Photo by chidsey

Lucas Miller begins the new year with another fun and inexpensive activity that will get you and your kids out into nature. The Christian Science Monitor’s gardening section recently shared planting advice in Annuals and Perennials that Attract Birds to Your Yard so, if you have wee ones, know you can also explore the world of birding by bringing nature to you.

This month I’m thinking about birdwatching, or just “birding” as it’s usually called by the pro’s. Yes, there are professional birdwatchers.

I will freely admit that I’m a very poor birder. I was a reptile and amphibian guy in my college zoology days and completely obsessed with sea turtles. I loved seeing birds but didn’t have an overwhelming temptation to be able to identify them.

Since then, however, I’ve had the privilege to spend some time with some great birders and they have me paying more attention to our fine feathered friends. I’m still pretty poor at identifying them but I appreciate that it’s something I can do wherever I am: driving down the road, on a walk, paddling in my brand-new kayak (finally!!!!), or even sitting on the living room couch. Birds are just everywhere and, when you learn to identify the 20-30 most common species in your area—cardinals, mourning doves, red-tail hawks, turkey vultures, chickadees, etc., it helps keep you tuned into the natural world a little more. You’ll also be much more likely to notice when something unusual does cross your path and you might even find yourself a little excited by it all.

I’ve seen kids get positively obsessed with birding so it’s good to at least give your kids a chance to participate in the pastime. So here are a couple of quick points from a guy who likes birds but is never going to be a “pro:”

1) Get yourself a good bird guide. I like the Sibley Guide to Birds (there regional editions that are smaller/cheaper), but check out the guides by Peterson, National Geographic, National Wildlife Federation, and Audubon Society, too; you may find you prefer one of them (some have photos, others illustrations). These are just a pleasure to browse and your kids will do so if they’re close at hand. Just remember the adage, “look at the bird, not the book.” That is, take note of as many markings and features as you can while the bird’s before you. Open the book after it has flown off if you want to check yourself or learn more.

2) Give birding software a try. Our Birds from Thayer Birding Software is great. It allows you to see a number of photos and hear their calls rather than try to figure out the often baffling written descriptions in the books. There’s a wealth of other information and you can even take quizzes. I hear there are some good phone apps, too, although I have not tried any. Leave a comment if you know of any worthwhile ones.
3) Get some optics (a.k.a. “binoculars” to the non-birder). Kids just love looking through them so make sure whatever you put in their hands can be dropped and/or broken without too much heartache. A little magnification is fine; too much and it’s hard to get the bird in the scope and the more the view will shake. Another tip: maintain your gaze on the bird while you lift the optics up to your eyes. This way you’ll be pointed pretty much in the right direction already and you won’t look so much like the other bird-novices who look away, grab the binoculars, and then rubberneck like crazy while they try to find that bird.

4) Watch the birds. It sounds silly but birding should be about seeing what they’re doing and not just identifying them. I personally just feel like an ignoramous when the focus is on naming as many species as possible. I find it more fun to try and discover something curious about them. Take note of how they use their beaks and how they walk and perch. Do they soar or do they have to flap their wings a lot? Notice the different kinds of tails and wings they have and see if you can tell how they might affect their flight. Also, watch for the interactions between birds; they can be amusing and/or amazing. Have you ever seen a group of little birds mobbing and chasing off a great big hawk? Have you seen a male bird strutting his stuff to impress the ladies and show up another male?

There’s a good reason birding is one of America’s fastest growing pastimes—it’s just plain fun. So set your eyes on the skies and see what you can see!

Lucas is an award winning children’s author and songwriter from Austin, Texas. He’s heading into a busy year, so this will be his last article for Greening Families, but we’ll let you know when his new CD and new DVD (we weren’t kidding when we said busy!) are being released. In the meantime, check him out at www.lucasmiller.net.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Autumn is my favorite season. The weather finally begins to cool, which in Texas means the highs drop into the 90s, and monarch butterflies begin to reappear. They can use your help again this time of year, just as they could during their spring migration. Lucas Miller explains what you and your family can do to both enjoy and nurture nature by assisting in research efforts to track monarch butterflies. Enjoy!

