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September 24, 1998 |
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clouded sulphur | |||||
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Butterflies: monarch Mammals: white tailed deer Birds: black bellied plover
Copyright © 1998, Janet I. Egan |
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I had to look up the clouded sulphur. Yellow wings with black edges and a small black spot on the wing. At Stage Island. I've seen them before but never knew the name. In fact I never knew most butterfly names except monarch, tiger swallowtail and viceroy until this summer. I got curious one day when I saw a cabbage white on the beach. I drew a picture of it in my birding notebook and wrote down a description and then looked it up in a field guide to insects. Today I had the same comprehensive guide to everything in New England in my pocket so I looked up the clouded sulphur right away. By the way, the spell checker thinks it's spelled "sulfur" but I'm going with what the book says. After coffee at Starbucks with Tom & Julie, with appearances by Ned and by Right Wing Anne with JoJo, I somehow found myself driving to Plum Island instead of home to my computer to look up something that T & J's daughter, Lauren, needed from the Fairfax County web site (Julie couldn't get at it from the computer at the library). I figured I could do that later when it clouds up again and not waste the nice weather. I set myself the task of identifying as many species of animals on the island as I could. It was kind of a game to see if I could sharpen my mind a little, shake it out of lethargy. I missed a few birds because they flew by so fast they just loooked like dark blurs. But at North Pool Overlook, I kept hearing a kingfisher while I was looking at some black ducks and mallards. I looked and looked until I found the kingfisher - actually two of them - perched on some kind of wooden post on the other side of the water containment structure (ie. dike - but if Roberta reads this she'll giggle). The only creature I got a good look at that I couldn't identify was the insect that bit my left arm. It was not a greenhead (they're all dead now), nor a deer fly, nor a horsefly. It was less than 1/4" long and sort of mosquito-like but its wings were almost triangular and white with a little very pale green in the middle. There's nothing like it in the book. Oh well. The bite itched for a little while but then receded. Three species of butterflies, three species of mammals, and twenty of birds. No dragonflies. I didn't walk the marsh loop trail or hang around on the water containment structure, so I missed naming dragonflies. The skunk was poking around the parking lot at Sandy Point. In fact, I had kind of planned to use the outhouse there 'cause the state park has better outhouses than the feds have on the refuge. Seriously, I actually like the Sandy Point outhouse as opposed to tolerating it. It's one of those Clivus Multrum composting toilets and it doesn't stink at all. Anyway, the skunk was between me and the outhouse, so no way was I going to get out of the car and attempt to get past the skunk. I did open the car window and take a picture of it though.
Back home, I looked up the info Lauren needed and failed to find it. The site was there, but the info I was looking for had apparently expired. I left a message on T &J's answering machine with everything I found out, and then showered and changed to go to my meeting. I listened to the Red Sox game on the way to and from the meeting, and then scurried into the house to turn on the radio and listen to the ninth inning. Tom Gordon struck out the side in the 9th to clinch the wildcard spot. Mo Vaughn got his 200th hit of the season tonight. Nomar Garciaparra hit his 35th home run. Pedro Martinez got the win - his 19th I think. They've been way fun to watch all season and I anticipate the playoffs will be fun. In my more manic moments - or maybe just unrealistic moments - I think if they could just get past Cleveland they could actually knock off the Yankees. But, as my brother always says, "What are the odds?" Hey, it could happen. Go Sox! | |||||
