A Long Hiatus

It’s been some time since a blog inclination has crossed my mind. I left for TN about 10 days ago and found that my daughter could give birth to a grandson faster than I could drive from Baltimore to TN. He timed his arrival on the one day when they would have to rely on friends rather than Nona to watch Elena and so they did.

Now ten days later, I am trying to remember what it is I said that I would write about when next I got a moment. I vaguely remember wanting to tell you one more thing about Australia; the way so many animals of one kind or another presented themselves, not with one here or there, but with hundreds and more. Parrots and bats in the Cairns and Sydney area but in the south, profusion showed up in insect form. Along the Great Ocean Road of Victoria where the main event is the sweeping ocean views,
the wild surf, and the towering cliffs eroded away from land, the famous 12 Apostles, I was stunned to find that almost anywhere we stopped the air was filled with dragonflies and butterflies. It was arresting. Not just a few, but literally thousands of each, flying against the ocean wind, hovering over the cliffs. Was this a usual phenomena or was it brought on by all the rain?

The butterflies were mostly cabbage white butterflies, which has to make you wonder, where were the cabbage and cauliflower plants growing in such profusion to feed the larvae to pupate into these hundreds and hundreds of butterflies?

Admittedly, I am no entomologist, and even Google isn’t helping much here. It does say the cabbage white was introduced from Europe to Melbourne in 1929 and has since become a pest. A lovely flit all about you pest, but if I were a gardener I suppose I would be shuddering rather than marveling. Surely, they must feed on something else that grows wild. Two wasp species have been introduced and are said to be controlling their numbers, but if this is what a controlled population looks like I can’t imagine when they were full blown!

The dragonflies, which again, without an insect guide handy when I had one literally in my hand, shall go unnamed. Mostly a dull brown, but they may have been the bonus of all that rain that flooded through Victoria, fresh water marshes springing up everywhere perhaps. They I believe are a welcome sight for they feed on the locust larvae so, for this, gardeners may be happy.

Well, some blog eh? One in which I have to admit to little knowledge, but just to share that the effect was memorable. An already breathtaking scene, than overlaid with flitting insects all around. Again spoiling me for seeing, as I have here in TN a cabbage white here or there. Perhaps I should get into the mindset of a cabbage farmer and be thankful they aren’t filling the air.