released a monarch butterfly

Today I signed up for a 1-mile wildflower hike at the Ballas Preserve in Bushkill Township. I had never heard of this preserve so it would be a new place to walk.

At one time it was owned by Mr. Ballas who was a florist in New Jersey. This property held dogwood, holly, crabapple and other specialty trees/bushes for his business. On weekends he would come and cut specimins and sell them to other forests. He was well into his 80s when the property was to be sold to a developer to build 40 houses. But then the market crashed and the township bought it from Ballas for the preserve. Ballas died in 2012 at 92.

I drove right past it. The sign is on an odd angle, and the Wildlands had not yet place their directional signs. For the first time ever I was early. I'm pretty shocked myself.

Praying mantis ootheca (cocoon).

July is the best time, apparently, to come here because a lot is blooming. Maybe the developer had started clearing the land already because most of the trees were gone. There was precious little shade. There was a ton and a half of flowers. They gave us a list of 35 that they found a few days ago—native and invasive—and added more to the list as we walked.

The walk was painfully slow. We stopped every few inches.That was fine at the beginning, but we were still doing it at the half way point. It took nearly an hour to get to the .4 marker. In addition to flowers we looked at insects, plant galls, cocoons, nests, scat, fungus, disease, you name it we looked at it.

I finally broke from the group and did the last half mile alone. I was hot and tired, and no longer interested.

Miles/Steps:       1. It wasn't exercise. It was slower than a stroll

Wildlife:              Bunnies. Scat from foxes. Scads of monarch, yellow/black swallowtails, and white moths. Small black butterflies or moths with an orange spot on each wing. At least 4 types of bees—bumble, honey, mason, and maybe leaf cutter. Praying mantis, and on the other side of the park it's ootheca (cocoon). Four full flocks of birds taking off together and making the sky black before disbanding. Frogs croaking in pond.

Weather:           82 sunny

Extra:                One of the participants raises monarchs. One hatched this morning. I got to release it into the wild. She also brought along containers of eggs and tiny caterpillars (they looked like an eyelash they were so small) to show us. The picture of the take off didn't come out.

Extra 2:               I discovered the praying mantis by almost stepping on it.

Extra 3:              Christine found a Queen Anne's lace "Queen" It is a full circle like a globe. I don't think I've ever seen one.