Shall We Dance?
Journal entry from July 2003:
I usually enjoy the sounds of night talkers while visiting moth sheets during the wee hours of the morning.. the yipping coyotes, chorusing frogs, squealing flying squirrels and the short staccato notes of ovenbirds that echo through the forest under the moonlight. Last evening, however, the buzzing of junebugs was grating on my nerves while trying to photograph moths- I can’t keep my attention on a focused image when I know a junebug is about to bounce off my head.
Distracted by the buzzing of the large beetles, I donned my cd walkman and jammed to ‘Marvin Gaye’s Greatest Hits’ while photographing io’s, polyphemus, crambus sp. and many other winged ones. Boogying around the sheets trying to keep from stepping on the moths, which probably really got the neighborhood gossip lines going this time.. (Harold, look- she’s out at those sheets again with all those bugs ..and this time she’s not just taking photos with that netting over her head, but I swear she’s dancing!)
Anyways, back to the moths- lately I’ve been finding many large saturniidae sp. wings scattered around the east end of our property- this area is quite a distance away from the garage where I hang my sheets under the mercury light & I chalked it up to the many bird species that pick the moths off the garage walls each morning.
So I’m swaying and singing, lamenting with Marvin on how “things aint what they used to be, mercy mercy me..†with the Olympus keeping beat with the abundance of species on the sheets, enjoying the evening to the max when there was a sudden flurry of wings above my head. NOT moth wings. Big wings. Really big wings. I stumbled awkwardly backwards & there sat a beautiful adult Barred Owl , big as day directly in front of the sheets facing me- a Barred Owl that happened to have a fluttering and quite captive polyphemus moth hanging out it’s mouth! I forgot I had a camera in my hand at this point and just stood there totally spellbound. The owl tossed it’s head back and swallowed the moth with one gulp, blinked its large inky eyes a time or two, then turned its attention skyward and with one large bound flew off into the night. Poof!
I stood there in my dumbfounded state with my own mouth agape for awhile.. and as I waited for my heart rate to come back to normal, my headset filled with Marvin & Tammie singing “aint nothin like the real thing baby..aint nothin like the real thing..â€. Right on Marvin.
I wonder what ‘Claptons Greatest Hits’ will bring in tonite?
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footnote- the next day, K.K. (author/birder/fond- of- leps guy) replied : ‘ maybe an empress Leilia?’ (a butterfly) ;)