Things I’ve Seen
July 24, 2019 by New Hampshire Garden Solutions
It’s so hot and humid here right now my camera lenses fog up the minute I take them from the dry, cool air of the car into the jungle humid air outside. If there’s one thing that can destroy a camera it is condensation so I’ve put together another “Things I’ve seen” post using all the photos that didn’t fit in other blog posts. Ten years ago I had never seen a Luna moth but on the day I took the photo above there must have been at least 8 of them on a white painted block wall where I work. These moths are big and easy to see and I’ve read that Luna moths are one of the largest moths in North America, sometimes having a wingspan of as much as 4 1/2 inches. They are beautiful, with a white body, pinkish legs, and pale lime green wings. In northern regions the moth lives for only 7 days and produces only one generation, while in the south they can live for as long as 11 weeks and produce three generations.
Another moth I’ve never seen is this one. Until this year that is; now I’m seeing them everywhere. They’re relatively large as moths go and you would think they’d be easy to identify but I haven’t had much luck so far. I can picture it landing on a tree and disappearing completely.
I was told it was a sphinx moth and I think that’s accurate, but if you Google “sphinx moth with blue eyes on its hind wing you get the eyed hawk moth, but that one only lives in Europe and the U.K., so that can’t be it. But it really doesn’t matter. I just wanted you to see it and to see this view of it, which reminds me of a blue eyed baboon face. I’m guessing it might scare away a bird.
Long time readers of this blog know that I don’t “do” birds and insects because of colorblindness but that doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy seeing and hearing them and trying to get photos of them to show you. My identification skills aren’t as sharp as I’d like them to be when it comes to insects especially, but I think this dragonfly might be a slaty skimmer. It has a dark blue body that looks gray to me, and a black head. Females and juveniles are said to have a dark stripe down their backs so I’m assuming this must be a male. If I’m wrong I hope you’ll let me know, because I’m seeing lots of them right now.
I’m also seeing damselflies and this one landed right in front of me one morning, so I had to take its photo. Though I don’t see any blue I think it might be a blue tailed damselfly because of its other markings. The chances of being correct with my identification are vey slim however, so again I hope you’ll let me know if I’m wrong.
When I was a boy we called this foamy stuff on plant stems “snake spit,” but of course it isn’t any such thing. Instead it’s really the protective foam used by spittle bug nymphs and has nothing to do with snakes. The nymphs use it to make themselves invisible to predators and to keep themselves from drying out. They make the foamy mass by dining on plant sap and secreting a watery liquid which they whip up with air to create the froth. There’s no telling where a boy’s imagination might take him, but quite often the real story is even more amazing than the imagined one.
One rainy morning a bumblebee hid under a leaf to keep dry, but it wasn’t working.
As I’ve said many times on this blog, spring starts on the forest floor and so does fall. By the time we see the colorful tree leaves many leaves have already put on their fall colors in the understory, among them those of false Solomon’s seal (Maianthemum racemosum or Smilacina racemosa,) which are some of the earliest. It marks the passage of time and though I like to see what their turning leaves will look like this year, I’m not ready to see them just yet. It seems like spring was just a few weeks ago.
Timothy grass (Phleum pretense) was brought to North America by early settlers and was first found in New Hampshire in 1711 by John Hurd. A farmer named Timothy Hanson began promoting cultivation of it as a hay crop about 1720 and the grass has carried his name ever since.
If you happen to be a nature lover and not watching for flowering grasses you’re missing a big chunk of the beauty that nature has to offer. Timothy grass flowers from June until September and is noted for its cold and drought resistance. It’s an excellent hay crop for horses. Each tall flower head is filled with tiny florets, each one with three purple stamens and two wispy white stigmas. The flower heads often look purple when they are flowering.
I saw this Japanese painted fern (Athyrium niponicum) growing in a local garden. Native to eastern Asia, these ferns often display hints of silver, blue and red on their stems and leaflets and their common name comes from the way they look like the colors have been painted on.