Back in the spring, I wrote a bit about planting milkweeds to attract monarchs.  The females seek out milkweeds when it’s time to lay their eggs and, hopefully, you had fun watching the little caterpillars feasting, fattening, and metamorphosing while you sipped your morning coffee on the porch.

Monarchs are on the move again so give those milkweeds some TLC (or maybe just go out and buy some more) if yours, like mine, have been decimated by aphids, scale insects, potato beetles, and a series of others.  The toxins in milkweeds are supposed to offer protection but, in my garden, the milkweeds suffer far more infestations than any of our other plants.

Mid- to late-August marks the very beginning of the monarchs’ migrations south—those east of the Rocky Mountains head to the forested mountains in south central Mexico and those west head to coastal southern California. It’s truly an amazing feat with some monarchs starting as far away as eastern Canada and voyaging nearly 3,000 miles. If you’d like to know more, JourneyNorth.org is a superb website about migration. Click here to see their extensive information about monarchs.

Another group, MonarchWatch, coordinates a huge effort to tag monarch butterflies and your family can get involved.  Based at the University of Kansas, MonarchWatch, provides some basic information about monarch life cycles as well as kits you can order to get your family involved in actual scientific research.

Tagging amounts to catching a butterfly and placing a small, numbered sticker on the butterfly’s hind wing. No, it doesn’t make the butterfly go in circles or affect their flight in any way. You keep a log of the tag numbers, the dates, locations, and genders of your butterflies (it’s easy to tell the difference) and, just as importantly, send it in to the scientists. Apparently a lot of folks go to the effort to tag them and fill out their logs but then don’t send them in.

If you purchase a tagging kit, starting at $15, it will come with instructions telling you how to handle the butterfly safely (they’re tougher than you might think) and exactly how to place the tags so that you don’t harm the butterfly. This is definitely something that young children can do—4 year-olds are known to participate. As a matter of fact, they say that your child’s little fingers may better suited to the task than your big ones. Something like 2,000 schools and 100,000 children participate in this effort every year but the more the merrier. Out of the many butterflies tagged, less than .1% will be recovered!

The hard part turns out to be catching the tiny nomads in the first place but, again, MonarchWatch provides techniques to catch butterflies and a shop to buy a net. If you’re a crafty/thrifty type, they even have free plans so you can build your own.

Time is of the essence, however, as monarchs are already on the move. So get out there and be a “citizen scientist!” It will get you outdoors and that, in and of itself, makes it worth the effort. You will also be getting your kids involved in genuine scientific research and demystifying that often intimidating realm.  See you out there!

Note:  I will be at Balcones Canyonlands National Wildlife Refuge on October 10 to perform and help participants tag monarch butterflies.

Readers will be excited to hear that Lucas recently released his first DVD, “Animals Rock with Lucas Miller.” We’ve been checking it out over the past couple of weeks and love, love, love it. As you know, we are big fans of his songs but songs alone do not a good DVD make. “Animals Rock with Lucas Miller” also has clever visuals and animations so it is as fun to watch as it is to listen to, even on multiple repeats. If you aren’t currently located in Texas, you can also get a taste of Lucas’ presentations and see why families love them so much. And, much to the girls’ delight, the DVD comes in a plastic-free case made from recycled materials. The DVD can be ordered online. Below is one of the DVD selections, which features the monarch, so you can see for yourself how fabulous the DVD is.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

I was thus excited to learn that a team of researchers led by Dr. May Berenbaum at the University of Illinois have untangled more of the mystery around colony collapse disorder. (I’m not an entomologist but knew of Dr. Berenbaum from her creation of the Insect Fear Film Festival and the character named after her on the X-Files.)

