Since monarch butterflies and viceroy butterflies are both rare in the yard, I haven’t had much practice identifying them. So when a gusty headwind forced this butterfly to perch on the deck this morning, I labelled the photos “Monarch” without paying much attention to the details. After a bit of research, I changed the label to viceroy. The broad stripe that crosses the hindwing’s network of other stripes seems to be the key.
What do you think? Monarch or viceroy?
The rabbits now spend their days exploring the shed and deck and irises, stretching their boundaries more and more as they grow. But they aren’t so mature that they are willing to skip a meal with their mother. They predictably return to the ginger lilies each evening, where she meets them after dark.
Even though they still nurse, they have become competent grazers. It’s fun to watch them experiment with the yard’s various weeds and flowers.
Publication Note: My poem “Ink” appeared at vox poetica earlier this month. It’s now posted on the poemblog.
This is the last image I have of the rabbits in their nest. At the time I took this picture, near nightfall on September 7th, there were three babies visible in the nest and a fourth hiding under the woodpile. Later that night, an unknown predator destroyed the nest and took two of the young rabbits.
What was it? Is there a way to name the hunger that crossed our fence in the dark? And what would I gain, in giving it a name?
The next day was one of uncertainty. How many had survived? One of them stayed visible all day, exposed and exhausted. I feared that it’s inexperience would lure another predator into the yard.
As it turns out, two of the baby rabbits survived. I have no way to know whether or not the rabbits grieve for their loss. All I know is that they go on. They sleep and graze, grow and explore. They live.
I’m sad about the lost rabbits, but less so than I might have been in the past. It’s a matter of perspective, and today’s date eclipses the yard’s small tragedies. Eleven years ago, I spent a week in front of my television, paralyzed with horror.
I felt, then, as if I would never again know joy. As if all of my future hours should be spent remembering and mourning. Except the world continued to turn and I couldn’t sustain my grief. Paper and ashes stopped falling from the sky. Piles of rubble disappeared. Names and stories quit flooding my dreams at night and swirled into the slow current of memory. Today I am able to sit quietly beside those memories and study a calmer reflection, one less distorted by ripples of fear. And tomorrow, when the Earth’s rotation delivers another new day, I’ll stand in the weedy expanse of my yard and take another picture of rabbits. Because all of my future hours should not be spent remembering and mourning. They should be spent living.
I believe these are Florida Predatory Stink Bug nymphs. I don’t know if they killed this cicada or found it already dead. Either way, their late-night feast created an eerie scene on the fence.
I am an amateur at identifying “true bugs”. Please comment to correct or confirm this ID!
At sunset, sphinx moths arrive for another feeding in the ginger lilies. They drain the flowers’ day-long accumulation of nectar, then move on. Around midnight, they return for the nectar that has been produced since nightfall.
I’ve seen a few different species of these hovering moths in the yard. The moth in the following photos is either a Carolina sphinx or a Five-spotted hawkmoth, but I can’t decide which. Any ideas? (Maybe it’s neither?)
The moth in this video is a Pink-spotted hawkmoth.
Rae Spencer 