Pain in the Grass

Take great care when walking on

A grassy dune or beach

Avoid the spiny sandburs

Is the lesson I would teach

Oddly it is classified

As a grass with flattened blade

The well protected prickly seed

Inflicts a pain I would not trade

To any other person

The one-seeded fruit may look benign

But as a kid the stalk of spurs

Was used like a cat-of nine

By bullies armed with barbed bouquets

A devilish construction

Persecuted mercilessly I was by

Weapons of grass destruction

The biological intent although

Is not to cause one dread

The seeds instead attach themselves

And from there the grass can spread

Food it is for larval forms

Of several butterflies

Like satyrs and many skippers

Just before they metamorphasize

The many forms of sandbur species

All members of the genus Cenchrus

Have caused a many manly men

To tiptoe along the seashells

The last thing I’ll say

I’ve saved for last

Please watch your step

For this pain in the grass

An Allergic Reaction to Suspense

If you’re the kind of person that has to peek under the Christmas tree before the day has arrived, go ahead and skip to the end. If you read the last page of a novel first or if you fast forward through the movie because you have to know “what is in the box!”, go ahead and skip to the end. I wouldn't want the suspense to kill you.

What is the fine specimen we have before us? It is a caterpillar entering the pupal stage before it becomes a butterfly. It has crawled up under a metal guardrail on a desolate road in the Everglades. Here it remains suspended, awaiting a transformative process that will entirely change its way of life. But which species will it become?

Brightly colored insects, reptiles and snakes are usually warning signs for predators to stay away. The caterpillars of this specie feed on passion flowers which cause them to be toxic.

While some predators ignore the warnings and suffer the consequences, others have adapted to the poison and can enjoy what most others can not. Will the fly on the bottom right of the caterpillar be one of those predators?

If the color wasn’t enough of a deterrent, the well-fortified exterior should repel the hungriest of predators. Surprisingly, the fierce looking spines are innocuous, flexible ornamentation that rounds out the repulsive costume.

Within a few days, the metamorphic process will conclude, the pupal casing will cleave and a beautiful butterfly will fly off, but which species?

If you skipped ahead from the opening paragraph, you’ve ruined it for everyone and now I won’t tell you what it is. But hey, what’s the fun of me telling you what is wrapped up in the package when it’s more fun to find out yourself. 

Letter Bee - The Mexican Clover

It’s hard to say if laziness, divine intervention, or concern/apathy for the environment led me to turn the mower off and leave my lawn alone. Probably a little bit of everything.

Here in south Florida things are still growing. Flowers still bloom and insects still hop, fly and flit across the lawn. During the summer months you can in fact “watch the grass grow” but with shorter days and fewer rain clouds the need to mow has gone from every four days to every three weeks.

As the dry season kicked in a few weeks back, frost-like blooms took over a corner of the lawn. Days passed and the snowy appearance spread. I mowed, but the prostrate plant avoided the whirling blades and left behind a colorful white and violet ground cover. It was beautiful.

The star-shaped flower is Mexican Clover (Richardia sp.), and despite the name may or may not be a native. It is found in Central and South America as well as the southern United States but may have extended its range down into Florida in the last few decades. Some say it was here before the Spanish explorers and deserves native status. Others think it was introduced.

As I mow on this particular Sunday I find myself humming a certain song as I make pass after pass. Each consecutive lap brings me closer to the field of Mexican Clover that covers nearly half the lawn. I watch hundreds of bees dart from bloom to bloom and slurp nectar from the flowers. Monarchs, White Peacocks, Gulf Fritillaries, Buckeyes, Skippers and other butterflies do the same. It’s like musical chairs for insects.
It’s a spectacular site. My lawn is a refuge. My lawn is a cafeteria. My lawn is beautiful.

Native or exotic – the flowers benefit the bees and butterflies. The humming in my head matches the humming of the bees. It drowns out the mower. I hear my mother say to me, speaking words of wisdom – let it be.
I turn the mower off.

PAC-119 - Monarch Watch Part II

Do you like movie trilogies? The first episode is so incredible/profitable that a second episode is rolled out regardless of a cohesive plot. Typically Part II is the dour, depressing, hopeless drama in the saga. A requisite cheery ending is doled out despite the passage of decades/principle actors and we spend endless wasted hours complaining about how it didn’t live up to the initial movie.

I’m warning you now – you will get a Part III. It may be months from now and the main character will be dead.
Our lead is PAC 119, a tagged Monarch butterfly discovered in October of 2010 at the St. Mark’s national Wildlife Refuge in Florida. The conspicuous blue dot on an otherwise orange and black butterfly is relatively unobtrusive to the insect as it bursts in effortless puffs from flower to flower, feeding on nectar. Where this butterfly picked up its tag is a mystery and where it will end up can only be resolved in a suspense filled follow up Part III in 3-D and UV. But for now we know this much, the tag reads:

TAG@KU.EDU
Monarch Watch
1-888-TAGGING
PAC 119
(The coding was changed to protect the anonymity of the butterfly)

The nine millimeter in diameter, adhesive backed tag was placed delicately on top of the mitten-shaped discal cell, a tagging practice that doesn’t impede flight and increases the chance of recovering it. Tagging and recoveries give insights into fly ways, distance traveled, peak migration and survival rates.