Beginning in 2006, colony collapse disorder and the resulting missing bees have been a concern to people all over the world. Bee keepers in North America and Europe lost 30-90 percent of their bee colonies and many of the bees were simply never found. Many workers were flying out of their hives and never returning, very un-beelike behavior. Many more were found dead within their hives, passing away seemingly overnight. The most chilling part was no one knew why.

As reported in Time, scientists now have some answers. According to Time:

A new study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) shows that the causes of CCD may be more varied than scientists expect. The bees may be dying not from a single toxin or disease but rather from an assault directed by a collection of pathogens. A research team led by entomologist May Berenbaum at the University of Illinois compared the whole genome of honeybees that came from hives that had suffered from CCD with hives that were healthy. The sick bees exhibited genetic damage that could account for the die-off, and that damage indicated that they might be afflicted with multiple viruses simultaneously. This could weaken them enough to trigger CCD. “It’s like a perfect storm,” says Berenbaum.

The PNAS team’s work was possible only because the honeybee’s genome is one of the few animal genomes that scientists have decoded in full. The researchers looked at the genes that were switched on in the guts of sick and healthy bees — the gut being both the place pesticides are detoxified and the main region for immune defense. The technique they used is what’s known as a whole-genome microarray, and it’s ideal for this kind of sweeping analysis. “It’s a really powerful tool that lets us look at all 10,000 honeybee genes at the same time,” says Berenbaum. “The causative agents [for CCD] might just leap out.”

In the guts of CCD-afflicted bees, the microarray analysis showed unusual fragments of ribosomal RNA. Ribosomes are essentially the protein factories inside cells — they’re vital to the health of the cell itself and the larger organism. Berenbaum believes that the presence of those genetic fragments inside the CCD-afflicted bees indicates that they may be under attack by a number of insect viruses — including deformed wing virus and Israeli acute paralysis virus — that damage the ribosomes. “It was the one factor that remained consistently associated with the CCD bees we tested, no matter where they came from or how severe the disorder was,” says Berenbaum. “It doesn’t have to be a specific virus, just an overload.” Once the bees’ systems get burdened this way, they are less capable of fighting off any other threat, from pesticides to other environmental causes.

If you are a go-to-the source person, the study’s abstract is available here.

If you want to help the honeybees, here are some ways to do so:

(1) Stop using pesticides. Pesticides can’t discriminate between insects – they kill all of them. Save yourself some money, save your family and neighbors from exposure to toxic chemicals, and give the bees a fighting chance by ceasing to use pesticides.

(2) Plant pollinator plants. The Pollinator Partnership has created a helpful tool to find pollinator plants for your area. Check out their Ecoregional Planting Guides to find plants for your zip code. Our previous articles on creating a certified wildlife habitat and the fabulous book Bringing Nature Home have more ideas and resources for making your yard eco-friendly.

(3) Ask your friends and neighbors to join you. Today’s Seattle Times included a great story about Sarah Bergmann, a Seattle resident who, with help from neighbors, converted a parking strip in her neighborhood into a pollinator zone.

Once a desert of grass with a few maples, the 108-foot-long, 12-foot-wide strip today blooms with plants selected to attract pollinators. It’s buzzing with life that has spilled over to plantings all around the neighborhood. An orange trumpet vine festooning a fence out back is mobbed with bees too busy to bother anyone, some stacked two to a flower.

She hopes to eventually extend the pathway to a mile, in all. “It’s so basic,” Bergmann said. “I consider it local ecosystem support.”

And I bet, in this time of declining property values, that this planting has made the neighborhood much more attractive to potential buyers.

