Here's the first new addition to our family in almost 10 years. He's the sweetest kitten ever. But hell on the houseplants. Most of the plants are crammed into a spare bedroom, yearning towards the weak winter light filtering in through the North facing window. The Banana Grove, however, spends its winters basking in the glow of Southern exposure of our master bedroom. The only drawback for the Grove, this winter anyway, is the tiger twining through its trunks and casually drawing a claw through a shading leaf, or, more worse: getting used as a juicy scratching post...ouch !

Tiny guy's Flight Schedule

Here she is, just seconds before take off...which I also missed !

Tiny Guy Emerges on Sept. 18th

Here he ( she actually ! ) is seconds before and after popping back into the world. I kept on eye on the chrysalis for 5 glorious hours....5 hours of watching the world of birds, bugs, trees and 'weeds' right outside my back door. And while stretching my legs for a minute, Tiny Guy presses the 'eject' button !

And a very sad event : Our son-in-law's Father passed away this same day, after a long fight with cancer. I only met him once, but was impressed with his love for his family and I know he must have been a great father, judging what a wonderful man his son is. The following is an excerpt from a book put together by the Monarch Teacher's Network ..... "According to Aztec belief, birds and butterflies escorted the souls of those who died heroic deaths ( in battle, through sacrifice, or in childbirth ). The butterfly ( papalotl ) delivered these souls to a special heaven in flower gardens that provided nectar to sustain the butterflies. Like the butterfly, the souls also sipped the sweet nectar of flowers."
And also this :
"In the State of Michoacan, Mexico, most people believe that the souls of dead family members and friends come to visit their families once a year in early November during the "Days Of the Dead". It is also believed that the spirits of loved ones are permitted to return to Earth In the form of Monarch butterflies, since it is at this time that Monarchs come from the North to spend the winter in Michoacan. The families make alters with fragrant flowers and many foods for the spirits to enjoy. To be sad or to cry would disrespect the dead, so music plays and the Days of the Dead become a happy celebration of reunion."

Nice.

After this year's premature loses of life in our family, it has been such a comfort witnessing the incredible metamorphosis life cycle of the Monarchs...watching the caterpillars change to butterflies, and the butterflies bravely rise up and take on a life's journey of thousands of miles....aloft on airy wings of determination. And perhaps within them, a few human souls that have fought illness or never even made it into this world, as well.

Tiny Guy Update

Tiny Guy is now metamorphosing into a butterfly, privately, within its jade cloak. Here he/she is less than two days before giving up the exclusive milkweed diet and life as an Earthbound caterpillar. In the 17 days it took to hatch from the pearly egg on the underside of a milkweed plant to the jewel-like chrysalis presently hanging in the Monarch's rearing tower, Tiny Guy has been a unique presence in our home. An eating/pooping/growing machine has now withdrawn to transform itself into an ephemeral-looking winged insect that will fly almost 3,000 miles, winter over in chilly Mexican mountains and begin the journey back several months later. Assuming he/she escapes storms, predation, fatigue and disease. Every Monarch you see on the wing around this time of year is probably heading South to join millions of other Monarchs in their great migration. Tiny Guy will join them on or around September 16th.

Emergence Continued...

Here's a little montage I slapped together while playing in Photoshop...trying to get the emergence sequence in order. Not sure if I was successful or not :/
hmmm...guess I need to redo the writing with the Text tool...my hand writing looks like I've been drinking !
Click anywhere on the picture to get a better look at the butterfly :>

Emergence !

The first caterpillar we collected from wild milkweed in our yard, on the 19th of August, emerges from its jade and gold chrysalis September 1st, Labor Day. Click on the picture to enlarge it...and check out the intricate structures that were created inside the chrysalis...amazing !
It was a perfect day to enter the world on wings...warm and sunny with jsut the lightest breeze.

Glorious Milkweed Community !

Here's a fantastic stand of milkweed...perhaps Purple Milkweed...it is just now blooming, and the "classic" milkweed is way into pod-dom already. This stand is in a meadow in Bluemont, Virginia. The landowner carefully mowed around the milkweed when he bush-hogged his acres in May, at the special request of his wife. This month it has been full of Swallowtails, Monarchs, bees and a variety of insects. Smells great too!

Praying Mantis

And now for something completely not Monarch-related.
This spring-green Praying Mantis really stood out against the pink of the Autumn Joy sedum. And even though she was busy finishing off a Bumblebee meal, she didn't seem to mind my intrusion too much. I've seen lots of Mantids this year, and more Grasshoppers than I've ever seen...all kinds of them. I'm now wishing I'd kept track of all the kinds there are ! I wonder what set of conditions converged to give them such an advantage this year ?

Tiny Guy's 6th day as a caterpillar

While changing out the old milkweed stems for fresh ones , I had an opportunity to get a photo of Tiny Guy. 6 days out of the egg. Seriously cute at this stage.