PAC 119 is a distinct set of numbers and letters that allows Monarch Watch to track it when recovered. I’ve passed along this butterfly’s location and from here the insect will head south where it will overwinter in a select range of coniferous mountains of Mexico. Unusually harsh winters have decimated the Monarchs hoping to ride out the winter months here and illegal logging is a persistent threat to the 20+ acres of forest that is home to most of North America’s butterfly kings.

So how will our leading lepidopteron fare? Will PAC 119 survive the flight across the Gulf of Mexico? Will it arrive safely at its alpine alcove? Will it succumb in the frigid forest? Tune in next time and see.

South of the Border–Monarch Watch Part I

When I was a kid our family made an annual summer migration from South Florida to Upstate New York and back again in the fall. It was an arduous trek that I liken to that of the Monarch Butterflies that are completing their southern migration as I type.

The circadian cue that prompted our northern departure was an overdose of vitamin D and the ability to roast ants with a magnifying glass at 9 pm in the evening. Too much sun. Time to head north. This was a huge relief for me and my siblings who grew up with no air conditioning. It was also an opportunity to avoid flea season which as I look back now was something that was probably unique to our home.

Our 1200 mile journey required many stops to rest and feed. Monarchs stop at nutrient-rich, nectar-loaded flowers before resuming their flight. We seemingly stopped at every Burger King and Arby’s along the Atlantic Coast.

The return trip was no less exhausting and the ravenous fleas waiting back home made it all the more dreadful, but “South of the Border”, the tacky highway tourist trap between the Carolinas was a refuge, a sombrero-adorned landscape, illuminated like fireflies at night like with festive green and orange lights. To my parents it was a Venus flytrap. They knew they shouldn’t stop, but they couldn’t help it. It meant we were half way home and it made for a fun rest stop full of as much Mexican culture as Arby’s was full of nutrients.

For migrating butterflies there is no shortage of dangers. Windshields, predators and exhaustion surely claim thousands each migration. Not all of them intend to make it all the way south. Some lay eggs and it will be that generation that carries on the migration south.

At the St. Mark’s National Wildlife Refuge on Florida’s panhandle coastline, the last of the Monarchs are gorging themselves on sugar-rich nectar before casting themselves from the shore and heading across the Gulf towards Mexico. There they’ll ride out the winter before heading back north again.

As I take photos and watch the spectacle of Monarchs, Fritillaries and Buckeyes feeding on salt bush and goldenrods, I search for inner calm as hundreds of no-seeums, aka blood sucking midges, feast on me. I’m reminded of the fleas and as much as I’d love to stay, it’s time to go.

Jungle Idol: Three Miles to Nowhere

I don't always lead tours. Part of my job is to give presentations and convince people they want to leave the beach and spend the day in the swamp. So I put on my jungle hat, grab a microphone and do my thing every Monday morning. Monday being my birthday - I gave my presentation and afterwards was praised by a very nice, well-to-do woman in her sixties who said "I can tell you love what you do and that is $&@^! cool!" OK!

As I promised myself, I took the rest of the afternoon off and headed down towards Shark Valley Slough in the middle of the Everglades to check out a spot I'd never been too. There's an old road off the main highway that's gated now and if anyone goes out there I don't know why. It reminds of a song by Roger Clyne & the Peacemakers called Hope and Madness about the resilience of nature and the ability to rebound from our ceaseless abuse - the lyrics go something like this:

Let her lead you so very far away

Where no one can reach you

Spread out wild and wander

And may everything they poison come back stronger

While the rest of us were sleeping

She sent flowers gently creeping.

And the waters slowly seeping

Through the cracks in the pavement

And the cracks in the dam

So now everything we steal away

We know someday she'll take it back again

I walked the pavement on a road to nowhere and reveled in the weeds that pushed up through asphalt the ant hills rising where cars once drove and the moon vines blanketing everything in the distance including a 20 foot tall tree of unknown species at the center of the photo. To the north by 200 miles, the Army Corps of Engineers has systematically removed 52 miles of canals and let the Kissimmee River revert to it's natural state. Along Tamiami Trail, the Department of Transportation will be lifting the road, creating a causeway and letting the water flow. And in the Picayune Strand - they are pulling up hundreds of miles of roads and canals in one of the largest (and failed) developments in US history. Eventually nature will take it back. Imagine if we ended the hostilities against her everywhere.

Near the end of my trek I stopped at a berry bush and noticed a strange shaped leaf. It twitched.And then spread it's wings - as did it's mate. It was a mating pair of Julia Heliconian butterflies - members of the longwing family. The female would fly as they mated and land not far away - hoping for a safe place to work on the next generation. This bird won't be passing along it's DNA. Nothing but feathers - the predator long gone with the tasty parts.I left my forgotten road and headed west on Tamiami Trail. By the time I made it to Shark Valley, the last Tram had departed and the final bikes were rented for the day. I walked the boardwalk and the tram road, smooth and tidy - imagining future cracks - prophesying weeds. The tourists can have their pretty park. I prefer to be off the beaten path. I liked my three miles to nowhere.