(4) Join ongoing research efforts. Scientific research is beginning to utilize the power of the people. If you live in Illinois, check out the Bee Spotter, a group of citizen-scientists who collect information on bees in their area. The Bee Spotters monitor local bee populations via photograph to preserve the bees. They hope to expand to other states in the near future. If you live outside of Illinois, you can still start right away through the Xerces Society’s Bumblebee Project. This research project is also using citizen sightings to track three species of bumble bees that used to be common. The bees tracked by the project are the rusty patched bumble bee (Bombus affinis), the western bumble bee (Bombus occidentalis), and the yellowbanded bumble bee (Bombus terricola). Identification guides are available on their website. This would be really fun to do as a family!

While the fragility of the web of life is becoming more clear, studies like this one are helping us see what we can do to help other species survive and thrive. To learn more about the impact that missing bees could have on humans, check out the video below.

Are you missing bees in your area? Have you changed the way you garden or plant recently? Or do you have other ideas for helping bees? Please share your thoughts in the comments!

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Whether you have a .35 acre lot in the suburbs, a sprawling ranch in the boonies or a mere balcony in the city, you can attract wildlife that will intrigue and excite your wee ones with a minimal investment of work and money.  The National Wildlife Federation’s Certified Wildlife Habitat program provides you with all the information you need to get started as well as the actual “certification.”  I don’t imagine your local bluebird’s likely to notice the certification sign that you can proudly display but, just perhaps, your human neighbors may ask you a few questions and convert their own piece of turf to a haven for native flora and fauna.

Our own efforts to get certified began about a year and half ago. As a family, we discussed the kinds of animals we wanted to see, or just see more of — butterflies, frogs, lizards, songbirds, and owls all came up. My wife mentioned hummingbirds but I wasn’t sure if we could expect to attract them because we live in north central Austin; a pretty urban environment. It would be nice, though…

The City of Austin was pushing the certified wildlife habitat pretty hard because it was trying (and has now succeeded!) to become a Certified Community Wildlife Habitat. The parks department provided some planning checklists to help us provide for animals’ necessities: food, water, cover, places to raise young, and an environment relatively free of dangerous pesticides and fertilizers. This is all covered on the NWF site as well.

Cover was pretty easy — we had some old branches we stacked up in an out-of-view spot in the front yard and made some “toad abodes” from some broken flower pots (lots of toad in our yard but I still haven’t seen one in any of those abodes).  Native bushes and trees can also count as cover. (Ed. note, to learn more about native plants and how to find what is native to your area, visit our Book Review for “Bringing Nature Home.”)

We’ve been “chemical free” (emphasis on free) since we had a yard to care for so that did not cause any adjustments for us. NWF requires that you make at least two efforts to garden with “green” techniques such as drip irrigation, herbicide-free, “integrated pest management,” rainwater collection, eliminating non-native plants, and more. These are detailed on their Garden in an Environmentally Friendly Way page.

I thought providing water would mean having to make a major water feature replete with a fountain. It turns out that a plain old bird bath was adequate for certification. We purchased one at a store that sells discontinued merchandise for pennies on the dollar (okay, a quarter on the dollar) and I cannot believe how much activity it gets. We’ve had some funny moments with birds that apparently squawk, “Yo, buddy—this thing’s dry. Are you gonna fill it back up or what?!” Last week, at dusk, we even had a pair of screech owls belly-up to the bar! They’ve actually become regulars at the Miller waterin’ hole.

As far as a place for animals to raise their young, host plants for caterpillars certainly qualify. We had great luck with our milkweeds (see my previous post about that) and, of course, a birdhouse can be a fun project to make and thrilling when it becomes occupied. If you can leave a dead tree standing, they are highly sought after by a number of birds and other animals.

When it comes to food, shrubs, vines, trees and annuals can provide berries, seeds, pollen and nectar. A bird feeder is not required but, again, these are fun to make and a special delight when you see them being used. We put up a trumpet vine that has transformed our dated, 50’s-era columns and turned them into things of real beauty. And guess what — we saw our first hummingbird about three weeks ago! One darted by while I was working on this article just awhile ago. I guess we hadn’t seen them before since they had no where to go.

