June 23, 2021

Banded Hairstreak

Notes and Changes since last report

• It was 65°F, Partly cloudy and breezy at 14:45 PM on June 23, 2021.
• The butterfly magnet, common milkweed, is blooming and some spreading dogbane survived the mowing of the Little Bluestem Meadow.
• Banded hairstreaks were back in force and the first least and european skippers of the season had appeared.
• This week's trail report covers the Cary Pines Trail side of the trail system.

The Trails

• Something orange darted in and out of the sun off the side of the Cary Pines Trail.
• It was an eastern comma.
• Something else had been haunting sunny patches, but higher up off the ground. Sometimes you wouldn't see much more than a silhouette.
• At the top of the Fern Glen was a perfect view of a banded hairstreak.
• Viewing angle, or angle of the sun can really change the background color.
• Twinleaf's seed pod lasts much longer than its flower.
• The pod is even more amusing than the flower is pretty.
• A rather ornate green spider was lounging in the sun on its web.
• On the way back towards the fen, red baneberry was indeed red.
• At the turn into the fen, purple-flowering raspberry was opening a few blossoms.
• Off the end of the boardwalk, poison sumac was a small, unassuming tree.
• The equally unassuming flower helps distinguish it from non-poisonous staghorn sumac, which has the familiar bright red cones of flowers.
• Elderberry was growing along the bank.
• Its flower had been blooming since the week before.
• Back along the boardwalk, maleberry was another easy to miss shrub.
• Its tiny flowers were like miniature blueberry flowers.
• Tall, whispy panacled hawkweed was deeper in the back of the 'Glen.
• It's not every year that whorled loosestrife blooms.
• What's that on top? A soldier beetle, a non-luminous relative of fireflies.
• Around the corner, by the deck, invasive crown vetch had crept in. Any attemp to dig this out will remind one that it was introduced for erosion control.
• Along the stone bridge, shinleaf, a pyrola, was up.
• The waxy looking little bells take a while to open.
• There were touches of scarlet on leaves of the river birch at the front of the pond.
• It was the velvet gall, caused by a tiny mite larva.
• Out in the Old Gravel Pit section of the Cary Pines Trail was a stand of wild basil, just starting to bloom.
• The Little Bluestem Meadow behind Gifford House had been completely mowed by now.
• Happily, some of the spreading dogbane had survived. This milkweed relative is also quite attractive to butterflies.
• Behind the Carriage House, big peonie-like flowers dangled from a tree with bark like a sycamore. It was a Stewartia - a tree from Asia that's considered non-invasive.
• Near the base, pokeweed was rising above everything else.
• Its inconspicuous flowers would soon enough turn into the familiar black berry clusters.
• Off to the side was a colony of bird feeder the escapee, Canada thistle.
• Goldfinch will be all over the flowers when they later turn to fluff and seeds.
• Mixed in was a familiar "weed", our native daisy fleabane.
• Back at the parking lot, a screech came from two white dots on the tree line across the road.
• It was a pair of red-tailed hawks. But by the time the camera woke up, there was only one. It seemed as surprised as I was annoyed at the disappearance of the other.
• The other was above, but soon out of sight.
• Next week: the Wappinger Creek Trail side of the trail system.

Sightings