Despite the heat, we had a pretty nice turnout for the Friends of Estabrook picnic yesterday, and the surprise guest was a turkey that hung out by the beer garden for quite a while. I can’t tell for sure if this is the same bird, but I found it on the paved path at the south end of the pond this morning, and how many turkeys could there be in the park? It sure would be nice if they gave the suburbs a break and visited the park for a while, wouldn’t it?
I found this next stunning creature beside the path along the river above the falls, and it turns out to be the very first primrose moth (Schinia florida) I’ve ever seen. You might think, as I did, that it got that name for its colorful appearance, but instead, it’s named for its host plant, evening-primroses, where it lays its eggs. Cool.
Our visiting solitary sandpiper was still with us this morning, and here it is rustling up its breakfast.
As I moved between the various river access points, I somehow noticed this colorful but tiny moth, only about 7 mm or 1/4 to 1/3 of an inch long, on a leaf beside the trail, and it turns out to be my first red-banded leafhopper (Graphocephala coccinea). What a morning this was shaping up to be. One might think that after spending as much time as I have in Estabrook, I might have seen just about everything there was to see, but days like today suggest that perhaps I’ve only just scratched the surface.
Thankfully, some sights have become familiar, and a mallard hen keeping her eye on me as her ducklings keep chowing down is one of them at this time of year.
Back to the unusual sights, this common buckeye at the pollinator garden let me get what I believe to be my first picture of the outside/underside/ventral side of its wings. I think that they’re pretty, too, but in an understated way.
Finally, now that the great blue herons have become regulars in the park, it’s almost as easy to get a picture of one as it is to get a picture of a mallard.
Lastly, I see out my dining room window that smoke from wildfires in Canada is back with us again, so who knows what I’ll see tomorrow morning, but I’ll be sure to let you know.
Signs of Life in Estabrook Park 