As you see, it really can be done with a minimum of time and money. Of course, you can really go wild and there are many houses in our neighborhood with majestic flower beds, verdant mounds of greenery and a variety of bird houses and feeders. If you’re like me, however, and you don’t have the time or skill to take it to that degree, don’t be ashamed to take it slow and keep it simple. The rewards may well surprise you and, I believe, you’ll be doing one of the best things you can do to help wildlife and keep your family connected with nature.

Lucas is a professional children’s author and songwriter from Austin, Texas. He recently released a DVD, called “Animals Rock,” which is available on his website.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

So you’re recycling your bottles, cans, and paper, right? I think that’s a given for our faithful readers. Hopefully, you’re not even taking the plastic bags in the first place but, if you are, you can recycle those, too.

How about composting? My wife and I have been composting off-and-on for over a decade now so I thought I’d provide some thoughts on our experiences. I’m no expert, though, so by all means feel free to contribute your own comments and tips!

In case you don’t know already, composting is just taking organic material (non-farmers, like me, stick exclusively to plant-based stuff) and allowing it to decompose somewhere on your property so that you can use it as fertilizer. I live in a warm climate (106º of warmth  today) and it seems to take at least six months for it to decompose to the point that  there aren’t any “recognizable bits.” I think it would take longer in a cold climate, right? I’m not sure that’s the sign of ready-to-use compost but that’s what I look for.

What can you compost? Fallen leaves, grass clippings, orange peels, coffee grounds, that vegan meal that went wrong, the “hairy carrots,” and the stinky-slimy spinach. We throw our eggshells in, too, but avocado pits don’t seem to break down well and you’ll have a lot of fruit flies if you throw in a bunch of banana peels.

We keep a stainless steel, lidded container on the counter and it usually fills up by the end of the day. The kids take it out after dinner and, since we adamantly avoid anything animal-based (other than the aforementioned eggshells), we have no problems with flies even though it’s about 10-15 feet from the back door. And, I assure you, there is no unpleasant odor.

Why would you compost? First, a huge amount of yard waste unnecessarily ends up in landfills. I don’t bag my grass clippings and my city offers curbside leaf pickup and composting (how cool is that?) but even with just the food waste, it’s amazing how much composting keeps us from throwing away.

Second, it will make your yard and/or garden plants do a little happy dance. We used a huge amount of compost on our wildlife garden last year and, I’m proud to say, it has grown like crazy this year. We even had our first hummingbird visitor last month! But I digress….

We took the low-budget approach with our first attempts at composting. You know–the big bin made of chicken wire and wooden stakes. That held a LOT of stuff but you’re supposed to turn it every so often (I was shooting for once a month) and it proved to be, shall we say, arduous. So arduous, I’m embarrassed to admit, that it basically never happened.

When we put our house on the market, I just took away the chicken wire and spread it all over the lawn as best I could. It wasn’t fun (or pretty).

We now use one of the compost tumblers and it has served us well. The one we use can be seen here. I’ve never ordered from this company so I can’t personally recommend them but I was amused at the embedded video. Yes, it spins and that does make it quite a bit easier but they show it spinning freely like a bicycle wheel. When it’s loaded with 50+ pounds of decaying material it WILL take some effort to turn it over! The whole “compost in two weeks” thing is optimistic, too, methinks, but I’m sure I would have better results if I gave my decaying vegetable waste a little more TLC.

My next big project is to start a vegetable garden this year (more on that later) and my currently-rotting herbaceous material is ear-marked for that. Talk about completing the cycle! I can’t wait to eat my first tomato grown from this year’s unused Jerusalem artichokes that came with last week’s CSA box (really—what WAS I supposed to do with those things??)

Anyway, give it a try. There are ways to get started that range from free to $500. Choose one that’s right for you and take the next step in recycling. And please, if you have comments fire ‘em our way!! (Anybody know anything about worm composting?)

