearly concluded a shutout of the wasps at the Bolt Hole over the past few days. In fact, I did manage to nearly wipe out the wasp nest I posted a photo of earlier. Only a few stragglers were seen by me and Mark as we worked on the garage today. They wold zoom in to the barn and then right back out. Their bright yellow and black striped bodies were easy to spot against the dark shadows of the barn's interior.

It was the second string that got me around noon today. We (Mark and I) were going to put some plywood over rotting, leaking windows on the west side of the garage. I had climbed the step ladder to screw the initial piece in place but had to hammer a stray nail out of the way first. it was then that I heard the loud buzz of a nest inside the garage wall with an entrance in the opposite corner of the window. You can reasonably assume I got off the ladder ASAP! Even then I was unscathed.

When things quieted down, I thought it might be safe to work on the other window. WRONG! No sooner had I moved the ladder and climbed up it than there was a very sharp jab behind my left ear. I swatted--and killed--the little martyr, and then got off the ladder again. Score one for the insect world. (The sting still hurts some 10 hours after it occurred, but, thanks to the allergy shots I wrote about, I was able to walk away without the need of medical attention.) I still had one can of Spectricide spray left and so I counter attacked, soaking the corner of the window as best I could before packing up my tools and calling it a day. I didn't stick around to see if the spray did any good or not.

These were not the same species of wasps as those that built the paper nest in the barn. These were about the same size (1/2 to 5/8 inches long) but were nearly all black with just a bit of pale yellow on their abdomen. I believe they may also build paper nest for, if I remember correctly, they had a small one some years ago under the Bolt Hole's second story deck. I got stung then, too, when I stepped out on the deck and the vibrations of my feet on the deck floor pissed them off.

When I get back up to the Bolt Hole (I'm back at the PA Aerie now) and get around to covering the windows, you can be assured I'll use a long pole to rap sharply on the window sill first to see if anyone is home.

Butterflies

We have a small patch of milkweed that I have left standing because it attracts butterflies. Not only are monarch butterflies pretty and frequent visitors but there are usually four or five yellow swallowtails and the same number of Fritillaries present on a sunny morning. (Interestingly enough, the monarch was the only one I could not get a picture of. It kept bouncing around from flower to flower and always just out of range of the camera.)


Fritillaries on milkweed.


Swallowtail on milkweed.


Red Admiral
(I had to “chase’ this one down as every time I started to take a picture, it fluttered away. It finally settled on this piece of sumac which had broken off the shrub and was hanging upon a tree branch. When the chase started, it too was feeding on the milkweed.

The milkweed is also a feeding ground for numerous honeybees, bumblebees, flies, etc.