Gypsy Moths

Gypsy Moth Mom Guards a Clutch of Eggs and Contemplates Eating Every Leaf in Southern Wisconsin

The Wisconsin State Journal devoted its front page to the bugs on my porch.

They’re Gypsy moths, a species native to Europe, Asia and Africa. In the 1870s, a French scientist brought the Gypsy moth to North America hoping to breed it with the silk moth and create an insect that would make silk like the silk moth and and eat anything (unlike the silk moth).

Zut alors, stupid French guy! The two moths were not even in the same insect family and could not be cross bred.

But the Gypsy moths have been very successful in North America. They’re hardy bugs that eat, voraciously, over 600 varieties of tree and shrub. In fact, Wisconsin has had to develop extensive Gypsy moth control and education programs.

For information, see the Wisconsin Gypsy Moth web site, which has helped me understand how to keep the little bastards from eating all my oak trees. I started today by properly disposing of all egg patches on my porch. Thus, I have ended the Metamorphosis project.

Yellow!

I love yellow! I have always loved yellow.

When I was a teenager, my room was yellow: yellow walls and a yellow wide-wale corduroy bedspread and yellow bolsters (this made a daybed, so I could pretend that my room was an apartment). I listened to Janis Ian and Queen, and was hopelessly, hopelessly in love with Captain Kirk, all surrounded by yellow.

My favorite yellow of all time is M. Graham watercolor Gamboge. It’s somehow warmer than other gamboges – I wonder if that’s because M. Graham uses honey as a binder? I don’t have visual example of M. Graham Gamboge at the moment – I haven’t dug out my watercolor stuff in a couple of years.

Thanks to Tracy for suggesting we comtemplate yellow. I hope we all can do something similar soon.

Juno is resting

I returned home from running errands on Monday to find Juno unwilling to stand up. An emergency trip to Four Paws revealed a pretty sick gal. X-rays showed a lesion on her spleen and internal bleeding. That night, she had her spleen removed at Emergency Clinic for Animals.

She’s back home now and recovering, though very groggy. The lesion on her spleen was cancer, a type called hemangiosarcoma. I am sad to think Juno won’t be with us for long.

For now, she’s coming out of her grogginess. When I started to tear lettuce for a salad tonight, she popped out from her resting place by the downstairs shower to beg for a bite. Which she got (a tiny, tiny one).

Thanks to the Dr. Brooke Milde, Tasha Hughbanks, Dr. Mark Koeppl and the other caring people at Four Paws and Emergency Animal Clinic for their help this week.