Lucas is a professional children’s author and songwriter from Austin, Texas. Check him out at www.lucasmiller.net. He is currently working on a song about composting – we’ll let you know when the decomposing ditty is fully composed!

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Spring is in the air, which means wildflowers are starting to bloom! This month Lucas Miller shares information about the iconic bluebonnet as well as some suggestions for viewing wildflowers with your family. The photo to the left is of Lucas and his family enjoying a beautiful spring day in Texas.

I was raised in Kentucky and moved to Austin, Texas, in my early twenties. I had heard a bit about the bluebonnets, the state flower, and how devotedly Texans loved them. But I really wasn’t prepared for the spectacle when I experienced my first Texas springtime. We had flowers back in Kentucky but the gaudy mixture of colors, shapes, and sizes blanketing the hills of central Texas left me astounded. I’m not Mr. Macho or anything but I never expected to be so taken with wildflowers.

Soon I started to notice another Texas phenomenon–cars parked before particularly splendiferous roadside displays and parents gazing through viewfinders at smiling children posing amid the expanses of bluebonnets, Indian paintbrush, primrose and myriad other wildflowers I have yet to learn the names of.

It’s a springtime rite of passage down here. Folks throughout the Lone Star State pack up their cameras, herd the young ‘uns into the minivans, and patrol for the biggest spread of bluebonnets they can find. There they snap the annual portraits of their newborns, toddlers, little league all-stars and high school graduates, as well as their dogs, cats, miscellaneous livestock, motorcycles, guitars (that one may just be me), and whatever else they may treasure. Get a poster-size print, frame it up and hang it over the fireplace and you’ve staked your claim as a proud Texan, regardless of your original birthplace.

I have to admit, I thought it was all kind of overdone for a long time. My wife worked in an art boutique for a year and the owner, wanting her store to be taken seriously, had one rule—no bluebonnet photos, watercolors, oil painting, sculptures, embroidery or other art of any kind!

But this spring, my wife and I decided it was time to take the family out and partake in the ritual, leaving our sarcasm and northern self-awareness at home, along with the dogs (but not the guitar!). And what do you know—we had a great time! I did a little Googling (best bluebonnets + central Texas + 2009); punched the destination into the GPS and hit the farm-to-market road. We reached our destination and, once out of the car, gasped when we beheld at least 2-3 acres of blue blossoms tottering spritely in the spring breeze.

Being careful not to tread on any blooms (or fire ant hills) my children ventured into the field, awed by the sea of color. Once the wonder of the countless flowers began to wear off, we took a closer look at individual plants. Bluebonnets hide their pollen between two petals cupped together like praying hands just below a little white spot. I showed them how they could pull petals down and see the pollen hidden inside. We also saw how some of the white spots had turned magenta which means the pollen is getting old and signals the bees to visit another blossom. We noticed the fuzzy peapods left behind by flowers that had already been pollinated and faded.

Bluebonnets are a Texas endemic (that is, we don’t share them with other states) but wherever you’re from, there are bound to be some spring wildflowers peeking up about now. Why not take hop in the car and see if you can find a spread of wildflowers, bask in their beauty and snap some family photos. While you’re at it, have your kids get some close ups of some of their favorite flowers and see if you can identify them (a field guide could be of great help here) as well as the important bits—stamen and/or pistol, petals. See if you can learn who pollinates the flower, whether or not it makes nectar and other factoids. There’s a lot to learn and you might find your children open to the lesson. Don’t expect to know all the answers, just be curious and willing to do a little reading research.

The important thing is to just get outside at this beautiful time of year with your family. I have a feeling my kids will remember our day in the wildflowers for a long, long time even if I don’t actually frame and hang that poster-size print.