Another caterpillar went Chrysalis yesterday afternoon. But first I rescued it from the inside of a big milk bottle that was holding the new milkweed stems....and lots of water ! The caterpillar's front antenna were dangling in the water...there it was, adhered to the damp glass sides by most of its feet...a sticky substance gluing the feet to the bottle. I ran outside and found a long twig that I slipped between its legs and applied a little bit of pressure so that it would have to push back on and hopefully cling to the twig. I waited until it had backed up a segment or two and then very gently pulled it up and away from a watery grave ! Whew ! After a brief rest the cat went on "walkabout" and found a better site on the wire of the rearing tower ( the cage ). We'll be moving the 3 chrysalids in the next day or so, and we've got two more to go !
Today it's about 65 degrees and lightly rainy...awful butterfly weather...I'm hoping we have some good, warm sunny days to release ours out into.

Tiny Guy

We thought this little one had died. But here he is, Tiny Guy, on his 4th day of life ! After paper-clipping a piece of the birth leaf ( with him on it ) to a fresher younger milkweed stem, he disappeared for a whole day. Was there something on the new stem that sickened the little guy...a virus or bacteria ? But this afternoon, there he was ...very still ( dead ? ) but sporting a new look...tiny stripes on a less transparent body. Then, a few hours later we noticed a little hole in the leaf, right next to the caterpillar with some telltale latex sap leaking out from the ragged ( nibbled ) edges....proof that he was eating ! This one is in his 2nd instar...he will shed his skin a total of 5 times before transforming to a chrysalis.

The second fully grown caterpillar is on 'walk-about'....cruising the whole cage for a secure spot to carry out its final metamorphosis. This is where I feel the most conflicted about collecting and caging them....there is no way I can provide exactly what it is they are looking for...I can only try and anticipate what a creature so different from me might need.
And this is where the intensive 3 day workshop with Monarch Teacher Network, that I took several weeks ago, really pays off. A total immersion in all that is Monarch for 3 days. They do this through games, books, films, sharing stories, a field trip and probably most importantly...lots of actual eggs, caterpillars and adult Monarchs to gain hands-on experience. Complete respect, even reverence, are practiced in the handling of every stage of the butterfly...from egg to wing. And all carried out with great humor and understanding. I am still in awe of their mission and commitment.

We will release "our" butterflies as soon as they emerge and their wings have stiffened up enough to begin their incredible journey South to Michoacan, Mexico.

Playing In Photoshop

Milkweed plants deserve a better name...the 'weed' designation really reduces it to 'pest', when in reality it is food, home and nursery ( and death bed ! ) to a huge community of organisms ranging from bacteria and viruses to many kinds of insects and spiders. I have even see a groundhog eating them with relish...sitting up on his haunches, clutching the stalk between his two little hands and chomping it down like a banana.
This is a logo I played with in Photoshop while daydreaming about running a nature-themed Bed and Breakfast in some imagined landscape. All guests would slow down and drink in the sights, sounds and smells of a less planned, less managed life. Milkweed would grow all around the edges of the meadow and the air would be alive with butterflies and the hundreds of other winged insects. The milkweed plants themselves are hosts to a teeming community of life from bacteria and viruses to aphids, wasps, beetles and butterflies ! A large weathered brick circle, each morning swept of sand and twigs, would provide a perfect area to practice early morning yoga to start the day. We would dine on simple, seasonal fabulous vegan food and sleep with open windows so as not to miss the crickets,fireflies and cool night breezes. Ahhhh.

Big Guy's New Look

Here's the freshly formed chrysalis of the first caterpillar I collected from our wild milkweed. I'm humbled everytime I even think about the process. Within two weeks a fully-formed butterfly will emerge and point South towards Mexico.

Monarch Caterpillars Pack It In !

This picture was taken on the 19th...the biggest caterpillar formed it's "J" that evening and 24 hours later became a chrysalis. What was , just hours earlier an active eating, pooping wave-legged bug, is suddenly a still, silent gold-spangled trinket hanging from a twig. So interesting ( and slightly scary ! ) to observe these caterpillars make these critical changes in the relentless succession that nature demands.
The teeny tiny hatchling is not in this picture...it had not hatched yet.

Let the Eating Begin !

The egg hatched yesterday and the tiny new life is enjoying milkweed, milkweed and more milkweed. We'll call him Tiny Guy. I transferred a bit of his "birth leaf" and the caterpillar to a new stem of fresh young milkweed and it didnt miss a beat. That's my thumb in the lower left...for scale....!

Monarchs In The Air and In Our Living Room

Monarch Butterflies have followed me most of my life, as it turns out. I was born in Monterey, California when we owned a house in Pacific Grove...the Winter destination for the Monarchs West of the Rocky Mountains. Here on the East coast, the butterflies have a different flight pattern.

