Tag Archives: Grasshoppers

August 6, 2013

Nature Jottings, ,

High columns of flying ants on the move pick up the morning sun that gives the see-through assemblage a bronze glow. The River is loud! A Spotted Sandpiper is at The Stockpond, only a few weeks after the last one was seen, but now such a visit would be more expected as the birds start to move perhaps all the way to the Southern Hemisphere. It takes a long time to get to Chile, might as well leave now. Summer is hardly about to end, but the days trickle from her, neither is Autumn about to begin, but her whisper is there. If one tramps these pastures and the grasslands over years, feels the sun and comes tuned to the subtly changing angle of its light, there comes a day of a sixth sense that brings one of those whispers: “And the Red-winged Grasshoppers? They’re about to be here …” I look down only moments after having this thought, see on a bare patch of dirt a set of scarlet and black wings that can only have belonged to one, its body already cut up by ants and carried away by them.

A magnificent sky for the whole morning, clouds towering into blue, thunder far off and harmless now but giving fair warning. By noon is a fearful storm, by sunset the clouds drift apart, and openings show sky again. I get home to Ridge House and find the great cliffs of the Galiuro Wilderness shining alabaster in sun, against the dark storm beyond them in this landscape that can only be called gigantic, one in which man’s size still shows true: small.

August 1, 2013

Nature Jottings, , , ,

Grasshoppers … pistachio green grasshoppers, vanilla striped. It is a month of insects, and we see new ones every year no matter how many years are spent on The River, some we only ever see once, some are greeted like old friends when they return, some of course bring an “Eww! not them again … forgot how much I can’t stand those things. When is it they leave?” On the Sphaeralcea mallows have appeared in their annual clockwork way pillbug-sized and -shaped larvae of something, in masses on the stems and leaf nodes–black or dark brown in body, covered in what look like should be nasty stinging hairs. They’ll be around for some weeks, grow a lot larger and be everywhere and then suddenly disappear. Tom O. finds out that they are the young stage of that very beautiful golden bug I’d last seen a couple weeks ago, whose intricate patterns gave me to dub it the Tao Bug. Their scientific name has a beauty equaling their colors and patterns, and is a very apt one: Calligrapha serpentina.

A Gray Hawk comes bursting out of the mesquite branches and woods edge, with many tail feathers missing and the rest of the bird looking pretty ragged, too. Earlier that was its sad, pained wail I heard, as if it were pleading, “Can no one stop this??” … two insanely angry kingbirds burst from those branches now behind him, dive on him, shriek out in this hawk drive of theirs, delighting in their work and the opportunity this presents for them to show off their aeronautics

July 29, 2013

Nature Jottings, , ,

A Great Blue Heron at The Stockpond, at dawn, where I’ve seen one several times this month and last. These birds are supposed to be uncommon here in the summer, guess they haven’t got that news yet. A Western Tanager surprises me with its early descent from the mountain forests and meadows; the last ones seen here were in late May.

Caribbean Horseweed is in full bloom, some also starting to bolt towards seed. In those fields the grasshoppers are still increasing and diversifying, a large bright yellow-green one adds itself to a greater number of these insects than I’ve seen before and my suspicions are growing that we are in for some trouble from them before the season winds down.

It’s been a week since measurable rain, and this is reflected in the sudden return of close to the former number of nighthawks to the evening pond to drink–other places have probably dried off by now.

July 18, 2013

Nature Jottings,

Many pale gray grasshoppers rise from my footfalls out across the grasslands, make arcs going out in all directions from me, fall, land, and disappear. Every day there are more.

The quelites (amaranths) have reached harvestable size, about six weeks after the sprouting of the first seedlings of this delicious wild green. At about five inches high they can be pulled up easily and taken home. Hold onto the root with one hand, tug hard on the stem with the other to have it break where the right tenderness begins, wash a bunch, barely cover with water and bring to a boil, simmer briefly, cover the pot, let sit a few minutes, drain, drizzle butter or olive oil, que aproveche. It doesn’t work as a leftover and I’ve read it’s not healthy to eat reheated amaranth–though that could be a myth of the conventional wisdom. Reheated amaranth is a bit on the revolting side anyway …

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