I think, in the almost nine years I’ve been doing this blog, that this is only the second time I’ve been able to show you the red fruit of the red elderberry (Sambucus racemosa,) and that’s because the birds eat them as soon as they ripen. Why they left these alone is a mystery. The berries are said to be toxic but they were cooked and eaten by Native Americans so I’m sure they knew how to cook them in such a way as to remove the toxicity. They also used them medicinally. Red elderberry is one of two elderberries native to New Hampshire. The other is the common or black elderberry (Sambucus nigra V. canadensis) which has black berries and isn’t toxic.
I’ve read that large amounts of water will cause deformation in chanterelle mushrooms (Cantharellus cibarius) and I often see them looking that way. From the side chanterelles look like trumpets, but so do many other mushrooms including the false chanterelle. That’s why mushrooms should never be eaten unless you are absolutely sure you know what you’re eating. Chanterelle mushrooms are considered a delicacy but I’ve had mushroom experts tell me that you can never be 100% sure of a mushroom’s identity without examining its spores under a microscope. Since I don’t have a microscope that means you can never be sure of my identifications either, so please don’t eat any mushroom you see here until you have an expert examine it first. There are mushrooms so toxic that one or two bites have killed. We have mushroom walks led by an expert or experts here. If you want to become serious about mushroom foraging they are a good place to start.
Indian pipes (Monotropa uniflora) have just started appearing, pushing up through the forest litter. They’re not mushrooms but they like dark forests and plenty of moisture just like mushrooms, so when I go mushroom hunting I usually find them as well. These plants slowly turn their single bell shaped flower from looking at the ground to looking straight up to the sky, and that is the sign that they’ve been pollinated. From then on they will turn brown as the spores ripen. They are also called ghost plants. Fresh stems contain a gel that Native Americans used to treat eye problems. The common name comes from the plant’s shape, which is said to resemble the pipes that the Natives smoked.
I found a cluster of what I believe are resinous polypores (Ischnoderma resinosum) growing on a dying tree. The sharp eyed will notice that they’re in full sunshine. That might seem strange because everyone knows that mushrooms like to grow in deep shade, but what not everybody knows is how almost everything growing in a forest will get its moment in the sun, even if it is just a single shaft of sunlight falling on it for a few minutes at the end of the day. On this day I just happened to come along while these fungi were having their moment in the sun.
The whitish underside of this mushroom will quickly turn brown if bruised, but these were pristine. Polypores get their name from the pores on their undersides. The pores are actually tubes where the spores are produced, and they are the fungi’s way of increasing the spore bearing surfaces. More surface area means more spores produced, and it’s always about the continuation of the species. The life force; the will to live, is strong in all living things and billions of spores ensure that there will be more resinous polypores.
One of the odd things about these particular example of resinous polypores were how they grew on a standing tree. The tree was close to dead but this fungus usually grows on recently fallen hard or softwood log, where it causes white rot that separates the annual rings in the wood. Though it often appears in summer another name is the late fall polypore. Drops of a reddish brown liquid often appear on it in rainy weather, as this photo shows. Resinous polypores are considered edible but once again I’m not a mycologist and don’t have a microscope, so if you are going to eat this mushroom you should learn how to identify it from an expert.
Chocolate tube slime molds get their common name from their long brown sporangia, which stand at the top of thin black, horsehair like stalks. They typically grow in clusters on rotting wood and are found on every continent on earth except Antarctica. They are also called “pipe cleaner slime molds” or “tree hair.” There are thought to be about 18 species which can only be accurately identified with a microscope. Some can be quite long and look like sea anemones, but these examples were short; about a half inch long. They start life as a white plasmodial mass before becoming a cluster of small yellow bumps, and they in turn grow into what you see here. They do remind me of undersea coral.
In this photo you can see why chocolate tube slime mold is also called “tree hair.” The wiry black stalks do indeed look like horsehair.
