Sphingidae — Sphinx Moth

A Sphingidae — Spinx Moth, AKA Hummingbird Hawk-Moth, was fluttering around feeding on our Purple Salvia with the bees and the butterflies. I made a short video of it and added one of our recordings of Caña for background music (I’m playing and Laurie’s dancing). The only sound on the original video was the wind.

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Bugs & Bunnies

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Glazed bunny cakelet

Before Covid-19 set upon us, Laurie and I got “Backyard Bugs” and “Bunny Cakelet” baking molds for Spring. Laurie made really good carrot cake bunny and bug cakelets, and a glaze to cover them with. She gave a couple of bunnies to her parents, and the bugs and a bunny to Tristan.

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Dragonfly and bee cakelets

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Glazed dragonfly, bee and bunny cakelets

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Backyard bugs

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Laurie testing the glaze

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Bunny cakelets

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Another view of the dragonfly and bee

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Bunny Cakelet mold

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Drone view of bunny cakelets

Clouded Colors

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The echinaceas are attracting the various colors of clouded sulfur butterflies: green, orange, yellow.

Green Clouded Sulfur (Colias philodice)

I was able to get the orange sulfur (Colias eurytheme), also known as the “alfalfa butterfly”, above with it’s wings open as it landed on an enchinacea. Clouded Sulfurs rarely open their wings to a flattened position when they are perched. The solid black around the edges of the wings indicate that this one is a male (females have dots on the black edges).

Backlit orange.

A male Orange fluttering around an unfazed female Green (the green has spots on the black edges of her wings).

Yellow Sulfer (Colias croceus).

 

 

The Red Antson Song

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Over hill, out of scale, on a dry and rocky trail, a red ant carries a bee. Over logs, over rocks, a little ant hopscotch, dusk falls and the ant carries on… Then it’s hi hi, he he, here in the bosque, only one ant a silent drone. For wherever he goes, the ant always knows, he carried that bee all alone.