A Bug’s Life
More on the Monarchs. They’re sleeping in the Mesquite tree by the Evergreen Sumac. I assume they’re catching their breath before they continue their migration. I’m glad I’ve got a hotel with a nice restaurant close by for them. It makes me wonder if they were here last year or the year before, and I simply didn’t notice. It’s entirely possible. In the last several years November, for me, has been a month of travel and getting ready to travel. So, we easily could have been on separate journeys.
I’ve seen them this year, however, and now I’ll look for them. I’ve also seen a lot of other guests eating on or around the blooms of the Sumac. Bees for one. Lots of them, including a big bumblebee. Two breeds of flies I’ve yet to ID, a moth (the yellow-collared scape moth), and two lead crawlers, the Leaf-footed bug, and the Wheel Bug. More proof, if you need it, of the beauty of the quantum world where the deeper you look the more you see, and I bet there are even smaller insects out there for the looking and seeing.
There’s a nice depth and breadth to the universe. At night I can look up and out and see stars trillions of light years away with no real understanding of what I’m seeing, while at the same time I can look down into a tree or shrub and see a completely different universe of creatures looking back at me with no idea or real understanding of what they’re seeing. And that’s not even taking into account viruses and bacteria. It’s sort of humbling to think how many lifeforms there are in the world, and how few of them give me a thought at any given time.