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Into the woods
(by Jennifer Botkin Phillips - August 13, 2008)
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Photo by Jennifer Botkin Phillips
The Question Mark butterfly lives in wooded areas and city parks. They get their name from their wings.
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As fate would have it, I found myself wooed by the lush green bush and brush at the entrance to the walkway to the Montvale Environmental Learning Center to see what I could see. As usual, I had my camera with me. You never know when you will be lucky and some magnificent or unusual happenstance of nature might appear, and you want to be ready.
That means being camera ready at all times which isn’t quite as easily done as said. Still, I began digging in my handbag to wrap my hand around the slim digital device lodged inside.
As I approached the Learning Center, a wooded marshy area, two pre-teen girls were also headed toward the entrance. “What’s in there?” one asked inquisitively.
“Oh, it’s just walkways and a small swampy area, and sometimes you see neat wildlife,” I responded.
After stepping over the overgrown vines that threatened to cover the walkway in certain parts, we came to the fork in the path.
“If you go this way, you wind around and it circles back. And, if you go that way, you can keep going and just follow the path and you’ll come out the other side”, I continued.
It was at the crossroads that we parted company. They walked down the wooden walkway to the left and I walked right which would take me past the swampy area, now dry and grown over. By now it was mid-afternoon and rather warm but a balmy breeze made my afternoon escape from the cares of the world rather enjoyable.
Every time I cross the George Washington Bridge for a jaunt into the city, I say to myself, why don’t I do this more often. Which is how I felt this afternoon at taking a brief mid-day break to breathe in fresh air and let go of some stress.
I stopped along the way to shoot a few photos of Black-Eyed Susan’s, the most common of all American wildflowers. They sporadically lined the paths with their vivid yellow florets framing the characteristic brown center all-adding to my afternoon delight.
Walking straight ahead to the little pond area that is now dry, but where I’ve seen ducks floating in the fall, I continued down the walkway that winds back around and becomes parallel to Philips Parkway to the alternate entrance/exit.
So far, today, I hadn’t actually seen any wildlife. I had bumped into the girls again and while we were chatting I told them that I had once seen deer in the center of the wooded area called the Montvale Environmental Learning Center. But, today, it seemed pretty quiet.
Oh, there were definitely critters here and there as you could hear rustling in the bushes and birds chirping, but that was it. I don’t know what exactly I expected to find… maybe lions, tigers, and bears. That clearly would have been out of my league, though it would make for some great photo shots.
Wait? What’s that? Something just flew past me and lit on the bark of a tree adjacent to the path. Oh, my. It’s a brilliantly colored butterfly! You’d have thought it was the Dalai Lama the way I got so jazzed, rather than a silly little insect.
Moving as silently as possible so as not to cause the butterfly to fly away, I pulled up my right arm into position to snap a photo. At first, though, his (I have no idea of its gender or how it’s determined, so I’ll just refer to this creature as a him) wings were closed, and I almost lost sight of him on the bark as he blended perfectly into the trunk of the tree. It must be the way God designed him to camouflage his whereabouts from predators, I concluded.
Standing still isn’t exactly in my nature, but there I was. Buttocks jutted out in back, knees slightly bent, handbag slung over my shoulder, hands gripping my camera, and mouth agape, of course, waiting for this little guy to spread his wings. As he flew past me it was the blur of color that caught my eye in the first place and I wanted to capture the moment. Maybe this would be my prize-winning photo?
I began to see that I may not have what it takes for capturing winning photos after all because now my back was now hurting, my arm was getting tired, my legs were wearing out, and I was feeling slightly ridiculous. What if those girls showed up again? I’m sure they would wonder who is the crazy lady with the camera in hand staring at a tree?
Believe it or not, I held my stance (and prayed) and in not too many more minutes the butterfly began to open his wings with an explosion of brilliant orange. Ah… it was worth the wait after all, and I began snapping one shot after the other.
But, the question is, what kind of butterfly had I captured on my camera? At first I thought it might be an Eastern Comma butterfly or a monarch butterfly. But, to correctly identify my find I would need to consult with a Lepidopterist (an entomologist specializing in the study of mouths and butterflies).
For now, I was enjoying being giddy with excitement about the blur of beauty that landed in my little corner of the world.
Later, since none of “my people” held the esteemed title of entomologist, I enlisted help from the World Wide Web… and George Galuschak, reference, from the Montvale library, to assist in identifying my find. George discovered that the name of the beautiful red orange butterfly with the black spots is a Question Mark butterfly. They live in wooded areas and city parks, and their flight period is from answer to May to September. They get their name from their wings.
Ah ha. Now I know why he was so still for so long. The adult male Question Mark butterfly will sit during the afternoon hours on tree trunks or leaves, waiting for females.
I never knew that the lure to step into the woods would kindle such afternoon delight.
Until next time… Top Blonde… on the run.
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