Being A Moth-er Is A Lot Of Work!

I've been a bit behind in my blog posts. I used to do at least one every 5 days on average, but lately I have had a hard time getting one done every 7-8 days.

I blame it on the moths.

Okay I guess that isn't fair, as in reality they are not encouraging me to spend so much time looking for them. In fact if I could understand moth language, it is entirely possible they would be telling me to stop interrupting their lives with light wavelengths that don't really benefit them but only distract them from their normal night time activities! Perhaps.

Bicolored Pyrausta

I have been fascinated with moths for years, but never really gave them their due until the last few years. Certainly the existence of a terrific new field guide made trying to identify moths so much easier. Colour images in natural postures really make a difference, compared to the usual black and white photos of pinned specimens that was the predominant presentation of former reference materials.  Having said that, although the new field guide shows about 1500 species, for the geographic area that the guide covers, there are several thousand species known.

Fervid Plagodis

As I pursued moths more and more, I began to realize how much effort is required, and over the weeks and months it resulted in less time for this blog. Choosing a place to set up the black lights, and getting them set up is one thing. But a much more major effort is required once a photo is taken. On one occasion I decided to see approximately how much effort that was. All my photos are taken in RAW format, which captures the maximum amount of detail in an image. But each photo can be approximately 30 megabytes, which is far too much to use for a blog or anything else. Just in 2020 I have 'mothed' at 6 different locations, and have taken over 3000 photos. There are lots of duplicates, just to make sure things are captured as well as possible. But each photo, once it is selected to be processed, goes through many stages to ensure it looks as good as possible. I use at least a couple of different types of software, and from the time I start processing a photo to the time it is ready to be posted on this blog (or iNaturalist, or somewhere else) will require at least 160 different mouse clicks, mouse wheel rolls, or keyboard clicks. Of the probably 2000 images of moths alone which I have processed this season so far, that turns out to be 320000 clicks, etc! No wonder my index finger is getting tired :-).

And that doesn't include the time trying to identify them. As mentioned earlier, only 1500 species are illustrated in the field guide. For some species that is quite adequate. For those species with more subtle markings, the field guide might get you to the family or genus, but beyond that, one has to delve further into a database, or post it somewhere such as iNaturalist or BugGuide and hope that someone can identify it. To compound the challenge, as moths age the scales on their wings that give them all the beautiful colours and patterns wear off, to the point that identification is impossible. By comparison, identifying the confusing fall warblers is easy peasy!

Clear Creek Forest Provincial Park

I used to have to do all of my black lighting at my vehicle, as I needed to tap into the battery to power the lights. So as to not be limited to parking lots at a trail head or something similar, I have obtained two portable power sources which enable me to set up my two lights at many more places. For example, Clear Creek Forest Provincial Park in eastern Chatham-Kent is a wonderful place to go mothing. I have been there on two occasions with a Rondeau staff member, to set up in the old growth forest part of this park. Here is one of the locations, shown above, where the old growth forest at the upper level looks down on a floodplain. This is about 500 metres from the road, so it requires a bit of effort to take the various lights, tripods, sheets, ropes, power packs, etc to this location for setting it up and then dismantling it all at the end of the evening several hours later.

In spite of all of the effort required, it is very much worthwhile. Discovering new species (to me) as well as documenting some of the rarer moths and other insects is all worthwhile. Learning more and more of the world of nature is a great passion and past time!

With that, I will feature a very small number of the highlights of the season so far. I will likely spend a bit more time featuring specific places in future posts, but hopefully this one will complement the moth posts of the last few weeks.

Sometimes I just set up in our back yard. Fortunately our yard is a little more moth friendly than many urban dwellers have due to the native trees and wildflowers that we've established over the years. Without trying too hard, I've photographed well over 100 species of moths plus various non-moth critters.

Barberry Geometer

Hickory Tussock Moth

Pine Tube Moth

Purple-backed Cabbagewom Moth

A few other randomly selected moth photos from places like Clear Creek as well as Moore Wildlife Area include the following:

American Ermine

Aproned Cenopis Moth

This next one was a real treat. It is large and so distinct. The body length is about 3.5 cm and the wing span is at least double that.

