A nice Thursday

[altivo]

Well, Thursday is almost always better than Wednesday, and this was no exception. ;p

Lovely sunny, breezy, but not too hot. Butterflies are emerging here, and I saw a comma (or a question mark, I just can't tell them apart), a red spotted purple, and a tiger swallowtail (one of the black ones with yellow stripes rather than the more common yellow with black stripes.)

Tess was well behaved about going out and coming back from the pasture mostly. Got my chores done in short time and since Thursdays I only work in the morning, had time to just play this afternoon. I should be working on writing, or threading the loom which is half done right now, but I spent some time listening to audiobook recordings of Harry Potter and just thinking. While making up hay nets for tomorrow I had a sudden inspiration for a story I want to write, so I do need to get that sketched out before it escapes me as such flashes sometimes do.

Now it's time to go shut the barn doors... Sunset is just a few minutes away.

Comments

[cabcat.livejournal.com]

Are the foxes chasing the butterflies?

Come to think of it with the drought and everything I haven't seen a butterfly for ages now o.O I miss seeing the Red Lacewing, the orchard swallowtail, the ordinary No brand crow, Cairns birdwing and the every blue Ulysses.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Haven't seen a fox for weeks now, though I thought I heard one last night.

That's an interesting list of butterflies, though I've never seen any of 'em. Obviously your butterflies are just as different as your other wildlife.

[cabcat.livejournal.com]

Well not quite, they have two wings, antenna and not made of butter just like yours ;)

[altivo.livejournal.com]

What? You mean to say they don't carry their caterpillars around in pouches, or reverse the metamorphosis process so they are born with wings and later shed them, turning into caterpillars before mating? How disappointing. Australia is not living up to its reputation for weirdness then. Tell your bugs to get busy mutating. Anyplace that has furry mammals who lay eggs should have equally weird insects.

[cabcat.livejournal.com]

Uh...we drive on the left. Does that make up for it? There are only two mammals that lay eggs or monotremes as they're called :)
The echidna and the playtypus.
Infant monotremes are known as puggles XD

Now class there shall be a test tommorow so I expect you to read up on the lifecycle of the two monotremes :D

Come to think of it I'm not sure what bugs we have that are strange in comparison to anywhere else. I do know that our Tarantulas aren't able to be kept as pets as they're rather agressive.

We have some funky stick insects, I know because a friend of mine's fiancee breeds them.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

You drive around on the left and walk around upside down without falling off the earth. That's pretty good, actually. I'm impressed.

Yes, the platypus and the echidna are the critters I had in mind, certainly some of the weirdest creatures I've ever seen. (Well, I've only seen photos of the echidna.) You have wombats too, and they can always make me laugh. :) Not to mention the koalas and roos and wallabies...

[cabcat.livejournal.com]

I love the platypus :) They're such endearing creatures, kind of like an otterduck. Koalas I've never really been a fan of, some people have wombats as pets but they often just dissappear one day.

I sometimes think people should be allowed to have endangered species as pets to help encourange their growth. Still I'm sure there are problems with that.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

I liked koalas until Qantas overdid them in their advertising so that now they are just trite.

Stick insects

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Oh yeah, meant to respond to that. We have stick insects too, but you have the most famous one, the "Land Lobster" from Lord Howe Island. My friend Doug discussed that recently in his own blog. That's quite a story. And that Ball's Pyramid place looks about as spooky as any I could imagine. Right up there with Ayers Rock, another of your peculiarities.

Re: Stick insects

[cabcat.livejournal.com]

I'm going to send this to my friend's fiancee, she might find that interesting. A lot of it went over my head to be honest :)

[doug-taron.livejournal.com]

Your list includes some of my favorite butterflies. I run one of those walk-through exhibits of live butterflies here in Chicago, and we fly all of the species that you mentioned. We have only recently begun getting Ulysses Swallowtails and Cairns Birdwings (from a supplier just outside of Cairns) and they have done really well on exhibit. Plus they're big and colorful- real crowd pleasers.

[cabcat.livejournal.com]

Man they have everything in Chicago :)

[marzolan.livejournal.com]

tiger swallow tail?

No thanks... just the thought of all the hairballs makes me cringe...

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Silly tiger. Not that kind of swallow tail, THIS one. Though in your case, the zebra swallowtail that we see far less often is a better color match.

[calydor.livejournal.com]

If you can't tell a comma and a question mark apart, it's back to kindergarten for you! ;-)

[cabcat.livejournal.com]

That's kittygarten

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Not in my case it isn't. ;p

[cabcat.livejournal.com]

Well no obviously, in your case it would be Foalschool :)

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Well, if you can tell this one from that one when you don't have both of them side by side and it's just fluttering past on the breeze, you're much better than I am. I admit it.

[calydor.livejournal.com]

Wow, you completely missed the joke. :-(

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Oh no, I got the joke. It was cute. But I thought you probably didn't have those species in Europe so I'd show you why it actually is confusing. ;p

[calydor.livejournal.com]

To be honest I have no idea what the species we have here would be called, but we do have a very common species that's light brown/orange with black markings, which looks a lot like those two.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

If the wings have that ragged scalloped edge, I'll bet it's Polygonia c-album, which is a close relative of the two we have here and is also called a "Comma" in England. A quick look at the web suggests that Danes refer to it as "Det Hvide C"?

The puzzling thing about the two related species here is that the easiest way to tell them apart is by turning them upside down to examine the underside of the hind wing. One has a mark that looks like a comma, the other a two part mark that vaguely resembles a question mark. A butterfly expert can probably tell them apart at a glance, but to me they've always looked so similar that they are all "question marks" (though in fact I think the comma is the more common of the two.)

On the other hoof, if the spotted butterflies you see often have smoother edged rounded wing shapes, they are likely fritillaries, a group of which Denmark appears to have quite a few striking examples.

[doug-taron.livejournal.com]

Heheh, you were probably wondering when I'd show up and start commenting on this thread. If it makes you feel any better, even our trained butterfly monitors have difficulty with the question marks and commas. Just to make matters even more difficult, there are actually find two species of comma here. The eastern comma is the more common of the two, and has hooks on the ends of the white mark beneath the wings. The gray comma has a mark that looks like the "swoosh" logo for Nike. (Or, if you are an Aussie feline, a boomerang).

[altivo.livejournal.com]

I figured you'd come along sooner or later on this one. :)

Actually, I have trouble telling comma from question mark even when the poor things are dead and holding still. Since I normally don't capture butterflies to examine them, but just look at them fluttering by, I don't feel too bad about not being able to distinguish between the Polygonia sp.