What to See This Week

Monarchs are a particularly popular insect. Not only are the butterflies beautiful but the story of their long migration is also fascinating. Now is the time of year to begin searching for caterpillars munching on the leaves! Pictured here is a final stage caterpillar, just a few days from crawling away in search of a good location to make its chrysalis. While this caterpillar is quite large (nearly 2 inches long!), when they first hatch, they are only a couple millimeters long so inspect milkweed closely.

Milkweed is hugely popular across the insect world. Looking over any patch of milkweed right now, you are likely to see several milkweed longhorned beetles. With their aposematic (warning) coloration, they are hard to miss. Just like any other insect that feeds on milkweed, they have adaptations that allow them to handle the toxins present in milkweed and even sequester the toxins to make them unappetizing to predators.

While the insects that feed on milkweed are so exciting, even common milkweed is beautiful in bloom. The flowers give off a strong floral scent and the unique flower structure makes them worth a closer look. Common milkweed has large balls of pink flowers and can be found in both gardens and natural areas.

Several other species of native milkweed occur in Ohio including the stunning butterfly weed. Butterfly weed has smaller, narrower leaves and bright orange (or sometimes yellow) flowers. They also serve as a host plant for monarchs and other milkweed insects. All milkweeds are also very attractive to pollinators. Pictured here is a small sweat bee. They are tiny but some species are a beautiful metallic green!

While the hummingbird feeder is very regularly visited by hummingbirds, the Bird Watching Garden is starting to fill with some of their favorite flowers as well. Pictured here is Indian pink, a beautiful bicolored flower that can be seen in the garden.

This next bloom may be less colorful, but very interesting nonetheless. Blending in amongst the grasses at the Red Barn Reserve was this beautiful blooming ragged fringed orchid. Did you know that Ohio is home to nearly 50 species of orchid? This species is primarily pollinated by moths that rely less on visual cues to find flowers and more on the fragrance they emit.