fauna – Page 24 – Black and White

eating machine

Caterpillars have about 4,000 muscles (compare humans, with 629). They move through contraction of the muscles in the rear segments pushing the blood forward into the front segments elongating the torso. The average caterpillar has 248 muscles in the head segment alone. Wikipedia

bucket of bugs

cag1002-c2779-bucket-bugs — I left a five gallon bucket filled to the rim with water outside overnight in Slabtown. The next morning the water level was two inches lower and this drama was occurring. What's up with the green v black thorax? Fashion, class, sex? What is the dragonfly up to? Need an entomologist. Easier to see in color

cag1002-c2779-color-bugs

Ardea herodias herodias

heron & quercus alba
Great Blue is the largest North American heron, with a head-to-tail length of 91–140 cm (36-55 in), a wingspan of 167-201 cm (66-79 in), and a weight of 2–3.6 kg (4.4-8 lbs).–Wikipedia
The herons on Town Creek sound a little like this.
Great_Blue_Heron

Ardea herodias herodias

heron, Rappahannock River
The Great Blue Heron was one of the many species originally described by Carolus Linnaeus in his 18th century work, Systema Naturae.–Wikipedia
(herons and the ospreys do not socialize)

Pandion haliaetus

The Osprey is unusual in that it is a single species that occurs nearly worldwide.–Wikipedia

(this is the way I keep house)

iso water

water

A passerine is a bird of the order Passeriformes, which includes more than half of all bird species. — I've been putting water out for the birds in a stainless steel dog bowl. Holds about a quart. The birds are thirsty. They've been drawing the bowl down daily. The weather is hot and dry. Birds walking around with their beaks open. Birds that normally don't tolerate each other, standing side by side, drinking.

feeding/eating

Acer saccharinum

robin on her nest during a thunderstorm — We had a severe thunderstorm in Charlottesville last Thursday. It snapped power poles, uprooted trees.
The robin made this nest in a 120 year old silver maple. The dread silver maple.
Outlawed by municipalities around the country. Experts say it is a weak wooded, weedy, infrastructure trashing tree.
Sure enough, this tree lost limbs, is that weak wooded or smart?
Instead of hanging onto all its limbs and blowing over in one beautiful piece,
it dropped a few limbs and lived.
Sister robin protecting those youngsters. Mommas all right.

lightning bugs

fireflies in a tree at night. — 10 seconds, Lampyridae display. They are hanging out in a quercus palustris.
They don't hang out in the tulip tree to the right.
This chemically-produced light from the lower abdomen may be yellow, green, or pale red — wavelengths from 510 to 670 nanometers. Most fireflies are quite distasteful and sometimes poisonous to vertebrate predators.--Wikipedia