All the rain, heat and humidity we’ve had means perfect conditions for slime molds. I found this example searching for food on last year’s leaves. Through a process called cytoplasmic streaming slime molds can reach speeds of up to 1.35 mm per second, which is the fastest rate recorded for any micro-organism. Scarcity of food is what drives them on, always searching for bacteria and yeasts to feed on. As this photo shows, slime mold plasmodium can be a mass of glistening vein-like material (actually a single-celled amoeba) that creeps across dead leaves, wood, or soil. I think this example might be the many headed slime (Physarum polycephalum.)
Here’s a closer look at a smaller version of the slime mold in the previous photo, which was on the same leaf. Science seems to think that slime molds have a limited intelligence, and that thought opens doors that I didn’t know existed.
The world is as large as I let it be. Each step I take into the unknown reveals a thousand more steps of possibility. Earth may not be growing but my world certainly does with each step I take. ~Avina Celeste
Thanks for stopping in.
Posted in Nature, Things I've Seen | Tagged Blue Tailed Damselfy, Canon EOS Rebel T6, Chanterelle Mushroom, Chocolate Tube Slime Mold, False Solomon's Seal, Indian Pipe, Japanese Painted Fern, Keene, Luna Moth, Many Headed Slime Mold, Mushrooms, Native Plants, Nature, New Hampshire, NH, Olympus Stylus TG-870, Red Elderberry Berries, Resinous Polypore, Shpinx Moth, Slaty Skimmer Dragonfly, Spittlebug Foam, Swanzey New Hampshire, Timothy Grass, Wet Bumblebee | 44 Comments
I love these miscellany posts of yours, Allen though I know they entail such a lot of research on your part. I rarely see slime moulds and would love to see more. I find them endlessly fascinating so thank you for your detailed information and photographs.
You’re welcome, and thank you Clare. I wish you could see more slime molds. Every time I see a new one I try to read the latest research concerning them and each time I do I come away flabbergasted. They’re very intersting and complex bits of nature that appear to “group think” like schools of fish or flocks of birds. It’s just amazing!
Those moth pictures are amazing!
Thanks!
I believe your blue spotted moth is from a species we called “giant silk moths” when I was a kid. Curious to know what it ends up being, though!
Thank you REbecca. A couple of readers thought it might be Paonias excaecatus, the blinded sphinx moth. It does seem to match up with what I saw.
I enjoyed your moth pictures. Like some flowers, moths often have a lot of hidden beauty to reveal if you can get up close enough to them. Your grass picture was very good, as grass is hard to shoot because it won’t stand still.
Thank you. I often find moths on buildings at work early in the morning. They must rest there at night.
It was a very still day when I saw that Timothy grass, so I took the opportunity.
I also have red elderberry still holding berries this year, and am baffled – I usually see the berries once, if I’m lucky, before they are all eaten by birds. I am also seeing a lot of narrow-leaf plantain here this year, which I think you mentioned recently. It used to be uncommon, and I was very aware of the absence as a friend in the UK said goats enjoy eating it. How I wish they relished broad-leaf plantain!
I know what you mean Quinn, the same thing usually happens here as well. The birds might be getting enough other fruit, I don’t know.
The narrow leaf plantain can spread very quickly. I had one or two plants a few years ago and now I probably have a hundred. I’m glad it isn’t broad leaf plantain!
My only idea was that maybe it was the flycatchers who had been eating all the berries, and for the first time in many years they aren’t nesting in their usual places under the eaves of my sheds. I’ve been missing them very much.
You could be right. I’m sure we must have flycatchers here as well.
We saw a moth, actually it was two moths, they looked like dried leaves hanging in a tree. They turned out to be Small-eyed Sphinx (Paonias myops).
I’m not sure if it is the same as your brown moth.
I just found something that looked like your tube slime mold! I couldn’t figure out what it might be. So thanks, you gave me a lead on that.