Giant Leopard Moth

Grapevine Looper

Silk moths are a favourite and include some of the largest and best known moths such as Cecropia and Promethea. This next one is an Io Moth, a member of the silk moth group and a future post will highlight it with its eyes showing. The Polyphemus Moth which follows is another silk moth.

At the other end of the scale is the much tinier Mantled Acrobasis.....

....and the Orange-headed Epicallima. This one is only about 8 mm long.

Black-dotted Glyph

Common Lytrosis

Crocus Geometer

Delicate Cycnia

Dimorphic Snout

Lappet Moth

Little Virgin Tiger Moth

Metallic Casebearer

Olive-shaded Bird Dropping Moth

Pearly Wood-nymph

Red-fringed Emerald

White-spotted Leafroller

Spiny Oak Slug Moth

In addition to moths, there is always a host of other creatures, from numerous caddisflies which are often difficult to identify beyond family, to beetles, flies, wasps, dragonflies, spiders and even an occasional butterfly. I also should mention mosquitoes, as they are very definitely a major presence at some locations, although at others, they are non-existent.

White-marked Spider Beetle

This next creature is known as a Say's Mantidfly. It turns out that it is quite rare in Ontario, but we've had several on the sheets on a couple of occasions at Clear Creek Forest.

Chalenius Beetle

Round-necked Sexton Beetle

Some creatures come by to check out the myriad insects which they presumably might be able to feast on, such as this unknown spider species.....

....and this Spring Peeper. I watched it feed on several small flying insects.

But the main highlight, at least for me, is the moths which are so varied in colour and form.

Yellow-collared Slug Moth

Wings and colours on a butterfly count

It is more or less the peak of butterfly season, which is why most butterfly counts take place in July. I only participate in one, the Rondeau area butterfly count. Heat and humidity are not my idea of the time to do lots of field work. So why am I located here in the extreme southwestern part of Ontario, which is undoubtedly one of the worst places in Canada for those conditions these days? Good question, but that is a topic for another time. But I limit myself to the one butterfly count, and on occasion I have declined even that when the conditions are extreme.

Fortunately the couple of days before the Rondeau count as well as the day of, were some of the cooler days we had for awhile. Not cool, as they were still slightly above normal, but it was a relative cool.

I hadn't done a lot of looking for butterflies leading up to the count, as my focus in recent weeks have been on those other members of the lepidopterans, the moths which enables me to do field work at a slightly cooler time of day. So I ventured out to the park a day or so before the Rondeau count, to see what was happening and to brush up on whatever butterflies I could find.

There was lots of Bottlebrush Grass along the trails, its name obvious due to its shape.

Butterfly Milkweed was abundant along the open edges of the forest. But virtually no butterflies at the time I was there.

In the damper edges of the forest there were scattered clumps of this next wildflower, Fringed Loosestrife.

It is easily identified by its bright yellow, down facing flowers.

It gets the 'Fringed' part of its name due to the little hair-like fringes along the leaf stem.

Dragonflies, such as this meadowhawk species, like using it as a resting place.

I got a few butterflies over the course of my hike, but not many, which did not bode well for the upcoming count.

My area for the butterfly count is not in Rondeau, as others have it covered, but in various places in the Erieau and Blenheim areas. I usually start off on the McGeachy Pond trail, then head over to the Rail Trail before meeting up with Steve, Keith and Jim to check out a grassy/shrubby field closer to Blenheim where we usually get a good diversity. Then we split up again, and I check out some wide roadsides and railroad edges in hopes that the vegetation has not been cut and there are flowering plants attracting butterflies. I check out a few other places along the way. In general it isn't the best habitat for diversity or rarities, but it gets the count circle covered and adds to the overall numbers for the day.

When I started at McGeachy Pond, it was early enough that there hadn't been many others on the trail. Eastern Cottontails were scattered here and there, but quickly moved on when humans arrived.

