Sept. 29,2019 - North Shore - Insects

One afternoon on our North Shore trip, we left our cabin to take a walk around the resort grounds. It was a sunny day and there were hundreds of dragonflies in the air catching tiny flying insects. I wanted to get a photo, but the dragonflies wouldn’t land—they just kept flying. Finally, I found this utility pole where a few of them landed. This is a Lake Darner, a large insect. It is just over three inches long and has a wingspan of almost 6 inches.

DragonflyDarnerLakeFenstad'sResortCounty20190919

Early one morning I was birding along the East General Grade Road and came across this dew-covered spider web. The dark shadows of the forest behind made it really stand out.

SpiderEastGeneralGradeRoadLakeCounty20190919

Then I walked around to the other side of the web, and the light background gave it a very different appearance.

SpiderEastGeneralGradeRoadLakeCounty20190919

Here’s another dew-covered web that was right outside our cabin window one morning. Notice the similarity between this web and the one in the previous two photos. There is a book that shows how to identify a spider by the kind of web it constructs. I’ll have to get a copy and see if I can match these webs to a species of spider.

SpiderFenstad'sResortLakeCounty20190916

There were still a few butterflies in the area. This is a Clouded Sulfur, and it’s on an Orange Hawkweed flower.

ButterflySulphurCloudedCollasphilodiceFenstad'sResortLakeCounty20190919

SulphurCloudedCollasphilodiceFenstad'sResortLittleMaraisLakeCounty20190914

I’m proud of this photo. It’s the first time I’ve been able to photograph a Monarch butterfly while it is flying. During our walk around the resort we saw several Monarchs, and this one flew directly overhead. I took a chance and ended up with a decent shot.

ButterflyMonarchFenstad'sResortLakeCounty20190919