Green six-spotted tiger beetle

Mishy has been noticing a pretty scary looking little green fella in and around the woods lately!  Actually the last time I seen this green, shiny spotted beetle, he seemed quite comfortable on the cement too!  Luckily I didn’t step on him, so I reached out and got closer to him only to notice he had 1-2-3-4-5-6 polka dots on his back wing! 

This is why he’s called the 6-spotted Tiger beetle!  Much like its distant cousin, the carrion this little guy loves the water, and is found most often close by watershed, or floodplains, muddy creek banks and really anywhere where there is lots of plant life!  

In the grown up world of biologists, this little guy is considered a PREDATOR! and very AGGRESSIVE because they eat bugs like crickets, fleas, gnats and even cute little grasshoppers (Mishy’s favorite). 

On a good note, Mishy has come to realize that everything serves a purpose and for this reason, a large tiger beetle will feed on spiders and other pesky bugs and have become known as a great helper for our gardens and our farmer fields!  

Oh one last thing, don’t ever be discouraged if you haven’t spotted one for longer than 10 seconds, they are clocked as the fastest moving insects ever, so it was gone before I could say thank you!

Mourning Cloak Butterfly

While walking through a brushy creek valley on a warm spring day, Mishy saw many butterflies overhead.  There must have been hundreds of them! On closer inspection though, there were only two!  Probably a husband and a wife because they were chasing each other around through the poplars and elm trees that hovered above me coming to rest together on a wild rose bush close by. 

A closer look I noticed their rich burgundy colored wings outlined with creamy white border.  I never saw this type of butterfly in Mishy’s small world, although they are the most widespread of all butterflies!  If you haven’t guessed yet what they are called, they are called the “Mourning Cloak”.  What a fitting name for them! The scientific name is Nymphalis antiopa, but I can’t pronounce that properly so I will like their other name better!

By the end of the day, the number of insect-eating birds increased dramatically, but even under the baking sun, all signs of the mourning cloaks disappeared up and down the creek valley.