And dragonflies.....the place was a flutter with them. I wasn't counting, but there must have been at least a thousand of them along this trail and the Rail Trail. The vast majority of them were Blue Dashers.

There were a few butterflies, but I only got about 7 species in the first hour or so. One of the highlights was this Question Mark, the only one of its kind I saw on the day.

Red Admirals were a little more plentiful.

I got a couple of these Monarch look-alikes, the Viceroy.

Cabbage Whites were quite abundant, as usual.

There used to be a nice Butterfly Bush at edge of the parking lot at the west end of the trail, which, if it was in flower, always had an excellent variety of butterflies. Unfortunately over the last couple of years it has died out for some reason. Maybe snow and ice effects in the winter, or high water in the last couple of years, or something else. Regardless, it is no longer there, so it makes this trail far less interesting for butterflies.

Being right along the pond/wetland, there were lots of Pickerelweed just coming into their prime.

There were actually quite a few flowering plants scattered along these two trails, but except for Common Milkweed, most were not native such as this Catnip....

....and Butter-and-eggs, which seemed a bit early in the season to see it in flower. I generally consider it a late summer bloomer.

Common Burdock was not common, but scattered.

Pokeweed was just starting to come into flower. It is a native species, and in a few weeks will be laden with luscious looking dark blue berries. But looks can be deceiving. While they are popular with birds, they are poisonous to some extent for humans.

I met up with the other three amigos at the grassy/shrubby field, which over the years has become much more shrubby and less hospitable for butterflies. Nevertheless, we did find some of the faithful ones, including lots of this Common Wood-nymph.

We only saw this single Little Wood-satyr.....

....and just this one Eastern Tailed Blue.

Probably the highlight, amongst the variety of butterflies we saw in this one location, was this Banded Hairstreak, the only hairstreak I saw all day, although the others had more success in their other area.

I continued on to the other places in my part of the territory. The most interesting place was along a wide section between a seldom used railroad and a forest, where some parts were wet to support things like Swamp Milkweed. It turned out that this milkweed was about in its prime, and certainly a popular flower for various invertebrate critters. Monarchs were at all of the places I covered on this count, but often were in flight only. The Swamp Milkweed here gave at least a few, a reason to rest and feed.

Clearly they had been here before, as this fairly large Monarch caterpillar on Swamp Milkweed attestst to.

A species I don't often get in my area is this next one, a Dun Skipper.

Another skipper, more to be expected in my area, was this next one, a Delaware Skipper.

There were other critters using the milkweed, including this pair of Banded Longhorn Beetles attempting to ensure another generation would be present.

There were several members of the Lepidopteran family around, but on the moth side of things. I saw at least a couple Nessus Sphinx moths, but did not get photos, as well as half a dozen of these Snowberry Clearwings where I had more success.

This Swamp Milkweed Leaf Beetle was burrowing into the flower head.

There were a few dragonflies as well. Nothing rare or even unexpected, but they gave a few photo ops such as this Widow Skimmer...

...this Black Saddlebags.....

....and this Common Whitetail.

This next wildflower is Climbing Prairie Rose. It is officially a Species At Risk, considered as Special Concern, in Ontario and Canada. It is most commonly found in parts of Essex County. Chatham-Kent has scattered populations, mostly in western C-K. There are a few populations in Lambton and Middlesex, but not much more than that. I had found this population during a butterfly count several years ago, and was glad to see that it is surviving, although a bit past its best on this day. Most flowers were wrinkled petals or none at all.

All in all it was probably a below average day for butterflies, at least for my area. The previous few weeks of heat and drought probably didn't help. I ended up with about 20 species overall, including the ones I saw in the shrubby/grassy field near Blenheim with the other three counters.

In case you didn't know, National Moth Week starts this weekend, and runs from July 18-26, so you can probably guess what I will be doing over these next few days! I'm already well behind in processing my moth photos from this season, but look forward to finding more new ones, and seeing some of the usual ones, so stay tuned!