Its sap is milky and the leaf is similar in shape if not size.
One nice thing about cloudy days is that skippers, like this little glassywing, alternate between feeding with wings up and sunning with wings down.
A spot of color caused a detour in my path. It was a rose, but not the ordinary multiflora rose, rather one I'll have to come back to visit with the book.
Right next to it was an interesting spider web. And now I see that it was inhabited.
In the back of the field, that tall, whispy loblia was up and blooming.
No white center in the flower and a regular sort of leaf... it must be spiked lobelia.
Ooo! A small battered skipper! Was this a 2nd chance at the one that got away a couple weeks ago? Unfortunately that's the best of 4 photos. And it looks more like a cobweb than the Indian I thought it would be. Oh well.
Sitting on the bench, hoping for more skippers in the Old Pasture, I felt something on my leg. It wasn't a tick but the tiniest caterpiller imaginable - so tiny it was scaling the hairs on the back of my hand like trees to get a better view of its location.
On the way down from the bluff of the Wappinger Creek trail, banded hairstreaks finally made an appearance, but not one I could capture; they were landing just a little too high. Then I noticed movement above them; it was a red-spotted purple even higher, almost in the tree tops. And something was disturbing it: more hairstreaks. I'd never seen them that high before.
I knew another spot where you could look down on them, but it was empty... I went down for a more thorough look. Nothing... except for narrow-leaved bittercress - an unbelievably prolific invasive. As I reached for the 3rd victim, I stopped and stared at my hand in amazement. I'd very carefully reached around the nettles, but the flame across my thumb was going off the scale. A small bumble bee-like thing came by, perhaps to see if I had gotten the message. Repetition was not necessary. I did notice over my shoulder as I fled, a gray paper ball in the weeds. Interesting - no yellow, not yellow jackets, too small for bald-faced hornets... maybe another time.
Farther along was a more pleasant surprise - an ebony jewelwing that sat still for me. And then a female, too.
Out along the Cary Pines Trail, in the crotch of a tree was miniature landscape with mountain slopes of bark and alpine meadows of moss.
Back on our local trails, Canada mayflower was forming berries.
I'd forgotten to check the trumpet creeper last week. Funny, it looks more like a tree than a vine. And these little barbs could mean this is prickley ash! This is something that giant swallowtails use for baby food up here in the North!
In the Fern Glen, lizard's tail would soon be blooming.
In the background was a damselfly dining on perhaps a fruitfly.
I remembered to look behind the Carriage House today and was surprised at the payoff: Stewartia was blooming.
Its "exfoliating" bark resembles that of sycamore and it has a striking flower.
