Interesting stuff from Laredo, TX

[Anne Kilmer]

Mark Walker wrote:
snip> 
> In addition to butterflies, I had a few other interesting insect encounters.
> The first occurred on a remote section of the highway, where I noticed
> something which appeared to be a beetle moving in the road.  I pulled over
> to inspect, and what I saw was a first for me.  Two beetles (black and
> squatty, about 2.5 cm long) were attached to a small sphere - with a 3 cm
> diameter - made of what looked like dried dirt.  The sphere was as perfect
> as anything I have ever seen, and at first appeared to be man-made. 


(Beetles can play with mud, I hear, but only Man can make a sphere.)
> One of
> the beetles was standing on the sphere, motionless, while the other beetle
> was attached by it's hind legs, it's body turned around and it's head and
> fore legs on the ground.  In a very deliberate and constant motion, the
> second beetle was rolling the sphere at an impressive velocity by pushing
> backwards with it's fore legs.  The rolling motion caused the first beetle
> to spin with the sphere, but never did the sphere actually roll over on top
> of the first beetle.  I grabbed a piece of paper, and allowed the beetle to
> roll the ball onto it, and then transplanted them all over to the side of
> the road.  When I laid them down, at first they became disoriented and
> walked away from the sphere.  But after a few seconds, they relocated it and
> continued their journey.  What a strange thing!  I'm assuming the sphere was
> some sort of egg case?  I dunno, but it was cool.  

Scarabs, with a ball of manure, in which, once they put it into a
previously-dug hole, they intended to bury an egg. 
The Egyptians, who believed that collecting shit can make you immortal,
revered them. 
(not to comment on the perennial collecting debate in which, as always,
everybody is perfectly correct.)
By rescuing them, you probably caused them to lose track of their hole,
and who knows what they did after that. 
A Buddhist would observe without interfering. And then a car would have
squished the lot of you. 
Meanwhile, I have three green-veined whites (Pieris napi), two peacocks
(Inachis io) and two speckled woods (Pararge argeria) to report. 
Or did, before the four-day gale. At the end of it, I noticed one
peacock, rather tattered, reposing on a lawn chair. The speckled woods
are fine; they are fond of the Lawson's cypress.  They reappeared today
when the sun came out. 
I have neither photographed them nor collected them, but I think I will
have to remove some of their nettles; at least the ones around the
rhubarb. And my lawnmowing service (a sheep and her lamb) may be
trampling the grass some. 
Anne Kilmer
County Mayo
Ireland