If your family library does not yet include a field guide, the National Audubon Society Field Guide to North American Wildflowers: Eastern Region is a great one. For those west of the Rockie Mountains, try National Audubon Society Field Guide to North American Wildflowers: Western Region. If you want to get a filed guide geared to children, check out Wildflowers, Blooms & Blossoms And as a Texan, I couldn’t resist recommending Miss Lady Bird’s Wildflowers: How a First Lady Changed America. Breathtaking illustrations accompany a story about how much one person can change the world, making this a great book for kids.

The U.S. Forest Service has a website dedicated to wildflowers called Celebrating Wildflowers. On it you can find information about wildflower events in your area, gardening with native plants, and the pollinators that help make the beautiful blooms possible as well as activities for kids. (Teachers, there are resources for you here as well!)

Lucas is a professional children’s author and songwriter from Austin, Texas. Check him out at www.lucasmiller.net. He’s currently working on a song about bluebonnets!

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Then, days before spring break began, the flu hit. Both girls got sick but with different strains, which allowed us to experience the full glory not once, but twice as germs were swapped. I am now ever more thankful that we own a washing machine.

By the tail end of spring break, everyone was finally feeling better. After a day of waiting to ensure no relapses would occur, we headed to the nursery. With their bright orange and yellow flowers and pointed leaves, the milkweeds were easy to identify among all the other plants. We had looked at some pictures online first, mostly because I wanted to spare the other gardeners a long search by two tired girls and their exhausted mom. Looking at the pictures definitely helped – the girls spotted the plants first.

We were excited to find Asclepias curassavica or Tropical Milkweed, a favorite of monarchs. We each took a pot and checked out. Both girls were clearly wiped out by the short trip and fell asleep in the car.

Since the trip wore everyone out, we did not plant them that day but left them in their pots for several days. A little water and they were fine. It was a bit cool during this time so we didn’t see many butterflies. I was beginning to wonder how long it would take for word of the milkweed to get out in the butterfly community when a warmer day arrived. And, just like that, the plants were swarmed with monarchs.

I could see the plants from my computer and, in one 20 minute period, four different monarchs appeared. I know this sounds anthropomorphic but in each case the butterfly flew up to the plant and appeared to get excited as it got close. The wings would flap faster and faster and the butterfly would almost dance in the air as it approached the milkweeds. Then the butterfly would light on a plant, sip some nectar, and appear to take a deep breath. It was really incredible to watch.

That afternoon we checked the plants and there were already 3 eggs! Now we are watching them (not very) patiently and waiting to see the caterpillars. It is giving us lots to talk and read about, as well as an appreciation for how much is happening in the world right around us.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Beginning about the middle of March, millions upon millions of monarch butterflies make their ways back to the USA as they return from the forested mountainsides in south central Mexico where they spend their winters. Monarch scientists and enthusiasts had feared lower numbers this year but, I’m pleased to report, the estimates are actually up slightly over 2007-08.

A common question about these tiny travelers is whether they are the same individuals who made the two- to three-thousand mile migrations in the fall. I asked entomology guru Dr. Mike Quinn this question a couple of years ago and was assured that, yes, they are. That’s actually the unique thing about monarchs.  There are insects that migrate farther (some dragonflies have been shown to cross the Pacific Ocean!) but we know of no other insect that makes the return migration as well.

The monarchs who return, by then about seven months old, won’t have much time left. They’ll mate and survey the terrain below for the milkweed plants upon which they must lay their eggs. A great way to help is to pick up a milkweed plant at your local nursery and put it in your garden. Actually, you can just leave it in the pot on your patio or balcony. If there are monarchs passing through your area, they’ll find that plant, lay some tiny white eggs on the leaves and, in 4-5 days, you’ll have some itty-bitty caterpillars (they’re striped black, white and yellow like the one below) within a couple of days.

There are actually over a hundred species of “milkweeds” in the genus Asclepias and monarchs only utilize about half of them. There are two species in particular they seem to favor. The “tropical milkweed,” scientifically known as Asclepias curassivica, is probably the best loved by monarchs. We had to buy three rounds of these last year because we had so many caterpillars and those gluttonous little fatties defoliated the first two all the way down to the stems!

