A Punk Caterpillar on Milkweed and other fun sightings

All the photos below were taken the early evening of July 27th in our front garden.  Milkweed Tussock Moth Caterpillars (Euchaetes egle) were on the Aesclepias plants.  I spotted them when I was looking for Monarch butterfly caterpillars.

They seemed to like eating the flowers.

Although the caterpillars are striking, the adult moths have dull yellow/orange abdomens with black spots and featureless grey wings.

Difficult to tell which end is the head.  But here you can just 
make out the shiny head where it is eating the flower.

The early instars are gregarious, but turn into loners in later instars.

This punk style reminds me of Dean at DDD.  :-)

Also on Aesclepias were these milkweed bugs busily making the next generation...

Neoneides muticus, a stilt bug, also on Aesclepias. These were tiny little things, but obviously adults because they are mating.

The coneflowers have been prolific this year.

This fly was going round and round, systematically visiting each little floret.

Many of the coneflowers were atypical.

"Look - my flower has flowers."  

And finally, a lovely little moth down at the base of Liatris.  Haematopis grataria - Chickweed Geometer.  Female with filiform antennae.

A Garden in Bloom

Our garden has been more beautiful this summer than any of the other 18 summers we have lived here.  I suppose that is not unexpected since we have been dabbling in the garden since day 1.  It hasn't all been forward movement; some things we have done have been more successful than others.  But then experimenting is half the fun.

This is the front of the house.  We have a stone path that leads from driveway across the front and around the side to the patio in back.

From the right perspective, the coneflowers make it look almost prairie-like.

But that illusion disappears when you stand up and look in the other direction.

The asiatic lilies were prolific.  This bed is behind the garage and my office window overlooks this scene.

We went crazy one year and planted a border of asiatic lilies around the entire front and side garden beds.  The orange lilies are in bloom in this photo.  A few weeks later, the pink star gazer lilies that were inter-mixed began to bloom.

I managed to overwinter the canna lilies and they made a beautiful comeback once they got back onto the patio.

This is the front of the house.  The front door is tucked around to the left of the garage.  Most of the plants are herbaceous perennials that have self-seeded.  

We started with 3 liatris plants, 6 moonbeam cosmos, 3 purple coneflowers, 3 black-eyed susans, and 3 butterfly weed plants.

The back garden is shadier and on the north side of the house.  We have ferns and hostas in the lower garden, which is the shadiest.  In the upper part we have astilbes, more hostas, lilacs, hydrangeas, bell flowers, balloon flowers, lungwort, speedwell, and lots more. 

The trellis separates our yard from the neighbors' yard.  The hummingbirds love the geraniums and begonias in the hanging baskets.  For some reason, the clematis (at the left end of the trellis) was more interested in growing bushy than in climbing the trellis.

I'll end this post with a backlit view from underneath a crane's bill geranium.  This little plant has blooming its heart out all summer and shows no sign of slowing down.

We have gotten so much pleasure from creating it and watching it progress from spring, through summer, and into autumn for 18 years.  With any luck, this is our last summer here in this house;  leaving it and the garden will be bittersweet.  Hope you enjoyed the tour; we certainly enjoyed our time here.