This egg I watched being delivered on a milkweed plant by a gorgeous female Monarch Butterfly, out in our Virginia yard on the 18th. I cut the stem and about half the plant and brought it inside to watch the unbelievably swift process from egg to wing. The egg hatched out today, less than 72 hours after it was attached to the underside of the leaf. The newly-hatched caterpillar has already eaten a tiny hole in the leaf, and the the big 1 1/2" caterpillar that I collected off of a milkweed on the 19th, split its caterpillar persona and became a chrysalis over the last 24 hours. Whew...so incredibly fast !

Spring !

Yea, Spring ! Just when all outdoor plant life looks really, really dead and gone, trees start to flower and bud out, Spring bulbs begin to nose out of the Earth...and suddenly.... Winter is over. Not that we had a hard Winter. Just the lack of green, growing plant-life brings me down after awhile. Houseplants help for sure, and the Dwarf Banana tree ( now a small grove ! )that shares our bedroom for six months out of the year has a definite living, breathing presence of its own. But watching the return of the mighty Hostas and Bleeding Hearts always seems incredible...so delicate looking, yet there they were, frozen root clumps for a good part of the year. Actually, frozen and defrosted several times over.
Yesterday I sowed some seeds out in the Fenced Garden, in a bed I prepared several months ago with some veganic plant food from Garden's Alive, some kelp meal and compost from our own heap. I sowed Red Cloud Beets, Short 'n Sweet Carrots, and Osaka Purple Mustard Greens. Garlic is coming up where J planted some out last October....or was it early November ? The weeds will be starting their race any day...some have already begun, but not in earnest yet.
Yellow Goatsbeard seeds got planted in a flat of seed-starting mix. I harvested the seeds from a crazy-looking seedhead down the road. I think S helped me collect the seeds. We'll see how they do...I kept the seeds in a closely closed baggie in a laundryroom cabinet all Winter.

New Leaf Vegan Society

I'm playing in Photoshop more....and trying to learn XHTML and CSS at the same time. Boy do I feel dumb a good part of the time...so many news angles to learn...!

I am looking forward to spiffing up our site and getting more information out to people about the truth of industrial-scale animal agriculture, and how easy and delicious and better for everyone involved, a vegan diet is.

Pirate Sam Dammit

Sam will be 12 years old this May. He's still got the energy and humor of a kitten. His left may need to be removed soon, and just for fun I fitted him up with a patch on Photoshop.

2008 Begins in the Heap

Ah, it's been a busy couple of months...I havent posted anything in months, and now that Winter is setting in I'm ready to garden again !
But the gardens need serious cleaning up, and I need to wait for Spring to come back around.
I did start a new compost heap today, seemed like the perfect way to start the New Year. We'd been tossing all of our veggie scraps, coffee and tea leavings in a loose pile of straw and leaves, waiting for there to be enough to build a big enough pile to contain the heat that the microbes give off while living their lives. Too small a mound and the warmth dissipates too soon, leaving the colony subject to freezing. Make it big enough and the heap will live on and work all through the winter and reward you with nice compost and worms aplenty in the Spring. I love our compost heap :)

I've been reading a lot lately about food. The history of American food production ( Kitchen Literacy by Ann Viselis), world food issues ( Feeding People is Easy by Colin Tudge ), Feeding your family on strictly local viands ( Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, by B Kingsolver ), and of course all the food related issues in the news ( that I can find time to read ! ). Several new vegan cookbooks have come out, including The Joy Of Vegan baking by Colleen Patrick Goudreau and Veganomicon by Isa Chandra...both very inspiring cooks and human beings.
And who knew that global warming was caused in large part by our shamefully wasteful and cruel methods of animal containment, torture and consumption of their body parts and excretions? Including transporting said body parts, "by-products" and other food stuffs around the globe. I guess we should have seen it coming. The reports have been out for several years now, and still it barely gets attention. "Try to eat less meat", is about the strongest message you'll hear on the subject. Sigh.
I remain hopeful though.

Because I don't know how else to stay sane.

Going and staying vegan has been incredibly easy, rewarding and fascinating. The hardest part is busting old habits and myths, and keeping an open mind. For instance: I just yesterday got around to making almond milk from scratch. I could not believe how easy it was. I've been vegan for over a year and still felt like milk ( rice, almond or soy milk you can buy in stores ) had to come from some factory and packaged in a carton. Like some magic made it "milk" behind factory doors. Jeez ! So you soak raw almonds in water for some hours, grind it up, strain it, and there is : nut milk ! The almond milk was very white ( even using unblanched nuts ) and barely tasted of almonds...perfect to splash on cereal or make into a chocolate pudding ( this afternoon's delish experiment ). So everyday I learn something new and wonderful that has been out there for years and years. And there's the hope : that others will catch on and look around, and realize that going vegan is so worthwhile, on so many levels.