Tropical milkweed is non-native to the US, however. If you want to go with a native route, swamp milkweed, Asclepias incarnate, is another great option (you can confirm that it’s native to your state at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center’s Native Plant Database). I haven’t used these myself yet but I’ll be trying them this spring.   (The Wildflower Center has lots of great information about milkweeds and gardening with native plants).

Be prepared, however, to see whole “cycle of life” in action. We had some caterpillars killed most gruesomely by hornets and another poor fellow who emerged from his chrysalis only to fall to the ground before its wings had hardened. It made us realize just what an endeavor a metamorphosis is. Each clear, opened chrysalis became a sign of victory—another monarch that made it!

We also learned about aphids and potato beetles that also turned up feasting on our milkweeds. We discussed and practiced organic gardening methods but, as it really turned out, those milkweeds are quite hardy. They leafed out again after every infestation (that includes monarchs from the milkweeds’ perspective).

Overall, I highly recommend giving it a try.  My family found real joy and excitement in watching the growth, transformation, and drama right off our front porch.

Learn pretty much all you could care to know about monarch butterflies at Journey North: Monarch Butterfly.  It’s geared for students as well as scientists and laymen alike and it’s the absolute best science-oriented website I’ve come across. I also have a song about monarchs – you can see the video free right there on my homepage.

Lucas is a professional children’s author and songwriter from Austin, Texas. Check him out at www.lucasmiller.net.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

In the book Dr. Tallamy, an entomologist, discusses the importance of native plants to an area’s wildlife. He clearly explains the link from native plants to native insects to native wildlife. He also walks through several sources of data to explain the situation wildlife in our country currently face. Most surprising (and disturbing) to me was that the measurements of landscape ecologists show only 3-5% of all U.S. land is undisturbed habitat.

This means that families can make a real difference for native insects, birds, and other wildlife by planting native species in their yards. With, for example, 96% of birds in North America relying on insects and spiders to nourish their young, the need for food and space for wildlife is crucial. Sometimes the most profound ideas are the most simple.

After reading the book, my daughters and I walked our dog through our neighborhood. Along the way we noticed which plants had insects on them (typically native) and which did not (typically non-native). By the end of our walk, the girls were correctly identifying native plants using only this easy test.

If you are interested in planting natives but need assistance finding local plants, the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center has created the Native Plant Database to help people identify their area’s natives. Light and moisture requirements can be selected to help you find the best plant for a given location. You can even search by flower color!

PlantNative is another helpful source of information. Their How To Naturescape section provides basic landscaping information, from making a plan to designing for wildlife. Their Recommended Books section even lists helpful books for each area in case you want to learn more.

If you want to neutralize the affect of your book purchase, visit Eco-Libris. To locate an independently owned bookstore near you, visit IndieBound. You may also want to check SwapTree, an online trading site for books, cds, dvds, and video games.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Rich had heard a friend talking about aspartame as a method for controlling fire ants so we decided to give it a try. He brought some packets of Equal home from a run to the local coffee shop and we were in business.

We sprinkled three packets of Equal on the biggest mound and waited to see what would happen. At first it seemed like nothing was changing but after 3 or 4 days the number of ants we could see started to decline. After a week we sprinkled the contents of another packet on the mound to replace what had been taken. By the end of the second week, there were no more ants to be found.

Fire ants often just move their mound when threatened so we kept a close eye on the area. It has now been several months and no new mounds have appeared.

We thought it might have been a coincidence so tried another test. As things outdoors heated up, our kitchen became home to a conga line of little black ants. I put some aspartame along their path and within three days they were gone.

Next time you have an ant infestation, consider aspartame instead of traditional insecticide. And if you eat or drink products containing aspartame, you may want to rethink them; I don’t want anything to happen to you!

If you have other green gardening tips you’d like to share, please do so!

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.