Nature Moncton Nature News: July 8 2024

NATURE MONCTON NATURE NEWS

July 8, 2024

Nature Moncton members, as well as any naturalist in New Brunswick or beyond, are invited to share their photos and descriptions of recent nature sightings to build a fresh (almost) daily edition of Nature News

To respond by e-mail, please address your message to the information line editor, nelsonpoirier435@gmail.com .

Please advise both the editor at nelsonpoirier435@gmail.com and the proofreader nicholsl@eastlink.ca if any errors are noted in wording or photo labelling.

For more information on Nature Moncton, check the website at www.naturemoncton.com .

Proofreading courtesy of Louise Nichols at nicholsl@eastlink.ca

**Louise and Glen Nichols were walking through Glen's vegetable garden with some friends on Sunday afternoon when one of them spotted a number of Black Swallowtail butterfly caterpillars on one of Glen's dill plants. Louise counted five altogether that she could see, and all look to be in the final instar. She attaches some photos.

**Peter and Deana Gadd spent the past weekend on Grand Manan Island. Although the planned pelagic bird tour on the Bay of Fundy was canceled due to predicted rough sea conditions, they decided to still make the trip and found it worthwhile despite mostly fog and rain. They did see one pelagic species from the ferry, a Great Shearwater. At Castalia Marsh Sunday morning a group of swallows were very busy. It turned out that most were Bank Swallows but Cliff and Barn Swallows were also part of the group.
To their great surprise, while checking the back of the marsh from the highway, they came across a large flock of Short-billed Dowitchers, approximately 160+ of them feeding in shallow water. In amongst them was a single Semipalmated Sandpiper, seemingly quite at home. The dowitchers were still very much in breeding plumage. It seemed early for their southward migration.
Acting on a tip, Sunday evening they caught up with two Black-crowned Night Herons, feeding from the decks of floating fishing sheds at the Seal Cove harbour.

**On Monday, July 1st, Brian Stone and Nelson Poirier were squishing their way through the bog near Allardville on route 8 and Brian sends a few more photos from that day that took a while to get processed. They both enjoyed the long, nearly frustrating wait for one of the yellow Pink-edged Sulphur butterflies to land close enough and long enough for a photo to be taken. Eyed Brown butterflies and Common Ringlet butterflies were also flying around the bog along with Long Dash Skippers and Least Skippers.

Grass Pink orchids and White Fringed orchids were scarce but present, and Virginia Ctenucha moths were there too.

Further along from the bog at Pokeshaw, Brian photographed some of the many Double-crested Cormorants that were nesting on the sea stack just beside the shore.

Brian Stone is slowly working his way through a few days worth of photos he took while visiting Nelson Poirier at Miramichi last week. While investigating a milkweed patch on July 2^nd, they took note of a smaller patch of Chicory and some nearby Ugly Nest moth caterpillar tents that had just a few caterpillars left inside.

Other items of interest from the area included a pair of Double-crested Cormorants, one adult and one immature, a Viceroy butterfly, a worn White Admiral butterfly, and a Northern Cloudywing skipper.

**Nelson Poirier has a story to share about a Northern Catalpa tree blazing with its orchid-like blooms at the moment in his camp yard.

The story starts circa 20 years ago when Nature Moncton member Janet McMillan brought in some long pods from a tree she had noticed and asked him if he knew what it may be. He did some research and found it to be from the tree of a Northern Catalpa which is much more common to the south of us but has some hardiness to grow in our zone. The pod contained several seeds which Nelson planted indoors which resulted in seedlings the following spring. They were planted outdoors and a few survived. One sapling was transplanted to the centre of his camp yard and never looked back. It is now circa twenty years old, approximately 20 feet high, and very sprawling. Every spring it looks as though some branches have died as can be seen in the photo, but they often come back to life the next spring so are left to let Mother Nature decide.

Needless to say, the tree is named Janet!

In the heat blast of Sunday, several Lepidoptera used the solar power to enjoy the nectar in the flowering ‘forest’ of Common Milkweed that has been allowed to take over the camp yard.

Visitors included Eastern Comma butterfly (which only allowed a hindwing view), Northern Azure butterfly, Hobomok Skipper, Virginia Ctenucha moth, and several others too bouncy to identify.

A Monarch butterfly was on a wish list but didn’t show!

Nelsonpoirier435@gmail.com

Nature Moncton