Animals

Monarch Butterfly Larvae and Pupa

Posted by Ellie
There are two monarch butterfly caterpillars, striped white, black and yellow with black antennae, on green leaves of a milkweed plant.
Monarch butterfly caterpillars

There is a wonderful children’s garden in the Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens, where I discovered that I am still a child as I enjoyed it just as much as any of the youngsters. When I visited there in September, 2015, I was thrilled to see these colourful monarch butterfly larvae as well as this pupa, on true milkweed.

a hard looking almost cylindrical case is hanging from a stem of a plant. It has a rim of what looks like small white bumps two thirds of the way up, before the cylinder comes to a rounded point at the top.
Monarch butterfly pupa

I had never seen either of these and only identified them with the help of the guide who was happy to explain all about the life cycle of this beautiful (and threatened) species. The guide, herself passionately interested in and very knowledgeable about monarchs, showed us the plants that they preferred and helped us hunt until we found what we were looking for. It was a windy day, though still warm and it was not easy to get a photograph as the plants were blowing around so much, but I was glad to get these to share.

More information about the life cycle of the monarch butterfly can be found here:
http://monarchlab.org/biology-and-research/biology-and-natural-history/breeding-life-cycle/
And about the Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens here: http://www.mainegardens.org
My posts are all on my blog: https://www.elliekennard.ca.

Joni is 18 months Old and Her Collection is a Google+ Featured One!

Posted by Ellie
Young black and white border collie dog is in a field of white flowers.

I have been so busy posting images of unrecognisable (or barely) subjects on my blur mentorship that I thought it was time I shared another image of Joni, who is now almost grown out of the puppy stage. Here she was waiting by the front of the house, nicely backlit next to the rhododendrons that are about to flower. She is always ready for any game, in spite of being so grown up.

See the whole album here: Joni, the Border Collie

Have a wonderful weekend everyone!

1484

Emotion: Love me, Love my Dog +1 Year

Posted by Ellie
Love Me, Love My Dog 2 - Ellie Kennard 2015
Love Me, Love My Dog 2 – Ellie Kennard 2015

Week 4/26: Emotion

The theme of the bi-weekly B&W Project this time is Emotion. This was a revisit of a photograph I took a year ago when we first got Joni, as a pup.  You will find the original posting and photograph I took here https://elliekennard.ca/love-me-love-my-dog/.

Two Border Collies, a Red Frisbee and the Ocean

Posted by Ellie
Joni, Aria and a red Frisbee - Ellie Kennard 2014
Joni, Aria and a red Frisbee – Ellie Kennard 2014

Original Post: June 30, 2014 – 143/365

I’m completely out of order here, but … hey! It’s my project and I’ll do what I want! 🙂

Today was Joni’s first day at the beach. It was hot and sunny and Arya’s owner called to see if we wanted to bring her down to play with their dog (1 year old) and introduce Joni to the ocean. The tide comes in at a terrific rate here and we had to time it before high tide, when the beach disappears completely under water. We all had a great time, with the two dogs playing and swimming in the waves and rolling about in the sand. When, after only a short time, we looked up, we had become cut off from our escape route back up the beach. After soaking my shoes in wading through the shallowest part of the water, I had to scramble up onto the rocks to work my way around the shore back to the exit. Joni went through the shallows below (which were not too bad, just too deep for shoes) and we met up at what remained of the dry part of the beach, making our way up to the boardwalk where the cars were. 

Here you see Joni (left) with Arya on the right. Arya was obsessed with catching the Frisbee, Joni was just obsessed with having fun. And with catching Arya. I think I probably got a bit sunburned. I’ll know later. 😀 Incidentally, there was plenty of room for us all on this beach – people and dogs. There is no overcrowding on our sandy beaches.

Thanks for all of your great comments. I will get to them as soon as I can. Life is so busy just at the moment and summer is too short to spend longer than I need to at the computer.