Dow Wetlands, August 18th:

I had an enjoyable visit to the Dow Wetlands this morning with friends to do some butterfly monitoring. A pair of Eastern-tailed Blue butterflies were working on increasing the local population.

Not far down the trail, a pair of Black Swallowtail butterflies were also involved in the same activity.

We found the largest Praying Mantis I have ever seen today. It was over 5 inches in length! This is likely the introduced mantid species that accidently came from Europe in 1899.

We saw several young Barn Swallows resting on the plants at the edge of the water.

These 3 Barn Swallows appeared to be playing the children's game, 

"Telephone Line" where participants stand in a line and the first player 

whispers a message to the next individual and so on, down the line!

A male Calico Pennant rests on a plant stalk at the pond's edge. The male has red heart-shaped spots along the abdomen.

A very tattered Eastern Tiger Swallowtail nectars in the flowers. The adults can have wing spans up to 5 inches wide. They can be found in parks, suburbs, forests and fields.

One of the most interesting finds for me was a White-lined Sphinx Moth. It hovered much like a hummingbird prior to landing on the vegetation.