I saw a few moths, butterflies, and wasps at the Arboretum last week. An eastern comma butterfly (Polygonia comma) rested on a leaf in the shrub and vine garden. It is named for the bright white comma, swollen at both ends, on its wing. I think it looks more like a crescent moon than a comma.
The wings look drab until they open, revealing a rich orange with black spots. This is the winter form of this butterfly, with its hind wings more orange than black.
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Honey locust trees in Christopher Columbus Park near Long Wharf have already started to turn. A good number of their leaflets were yellow this afternoon. Most of the honey locust trees in the city are still green, but probably not for too long.
A bittersweet vine (Celastrus sp.) twists around a tree trunk in the Arboretum with tiny black creatures crawling on it. I believe these are black bean aphids (Aphis fabae). These aphids are sucking the sap out of the vine. While they prefer eating from the bounty of the bean family, they are known to attack bittersweet.
Like other aphids, they produce a sweet waste product called honeydew. Ants are attracted to the honeydew and collect it, tending aphids as we do cows. In the photo below, a black carpenter ant (Camponotus pennsylvanicus) watches over a black bean aphid, waiting for its sugary treat.
I didn’t let summer’s final gasp of heat and humidity deter me from a walk in the Arboretum on Wednesday, although, after a month-long break in 90-degree heat, I felt like I was experiencing the first hot day of the season. I spotted a nursery web spider (Pisaurina mira) biding its time under a leaf. Note how it rests with its two front legs touching each other.
This spider has a dark stripe running down the middle that is bordered by a white margin, which undulates along its abdomen. Also note the white hairs along its body and the black spines on its legs.
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Aside from the aphids, I spotted a number of other creatures in the Arboretum last week. An American bullfrog was spread out lazily in the marsh waters.
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I found a spider clinging to the underside of an American elm leaf yesterday. Thanks to John and Jane Balaban at BugGuide, I now know it as a marbled orbweaver (Araneus marmoreus).
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I passed a European alder tree (Alnus glutinosa) on Willow Path at the Arnold Arboretum a couple days ago (accession 1399-73*B), and noticed that many of its branches were covered in a white fungus/mold-like substance. Upon closer inspection, the mold moved!
This was no mold. It was an infestation of woolly alder aphids (Prociphilus tessellatus).
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Soon after I first saw them, the monarch caterpillars disappeared off the milkweed in my yard. Oleander aphids (Aphis nerii) soon took their place.
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On Tuesday, I walked from the Arboretum’s main gate to the shrub garden. I saw a couple of butterflies for the first time, among them a common sootywing (Pholisora catullus), a dark brown butterfly with white spots.
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We watched the tail end of Boston’s Dominican Parade Sunday afternoon on Centre Street in Jamaica Plain. Loud and festive, the parading groups brought a lot of energy to the neighborhood. Dominican flags flew everywhere.
Drivers seemed to compete as to who could stack the most speakers on their car or van. At times, the loud music was nice, especially when dancers followed. But I didn’t understand why five cars in a row each blared a different song; all we heard was noise. Is it about the music or your speaker set-up?
