lisa281's Favorites

This was one of my favorite parts of the camp -- north of the biodiversity park. Several jebels (hills) here, and lots of neat critters and plants. Spooked the fox here too! :)
https://www.inaturalist.org/journal/sambiology/90830-trip-to-middle-east-wow

Photo 1:
First Meal
I had seen the egg with baby showing in the morning. In the early evening I checked again & found a hatchling. The first meal a newly hatched caterpillar has, is its own egg. And this cutie was happily munching away. I gathered a few fresh saucer magnolia leaves and put the dried egg leaf on top of one so it would have fresh food when ready.
Photo 2:
Little Devil Has Horns
I'm guessing the horns are meant to scare off predators but I think they are kind of cute. Making good progress on that egg.
Photo 3:
Swallowtail Hatchling
I left this one uncropped so you can see how tiny it is. I have a papertowel on the bottom of the butterfly habitat to keep moisture levels down. And plenty of fresh leaves available. When I went to bed, the baby was still eating the egg.
Unfortunately, the next morning, it was dead. Egg was gone but the baby never moved on to the fresh leaves. No evidence of any disease but it might have been parasitized before I brought the egg inside. I have no way of knowing. I am grateful for what I did get to see and hopeful for another chance someday. This species might be more difficult to raise than monarchs, queens and tersa sphinx with which I've had success.
Observation of the ready to hatch egg is here: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/83947025
Observation of the female laying said egg is here: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/83801208

Ready To Hatch
After seeing the swallowtail laying eggs, I searched both my saucer magnolia trees. I was only able to find one egg & it was on the leaf I photographed the butterfly actually laying it. No clue why just 1 egg. It was green when I found it. I brought it inside to my butterfly habitat. I have raised many monarchs so thought I'd try with this one.
6 days later the egg looks like this. No longer green, it is translucent & you can see the tiny caterpillar inside.

This is the photo of the butterfly actually laying this egg: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/83801208

Lifer! Lucky! Grateful!
I decided to go on a random birding drive without a specific spot in mind. 60 miles later and after stopping at railway crossings, gas station and several detours to click kestrels and other birds (separate posts), I was on a off-beat side road where I didn't miss spotting this large bird at 5:30pm. I was delighted to see a barred owl for the first time! I was there at the right time - how lucky!
Today, nature rewarded my 3 month old wish to see an owl! Happy with the quick turnaround! Grateful!
The owl and I exchanged few stares before it took off.

First two pics show two species for comparative purposes.

Specimen on right: Note V-shaped base of flower, less dense branching, longer/narrower petals compared to Amphiachris (left; https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/34926032).

These specimens were growing adjacent to one another in the same soil type (a silty, firm sandy loam).

Source: http://www.wildflower.org/plants/result.php?id_plant=ZAHI2.

Note: According to Flora of NC Texas, twigs and leaf rachises densely to sparsely spreading-pubescent (latter extreme is the common form in nc TX); leaflets with shallow, rounded teeth. When I zoom in on the closeup photo of the leaflets, those are the characteristics that I see.

Brushy Creek/Champion Park
4/21/2017
Geranium sp.

I saw a number of these Geraniums around Williamson county in 2017 and unknowingly took shots of them in previous years as well. At first glance they look like G. carolinianum. However, they have 5 purple anthers instead of the 10 yellow anthers of G. carolinianum.

The only Geranium I have found in the literature which has only 5 anthers is G. pusillum. However, other characteristics of this plant, such as the pubescense on the sepals and pedicels and also the petal shape is different from what is described for G. pusillum. In fact the pubescence on these plants is a much better match for G. texanum (minute appressed hairs abaxially on the sepal veins mostly with retrorse appressed hairs on the pedicels), which is what I thought these plants were until I noticed the 5 purple anthers.

As mentioned, I have seen them in various places around Williamson county from out near Camp Tejas in the western part to Brushy Creek and Berry Springs more centrally and also Granger Lake in the east. However, though they appear to be somewhat common in Wilco, I have not been able to find any other Geranium observations in Texas on iNat that seem to match these (though only a small percentage of observations have photos good enough to use). Anyway, I thought I'd tag some of the frequent observers of Wilco plants and the surrounding areas to keep their eye out for this one. If anyone happens to have any other clues what it might be, that would be great, but I'd also like to see if the range is any greater than what I have seen.

Not sure of the difference between Star of Bethlehem and Crow Poison. Am also noticing horizontal structures on the concave side of the leaf (see second photo). Not sure what those are for. @sambiology can you enlighten me? 8-)