There are probably a couple cooler days coming your way if you get our Michigan weather, so far two days with cool nights, low humidity. It has been great!
Thank Chris! A couple of readers suggested Paonias excaecatus, the blinded sphinx moth, and that sounds like it.
I’m glad you found the slime mold. Those kind aren’t easy to see.
We’re having your weather right now, and I thank you for that!
You do find the most interesting things and provide a learning moment for all your readers. 🙂
Thank you Judy, I’m glad that you think so!
Great miscellany post! Lots to chew on. 🙂
Thank you Lee!
Spring WAS just a few weeks ago here in NH! I’d love to see some of that chocolate slime mold in person.
That’s true! I find that slime mold growing on debarked pine logs that aren’t yet rotted. They grow right on the surface of the wood.
They’re fascinating things!
Those moths were both beautiful and interesting, thank you.
Thank you Susan, I’m glad you liked them!
Very interesting, Allen. That Luna moth and the sphinx moth are fabulous. A question for you: my friend’s magnolia tree looks diseased — pale green leaves, and the branches coated with a sticky white stuff. Have you ever come across this in your travels?
Thank you Cynthis. It sounds like the magnolia might have mealybugs, aphids, or scale. All are sucking insects that will weaken the tree, hence the pale leaves. Mealybugs are covered with a white cottony material and all three insects will secrete “honeydew.”
It could also have Powdery mildew fungus which forms white, powdery mats on the leaves that will wash off.
I’d call an expert if it were my tree. Here we have state extension services that will often look at problems for free.
Hope this helps!
It does.
Interesting as usual.
The closest I can find to your moth for the U.S. is the twin-spotted sphinx moth https://images.app.goo.gl/1KBN9RkDQ5NHcix1A
But like you say, it looks more like the eyed hawk-moth of Europe.
Maybe it hitched a ride to the U.S.
I found a beautiful four-eyed moth on the wall of my house here. Here it is illustrated in Sharon Chester’s wonderful book “A Wildlife Guide to Chile”: https://images.app.goo.gl/RwbMRPKdUtTpZnxx8
On Wed, Jul 24, 2019, 4:16 AM New Hampshire Garden Solutions New Hampshire Garden Solutions posted: ” It’s so hot and humid here right > now my camera lenses fog up the minute I take them from the dry, cool air > of the car into the jungle humid air outside. If there’s one thing that can > destroy a camera it is condensation so I’ve put together another “Thin” >
Thanks very much Ron. A couple of readers suggested Paonias excaecatus, the blinded sphinx moth and it looks to be a match. That one also populates New Hampshire.
I’ve never heard of the four eyed moth but you’re right; it’s beautiful!
So much to see! Love those lunar moths. In central Maine, the humidity has gone, and we are having beautiful summer days. Hope the same is true for you.
Thank you Laurie. Yes, the humidity is gone for now but they say it might make a comeback over the weekend.
I’m glad you’re staying cool!
Right now, the weather is utterly delightful in Maine.
Here too, but they say hotter and more humid this weekend.
Sigh. Well, at least we’ve had this glorious week.
Yes, it was a good one!
[…] pollinated. From then on they will turn brown as the spores ripen.” I learned this from the NH Garden Solutions blog which is a great source for information on native […]
Thanks very much.
I can see why you kept these beauties! Especially the moths.
Thank you Ben. I never knew moths could be so beautiful until I started doing this blog!
Nor I. Thanks to you!
Beautiful and interesting things seen, as usual! Your moth with the blue “eyes” might be Paonias excaecatus, the blinded sphinx moth?
Thank you. Another reader thought the same, and I think they do look a lot alike. If there are differences they must be slight.
Try comparing your moth to the Blinded Sphinx, which is found in NH. -Susan
Thanks very much Susan. They do look a lot alike!
I think that damselfly does have a little patch of blue at the tip of it’s tail.
I thought so too but then I wondered if it was just a trick of the light. It was early in the morning so it was a cool light; cool enough to make white appear blue.