Now, I have some big news, folks. I'm taking a hiatus from MOSI for a while so this past Sunday was my last day for a bit. I'm sure I'll still drop by to give them my extra caterpillars and my trainee still has a book she borrowed from me so there's that. But I felt like I needed a break. I'm just kind of in a rut in my life and I want to do some different things. Problem is, I have limited energy due to the chronic fatigue and so I have to make what I call "energy choices". So I'm going to put my energies elsewhere. And since it's starting to get warm outside it seemed like good timing. Tentatively, I'm planning to take the summer off. But I might miss it and go back or I might quit altogether. I literally have no idea what I'm doing. But I talked to my therapist about it and he said as long as I'm not trying to isolate myself, it seems like it could be a good time to do some new things. That being said, you're going to have to put up with less of my pretty, museum pictures and more of my bad, wild photos. But at least I'll have time (and energy) to visit the wild butterflies!
After admonishing the Sulphurs for not laying eggs, they seem to be going insane. They're still stacking their eggs on the one Cassia in the flight cage!
And speaking of Sulphurs, it's mostly Orange-Barreds in the flight cage and outside. (More on that in my next post.)
It's weird because generally the Cloudless outnumber them, especially early in the year. It used to be the Orange-Barreds didn't really start up until the warm weather came but Cloudless were nearly year-round. Maybe mild winters are changing things up a bit? But I did get to release one Cloudless Sulphur.
Lots of Gulf Frits around now. My friend Dominic (who says he's 13 going on 28, whatever that means) stopped by and caught four Frits. I caught one. But then again, if I had the energy of my 13 year-old self, I'm sure I could have caught more.
And we still have quite a few Julias.
The Buckeyes were mostly in their chrysalises but a few had emerged. Not that they would come down and pose, though.
A couple of newly emerged Zebra Longwings.
I saw a Checkered White in the gardens but didn't have my net, of course. There have been way fewer White butterflies this year. I think the late freeze we had may have affected the Virginia Pepper Grass, which they host on. It seems to have appeared later this year. So I was really glad to see this one flying around.
Okay, as I was just typing I heard something. I am crazy, but I don't generally hear things that aren't there, so I checked the Critter Keepers and darn if that American Lady didn't come out! That was only seven days in the chrysalis! More on that in the next post.
Back to MOSI...I did get to see some butterfly mating so that was fun.
And back at home the Duskywings were there to greet me. I have a whole pack of them that nectar in front of the house now.
