Daddy Red Taking a Drink From the Tub

Granddaddy Red--Part 1

One of the more intriguing insects that we have around here is really not an insect at all: the daddy longlegs or granddaddy longlegs spider. But then it’s not a spider either. So, is it a bug? No. Then, what the hell is it? The best and entomologically correct description is “harvestman.”

Let’s back up a little. An insect is defined as a little critter that has six legs, three segmented body parts, antennae, and wings. OK? A spider has eight legs, eight eyes, only two body parts, no antennae or wings, but has spinnerets (their silk-producing organ). OK? A harvestman is similar to a spider, but does not make a web (has no spinneret), has only one body part, and only two eyes. The harvestman is more closely related to a scorpion than a spider—though it has neither venom nor fangs. OK? So, what’s a bug? Well, it’s an insect (so it does has six legs) but is distinguished from an insect by having sucking, beaklike mouthparts. OK? Confused? So am I. It’s no wonder that we common folk have a struggle understanding entomologists.

Let me get back to the one particular critter I started with: the daddy longlegs… the harvestman. From any perspective, they are an odd-looking creature, with their small, round, one-part body, supported by incredibly long skinny legs. If its body size were as big as a human, each of those legs would be some 50 feet long!

Harvestmen are one of the most ancient animals on the planet—dating to some 400 million years ago. That predates the dinosaurs by a long shot! There are over 200 species of harvestman in North America alone. They come in many different sizes and colors, but all of them possess those ungainly long legs. And speaking of those legs, one of them can easily detach, if a predator attacks them and grabs a leg (which is likely to happen, given that they are mostly all leg). What’s more, the lost leg continues to twitch on its own for several minutes, which is Mother Nature’s way of confusing the attacker and giving the daddy longlegs a chance to run (seven-legged) away to safety… sans one leg for the rest of its life, but alive.

There are a few other peculiarities of harvestmen, but we’ll leave it at that for now. Well, OK… one more. Even though it has eyes (just two of them, remember?), they can’t see much at all, so its other sensory capabilities must make up for that loss. Mother Nature has compensated by allowing its second pair of legs to act sort of like the eyes, nose, and tongue on humans. Weird, eh? But remember, they have been around for nearly half a billion years, so they’ve gotta be doing something right.

More on Granddaddy Red next time…

Curiosity Has Landed!!

Almost exactly 41 years ago NASA landed Apollo 11 on the moon. This is the next big landing in its history. What wonders will be forthcoming?

Clarion Call--Part 2

The first English colonists to land in Virginia in the early 1600s were enchanted by the flashy trumpet vine blooms. They sent seeds back to England—presumably earning the enduring enmity of the fussier British gardeners. The vine is native to southeast United States, but like kudzu, it happily and obnoxiously thrives in many foreign sites. When I surfed the web for information on the vine, nearly as many websites offered suggestions for eradicating it, as described its attraction for hummingbirds. I like it because it masks the view of the ugly outbuildings, but also looks very attractive—to say nothing of the enjoyment I get watching pollinators come for a nectar sip.

Nectar is a sugar-rich liquid that many blossoms secrete, to attract hummers, bees, butterflies, and other pollinators. It is much more than the bland sugar water that we fill our hummingbird feeders with. The plants have evolved a clever technique of adding smelly chemicals to the nectar that emit attracting aromas to flying critters who have a sweet tooth. But nectar has even more goodies: a complex blend of many amino acids that constitute protein. So a hummer not only gets a sugar high, but ingests crucial protein. When a hummer’s sweet diet consists primarily of human offerings of sugar water in a feeder, the bird must supplement this diet by finding tiny spiders and insects for its protein. I doubt that I could come up a balanced diet as good as nectar, even if I were to try to find some way to add a pinch of amino acids to my feeder.

Of course, the flower’s sweet gift is not solely a generous gesture to pollinators. It requires some energy on the part of the plant to manufacture nectar—something it really doesn’t need for itself. But it does need to have its pollen transported from bloom to bloom, in order to inseminate its reproductive structures, and it hasn't yet evolved to fly. The (humming) birds and the bees do that for it. When the hummer ducks its head into a blossom, it withdraws it coated with pollen. When a bee waddles down inside, it must brush against the flower’s reproductive organs, coating itself with pollen in the process. It’s a wonderful example of one of nature’s symbiotic relationships—an interaction between two different organisms, to the advantage of both.

The bloom time for the trumpet vine is just a few weeks in late July. There is no other nectar-offering plant close to my outdoor tub. I think I’ll want a bath more often at this time of year, just so I can get more of the aerial pollination show.

Female Hummingbird

This is a female ruby-throated hummingbird. she was in jured and later died, despite my attempt to care for her.

Clarion Call--Part 1

By mid-July the trumpet vine is in full bloom, with its brilliant orange-red blossoms, a full three inches long—beckoning all pollinators to come feast. The blossoms on this vine are well named, as they are narrow and long, with the outer end flaring, much like a trumpet. The call goes out, in the form of attracting aromas that entice hummingbirds and bees to come for free sips of nectar, in exchange for the satiated creature passing its pollen to adjacent flowers.

I sit in the tub in the evening, watching the aerial visitors stop by for a drink, just before dusk settles in. A mere 10 feet from the tub is a gorgeous, massive trumpet vine that completely covers and hides a homely storage shed. I watch a hummingbird visit a blossom, hovering like a mini helicopter, while the bird’s extremely long tongue dips deeply, seeking the sweet nectar. He sips twice, three times, then acrobatically zips over to the next bloom. While feasting, he remains on alert, knowing that when his head is plunged into the trumpet, he is temporarily blinded. He frequently pops his head back out, surveys the area for any potential predators, then dives back in for another drink.

I watch him for a few minutes, flitting from bloom to bloom—dipping only once into some, but going back a dozen times to others. Do some blossoms offer more nectar than others? Is the nectar sweeter in some? Has another hummer beaten him to the prize and already sucked up most of the offering in some of the blooms? On occasion, when he’s looking around for any threats, he turns my way and his brilliant ruby-colored throat flashes at me, dazzling me for a brief moment.

A little later a stout bumble bee wanders into the realm of the vine, drawn in by the sweet aroma. Rather than hover, the bee lands on the trumpet flare and waddles down inside—disappearing from my view. A few seconds later she emerges, coated with pollen, and flies to another bloom—thereby inseminating it.

The trumpet vine—also called the trumpet creeper and the cow itch vine—is an aggressive plant that, once having achieved a toehold in your yard, will threaten to become the one-and-only foliage in the area. It grows incredibly fast—adding several feet to its reach each summer. It wants support (being a member of the vine family) and will accept most anything stiffer than it is: a tree, a wall, a fence, or even a cow, if it doesn’t move fast enough. In fact, the moniker “cow itch vine” stems from the leaves of the vine causing a skin irritation. Cows are apparently especially susceptible... especially when they don't move.

One does not want to plant a trumpet vine within reaching distance of a vegetable garden. If you do, within a few short years you’ll have the vine choking out all the veggies. They send out roots, resulting in tiny vines popping up like mushrooms after a rain. If these little babies are not quickly nipped in the bud (I’ll take that pun), the area will soon be awash in trumpet vines. Sometime in late winter I ruthlessly prune back the vine to a size that will keep next year’s new growth contained.

More on trumpets next time…

Darrel struggling among obstacles